The Marriage of Elinor

CHAPTER XXVI

John left the Cottage next morning with the full conduct of the affairs of the family placed in his hands. The ladies were both a little doubtful if his plan was the best – they were still frightened for what might happen, and kept up a watch, as John perceived, fearing every step that approached, trembling at every shadow. They remembered many stories, such as rush to the minds of persons in trouble, of similar cases, of the machinations of the bad father whose only object was to overcome and break down his wife, and who stole his child away to let it languish and die. There are some circumstances in which people forget all the shades of character, and take it for granted that a man who can go wrong in one matter will act like a very demon in all. This was doubly strong in Mrs. Dennistoun, a woman full of toleration and experience; but the issues were so momentous to her, and the possible results so terrible, that she lost her accustomed good sense. It was more natural, perhaps, that Elinor, who was weak in health and still full of the arbitrariness of youth, should entertain this fear – without considering that Phil was the very last man in the world to burden himself with an infant of the most helpless age – which seemed to John an almost quite unreasonable one. Almost – for, of course, he too was compelled to allow, when driven into a corner, that there was nothing that an exasperated man might not do. Elinor had come down early to see her cousin before he left the house, bringing with her in her arms the little bundle of muslin and flannel upon the safety of which her very life seemed to depend. John looked at it, and at the small pink face and unconscious flickering hands that formed the small centre to all those wrappings, with a curious mixture of pity and repugnance. It was like any other blind new-born kitten or puppy, he thought, but not so amusing – no, it was not blind, to be sure. At one moment, without any warning, it suddenly opened a pair of eyes, which by a lively exercise of fancy might be supposed like Elinor's, and seemed to look him in the face, which startled him very much, with a curious notification of the fact that the thing was not a kitten or a puppy. But then a little quiver came over the small countenance, and the attendant said it was "the wind." Perhaps the opening of the eyes was the wind too, or some other automatic effect. He would not hold out his finger to be clasped tight by the little flickering fist, as Elinor would have had him. He would none of those follies; he turned away from it not to allow himself to be moved by the effect, quite a meretricious one, of the baby in the young mother's arms. That was all poetry, sentiment, the trick of the painter, who had found the combination beautiful. Such ideas belonged, indeed, to the conventional-sacred, and he had never felt any profane resistance of mind against the San Sisto picture or any of its kind. But Phil Compton's brat was a very different thing. What did it matter what became of it? If it were not for Elinor's perverse feeling on the subject, and that perfectly imbecile prostration of her mother, a sensible woman who ought to have known better, before the little creature, he would himself have been rather grateful to Phil Compton for taking it away. But when he saw the look of terror upon Elinor's face when an unexpected step came to the door, when he saw her turn and fly, wrapping the child in her arms, on her very heart as it seemed, bending over it, covering it so that it disappeared altogether in her embrace, John's heart was a little touched. It was only a hawking tramp with pins and needles, who came by mistake to the hall door, but her panic and anguish of alarm were a spectacle which he could not get out of his eyes.

"You see, she never feels safe for a moment. It will be hard to persuade her that that man, though I've seen him about the roads for years, is not an emissary – or a spy – to find out if she is here."

"I am sure it is quite an unnecessary panic," said John. "In the first place, Phil Compton's the last man to burden himself with a child; in the second, he's not a brute nor a monster."

"You called him a brute last night, John."

"I did not mean in that way. I don't mean to stand by any rash word that may be forced from me in a moment of irritation. Aunt, get her to give over that. She'll torture herself to death for nothing. He'll not try to take the child away – not just now, at all events, not while it is a mere – Bring her to her senses on that point. You surely can do that?"

"If I was quite sure of being in my own," Mrs. Dennistoun said, with a forlorn smile. "I am as much frightened as she is, John. And, remember, if there is anything to be done – anything – "

"There is nothing but a little common sense wanted," said John. But as he drove away from the door, and saw the hawker with the needles still about, the ladies had so infected him that it was all he could do to restrain an inclination to take the vagrant by the collar and throw him down the combe.

"Who's that fellow hanging about?" he said to Pearson, who was driving him; "and what does he want here?"

"Bless you, sir! that's Joe," Pearson said. "He's after no harm. He's honest enough as long as there ain't nothing much in his way; and he's waiting for the pieces as cook gives him once a week when he comes his rounds. There's no harm in poor Joe."

"I suppose not, since you say so," said John; "but you know the ladies are rather nervous, Pearson. You must keep a look-out that no suspicious-looking person hangs about the house."

"Bless us! Mr. John," said Pearson, "what are they nervous about? – the baby? But nobody wants to steal a baby, bless your soul!"

"I quite agree with you," said John, much relieved (though he considered Pearson an old fool, in a general way) to have his own opinion confirmed. "But, all the same, I wish you would be doubly particular not to admit anybody you don't know; and if any man should appear to bother them send for me on the moment. Do you hear?"

"What do you call any man, sir?" said Pearson, smartly. He had ideas of his own, though he might be a fool.

"I mean what I say," said John, more sharply still. "Any one that molests or alarms them. Send me off a telegram at once – 'You're wanted!' That will be quite enough. But don't go with it to the office yourself; send somebody – there's always your boy about the place – and keep about like a dragon yourself."

"I'll do my best, sir," said Pearson, "though I don't know what a dragon is, except it's the one in the Bible; and that's not a thing anybody would want about the place."

It was a comfort to John, after all his troubles, to be able to laugh, which he did with a heartiness which surprised Pearson, who was quite unaware that he had made any joke.

These fears, however, which were imposed upon him by the contagion of the terrors of the others, soon passed from John's mind. He was convinced that Phil Compton would take no such step; and that, however much he might wish his wife to return, the possession of the baby was not a thing which he would struggle over. It cannot be denied, however, that he was anxious, and eagerly inspected his letters in the morning, and looked out for telegrams during the day. Fortunately, however, no evil tidings came. Mrs. Dennistoun reported unbroken peace in the Cottage and increasing strength on the part of Elinor; and, in a parenthesis with a sort of apology, of the baby. Nobody had come near them to trouble them. Elinor had received no letters. The tie between her and her husband seemed to be cut as with a knife. "We cannot of course," she said, "expect this tranquillity to last."

And it came to be a very curious thought with John, as week after week passed, whether it was to last – whether Phil Compton, who had never been supposed wanting in courage, intended to let his wife and child drop off from him as if they had never been. This seemed a thing impossible to conceive: but John said to himself with much internal contempt that he knew nothing of the workings of the mind of such a man, and that it might for aught he knew be a common incident in life with the Phil Comptons thus to shake off their belongings when they got tired of them. The fool! the booby! to get tired of Elinor! That rumour which flies about the world so strangely and communicates information about everybody to the vacant ear, to be retailed to those whom it may concern, provided him, as the days went by, with many particulars which he had not been able to obtain from Elinor. Phil, it appeared, had gone to Glenorban – the great house to which he had been invited – alone, with an excuse for his wife, whose state of health was not appropriate to a large party, and had stayed there spending Christmas with a brilliant houseful of guests, among whom was the American lady who had captivated him. Phil had paid one visit to the lodge to see Elinor, by her mother's summons, at the crisis of her illness, but had not hesitated to go away again when informed that the crisis was over. Mrs. Dennistoun never told what had passed between them on that occasion, but the gossips of the club were credibly informed that she had bullied and stormed at Phil, after the fashion of mothers-in-law, till she had driven him away. Upon which he had returned to his party and flirted with Mrs. Harris more than ever. John discovered also that the party having dispersed some time ago, Phil had gone abroad. Whether in ignorance of his wife's flight or not he could not discover; but it was almost impossible to believe that he would have gone to Monte Carlo without finding out something about Elinor – how and where she was. But whether this was the cause of his utter silence, or whether it was the habit of men of his class to treat such tremendous incidents in domestic life with levity, John Tatham could not make out. He was congratulating himself, however, upon keeping perfectly quiet, and leaving the conduct of the matter to the other party, when the silence was disturbed in what seemed to him the most curious way.

One afternoon when he returned from the court he was aware, when he entered the outer office in which his clerk abode, of what he described afterwards as a smell fit to knock you down. It would have been described more appropriately in a French novel as the special perfume, subtle and exquisite, by which a beautiful woman may be recognised wherever she goes. It was, indeed, neither more nor less than the particular scent used by Lady Mariamne, who came forward with a sweep and rustle of her draperies, and the most ingratiating of her smiles.

"It appears to be fated that I am to wait for you," she said. "How do you do, Mr. Tatham? Take me out of this horrible dirty place. I am quite sure you have some nice rooms in there." She pointed as she spoke to the inner door, and moved towards it with the air of a person who knew where she was going, and was fully purposed to be admitted. John said afterwards, that to think of this woman's abominable scent being left in his room in which he lived (though he also received his clients in it) was almost more than he could bear. But, in the meantime, he could do nothing but open the door to her, and offer her his most comfortable chair.

She seated herself with all those little tricks of movement which are also part of the stock-in-trade of the pretty woman. Lady Mariamne's prettiness was not of a kind which had the slightest effect upon John, but still it was a kind which received credit in society, being the product of a great deal of pains and care and exquisite arrangement and combination. She threw her fur cloak back a little, arranged the strings of her bonnet under her chin, which threw up the daintiness and rosiness of a complexion about which there were many questions among her closest friends. She shook up, with what had often been commented upon as the prettiest gesture, the bracelets from her wrists. She arranged the veil, which just came over the tip of her delicate nose, she put out her foot as if searching for a footstool – which John made haste to supply, though he remained unaffected otherwise by all these pretty preliminaries.

"Sit down, Mr. Tatham," then said Lady Mariamne. "It makes me wretchedly uncomfortable, as if you were some dreadful man waiting to be paid or something, to see you standing there."

Though John's first impulse was that of wrath to be thus requested to sit down in his own chambers, the position was amusing as well as disagreeable, and he laughed and drew a chair towards his writing-table, which was as crowded and untidy as the writing-table of a busy man usually is, and placed himself in an attitude of attention, though without asking any question.

"Well," said Lady Mariamne, slowly drawing off her glove; "you know, of course, why I have come, Mr. Tatham – to talk over with you, as a man who knows the world, this deplorable business. You see it has come about exactly as I said. I knew what would happen: and though I am not one of those people who always insist upon being proved right, you remember what I said – "

"I remember that you said something – to which, perhaps, had I thought I should have been called upon to give evidence as to its correctness – I should have paid more attention, Lady Mariamne."

"How rude you are!" she said, with her whole interest concentrated upon the slow removal of her glove. Then she smoothed a little, softly, the pretty hand which was thus uncovered, and said, "How red one's hands get in this weather," and then laughed. "You don't mean to tell me, Mr. Tatham," she said, suddenly raising her eyes to his, "that, considering what a very particular person we were discussing, you can't remember what I said?"

John was obliged to confess that he remembered more or less the gist of her discourse, and Lady Mariamne nodded her head many times in acceptance of his confession.

"Well," she said, "you see what it has come to. An open scandal, a separation, and everything broken up. For one thing, I knew if she did not give him his head a little that's what would happen. I don't believe he cares a brass farthing for that other woman. She makes fun of everybody, and that amused him. And it amused him to put Nell in a state – that as much as anything. Why couldn't she see that and learn to prendre son parti like other people? She was free to say, 'You go your way and I'll go mine:' the most of us do that sooner or later: but to make a vulgar open rupture, and go off – like this."

"I fail to see the vulgarity in it," said John.

"Oh, of course; everything she does is perfect to you. But just think, if it had been your own case – followed about and bullied by a jealous woman, in a state of health that of itself disgusts a man – "

"Lady Mariamne, you must pardon me if I refuse to listen to anything more of this kind," said John, starting to his feet.

"Oh, I warn you, you'll be compelled to listen to a great deal more if you're her agent as I hear! Phil will find means of compelling you to hear if you don't like to take your information from me."

"I should like to know how Mr. Phil Compton will succeed in compelling me – to anything I don't choose to do."

"You think, perhaps, because there's no duelling in this country he can't do anything. But there is, all the same. He would shame you into it – he could say you were – sheltering yourself – "

"I am not a man to fight duels," said John, very angry, but smiling, "in any circumstances, even were such a thing not utterly ridiculous; but even a fighting man might feel that to put himself on a level with the dis-Hon – "

He stopped himself as he said it. How mean it was – to a woman! – descending to their own methods. But Lady Mariamne was too quick for him.

"Oh," she said; "so you've heard of that, a nickname that no gentleman – " then she too paused and looked at him, with a momentary flush. He was going to apologize abjectly, when with a slight laugh she turned the subject aside.

"Pretty fools we are, both of us, to talk such nonsense. I didn't come here carrying Phil on my shoulders, to spring at your throat if you expressed your opinion. Look here – tell me, don't let us go beating about the bush, Mr. Tatham – I suppose you have seen Nell?"

"I know my cousin's mind, at least," he said.

"Well, then, just tell me as between friends – there's no need we should quarrel because they have done so. Tell me this, is she going to get up a divorce case – "

"A divorce – !"

"Because," said Lady Mariamne, "she'll find it precious difficult to prove anything. I know she will. She may prove the flirting and so forth – but what's that? You can tell her from me, it wants somebody far better up to things than she is to prove anything. I warn her as a friend she'll not get much good by that move."

"I am not aware," said John, "whether Mrs. Compton has made up her mind about the further steps – "

"Then just you advise her not," cried Lady Mariamne. "It doesn't matter to me: I shall be none the worse whatever she does: but if you are her true friend you will advise her not. She might tell what she thinks, but that's no proof. Mr. Tatham, I know you have great influence with Nell."

"Not in a matter like this," said John, with great gravity. "Of course she alone can be the judge."

"What nonsense you talk, you men! Of course she is not the least the judge, and of course she will be guided by you."

"You may be sure she shall have the best advice that I can give," John said with a bow.

"You want me to go, I see," said Lady Mariamne; "you are dreadfully rude, standing up all the time to show me I had better go." Hereupon she recommenced her little manège, drawing on her glove, letting her bracelets drop again, fastening the fur round her throat. "Well, Mr. Tatham," she said, "I hope you mean to have the civility to see after my carriage. I can't go roaming about hailing it as if it were a hansom cab – in this queer place."

CHAPTER XXVII

John went down to Windyhill that evening. His appearance alarmed the little household more than words could say. As he was admitted at once by the servants, delighted to see him, he walked in suddenly into the midst of a truly domestic scene. The baby lay on Elinor's knee in the midst of a mass of white wrappings, kicking out a pair of pink little legs in the front of the fire. Elinor herself was seated on a very low chair, and illuminated by the cheerful blaze, which threw a glare upon her countenance, and called out unthought-of lights in her hair, there was no appearance in her looks of anxiety or trouble. She was altogether given up to the baby and the joy of its new life. The little kicking limbs, the pleasure of the little creature in the warmth, the curling of its rosy little toes in the agreeable sensation of the heat, were more to Elinor and to her mother, who was kneeling beside her on the hearth-rug, than the most refined and lofty pleasures in the world. The most lofty of us have to come down to those primitive sources of bliss, if we are happy enough to have them placed in our way. The greatest poet by her side, the music of the spheres sounding in her ear, would not have made Elinor forget her troubles like the stretching out towards the fire of those little pink toes.

When the door opened, and the voice and step of a man – dreaded sounds – were audible, a thrill of terror ran over this little group. Mrs. Dennistoun sprang to her feet and placed herself between the intruder and the young mother, while Elinor gathered up, covering him all over, so that he disappeared altogether, her child in her arms.

"It is John," said Mrs. Dennistoun. "God be thanked, it is only John."

But Elinor, quite overcome by the shock, burst suddenly into tears, to which the baby responded by a vigorous cry, not at all relishing the sudden huddling up among its shawls to which it had been subjected. It may be supposed what an effect this cloudy side of the happiness, which he had not been able to deny to himself made a very pretty scene, had upon John. He said, not without a little offence, "I am sure I beg your pardon humbly. I'll go away."

Elinor turned round her head, smiling through her tears. "It was only that you gave me a fright," she said. "I am quite right again; don't, oh, don't go away! unless you object to the sight of baby, and to hear him cry; but he'll not cry now, any more than his silly mother. Mamma, make John sit down and tell us – Oh, I am sure he has something to tell us – Perhaps I took comfort too soon; but the very sight of John is a protection and a strength," she said, holding out her hand to him. This sudden change of front reduced John, who had been perhaps disposed for a moment to stand on his dignity, to utter subjection. He neither said nor even thought a word against the baby, who was presently unfolded again, and turned once more the toes of comfort towards the fire. He did not approach too near, feeling that he had no particular share in the scene, and indeed cut an almost absurd figure in the midst of that group, but sat behind, contemplating it from a little distance against the fire. The evening had grown dark by this time, but the two women, absorbed by their worship, had wanted no light. It had happened to John by an extreme piece of luck to catch the express train almost as soon as Lady Mariamne had left him, and to reach the station at Hurrymere before the February day was done.

"You have something to tell us, John – good news or bad?" Mrs. Dennistoun said.

"Good; or I should not have come like this unannounced," he said. "The post is quick enough for bad. I think you may be quite at your ease about the child – no claim will be made on the child. Elinor, I think, will not be disturbed if – she means to take no steps on her side."

"What steps?" said Mrs. Dennistoun. Elinor turned her head to look at him anxiously over the back of her chair.

"I have had a visit this afternoon," he said.

"From – " Elinor drew a long hurried breath. She said no name, but it was evident that one was on her lips – a name she never meant to pronounce more, but to which her whole being thrilled still even when it was unspoken. She looked at him full of eagerness to hear yet with a hand uplifted, as if to forbid any utterance.

"From Lady Mariamne."

How her countenance fell! She turned round again, and bent over her baby. It was a pang of acute disappointment, he could not but see, that went through her, though she would not have allowed him to say that name. Strange inconsistency! it ran over John too with a sense of keen indignation, as if he had taken from her an electric touch.

" – Whose object in coming to me was to ascertain whether you intended to bring a suit for – divorce."

A cry rang through the room. Elinor turned upon him for a moment a face blazing with hot and painful colour. The lamp had been brought in, and he saw the fierce blush and look of horror. Then she turned round and buried it in her hands.

"Divorce!" said Mrs. Dennistoun. "Elinor – ! To drag her private affairs before the world. Oh, John, John, that could not be. You would not wish that to be."

"I!" he cried with a laugh of tuneless mirth. "Is it likely that I would wish to drag Elinor before the world?"

Elinor did not say anything, but withdrew one hand from her burning cheek and put it into his. These women treated John as if he were a man of wood. What he might be feeling, or if he were feeling anything, did not enter their minds.

"It was like her," said Elinor after a time in a low hurried voice, "to think of that. She is the only one who would think of it. As if I had ever thought or dreamed – "

"It is possible, however," he said, "that it might be reasonable enough. I don't speak to Elinor," who had let go his hand hastily, "but to you, aunt. If it is altogether final, as she says, to be released would perhaps be better, from a bond that was no bond."

"John, John, would you have her add shame to pain?"

"The shame would not be to her, aunt."

"The shame is to every one concerned – to every one! My Elinor's name, her dear name, dragged through all that mud! She a party, perhaps, to revelations – Oh, never, never! We would bear anything rather."

"This of course," said John, "is perhaps a still more bitter punishment for the other side."

She looked round at him again. Looking up with a look of pale horror, her eyelids in agonised curves over her eyes, her mouth quivering. "What did you say, John?"

"I said it might be a more bitter punishment still for – the other side."

Elinor lifted up her baby to her breast, raising herself with a new dignity, with her head high. "I meant no punishment," she said, "I want none. I have left – what killed me – behind me; many things, not one only. I have brought my boy away that he may never – never – But if it would be better that – another should be free – "

"I will never give my consent to it, Elinor."

"Nor I with my own mind; but if it is vindictive – if it is revenge, mother! I am not alone to think of myself. If it were better for – that he should be free; speak to John about it and tell me. I cannot, cannot discuss it. I will leave it all to John and you. It will kill me! but what does that matter? – it is not revenge that I seek."

She turned with the baby pressed to her breast and walked away, her every movement showing the strain and excitement of her soul.

"Why did you do this, John, without at least consulting me? You have thrown a new trouble into her mind. She will never, never do this thing – nor would I permit it. There are some things in which I must take a part. I could not forbid her marriage; God grant that I had had the strength to do it – but this I will forbid, to expose her to the whole world, when everything we have done has been with the idea of concealing what had happened. Never, never. I will never consent to it, John."

"I had no intention of proposing such a step; but the other side – as we are bound to call him – are frightened about it. And when I saw her look up, so young still, so sweet, with all her life before her, and thought how she must spend it – alone; with no expanding, no development, in this cottage or somewhere else, a life shipwrecked, a being so capable, so full of possibilities – lost."

"I have spent my life in this cottage," said Mrs. Dennistoun. "My husband died when I was thirty – my life was over, and still I was young; but I had Elinor. There were some who pitied me too, but their pity was uncalled for. Elinor will live like her mother, she has her boy."

"But it is different; you cannot but see the difference."

"Yes, I see it – it is different; but not so different that my Elinor's name should be placarded about the streets and put in all the newspapers. Oh, never, never, John. If the man suffers, it is his fault. She will suffer, and it is not her fault; but I will not, to release him, drag my child before the world."

Mrs. Dennistoun was so much excited that she began to pace about the room, she who was usually so sober and self restrained. She had borne much, but this she was unable even to contemplate with calm. For once in her life she had arrived at something which she would not bear. John felt his own position very strange sitting looking on as a spectator, while this woman, usually so self-controlled, showed her impatience of circumstances and fate. It was ruefully comic that this should be, so to speak, his doing, though he was the last in the world to desire any exposure of Elinor, or to have any sympathy with those who sought justice for themselves or revenge on others at such a cost.

"I was rash perhaps to speak as I did," he said; "I had no intention of doing it when I came. It was a mere impulse, seeing Elinor: but you must know that I agree with you perfectly. I see that Elinor's lot is fixed anyhow. I believe that no decree of a court would make any difference to her, and she would not change the name that is the child's name. All that I recognise. And one thing more, that neither you nor Elinor has recognised. They – he is afraid of any proceedings – I suppose I may mention him to you. It's rather absurd, don't you think, speaking of a fellow of that sort, or rather, not speaking of him at all, as if his name was sacred? He is afraid of proceedings – whatever may be the cause."

"John, can't you understand that she cannot bear to speak of him, a man she so fought for, against us all? And now her eyes are opened, she is undeceived, she knows him all through and through, more, far more, than we do. She opened her mind to me once, and only once. It was not that alone; oh, no, no. There are things that rankle more than that, something he did before they were married, and made her help him to conceal. Something dishon – I can't say the word, John."

"Oh," said John, grimly, "you need not mind me."

"Well, the woman – I blush to have to speak to you even of such a thing – the woman, John, was not the worst. She almost might, I think, have forgiven that. It was one thing after another, and that, that first business the worst of all. She found it out somehow, and he had made her take a part – I can't tell what. She would never open her lips on the subject again. Only that once it all burst forth. Oh, divorce! What would that do to her, besides the shame? You understand some things, John," said Mrs. Dennistoun, with a smile, "though you are a man. She would never do anything to give herself a name different from her child's."

"Yes," said John, with a laugh, "I think I understand a thing or two, though, as you say, my dear aunt, I am only a man. However, it is just as well I am that imperfect creature, to take care of you. It understands the tactics of the wicked better than you do. And now you must persuade Elinor and persuade yourself of what I came here on purpose to tell you – not to disturb you, as I have been so unfortunate as to do. You are perfectly safe from him. I will not let the enemy know your sentiments, or how decided you are on the subject. I will perhaps, if you will let me, crack the whip a little over their heads, and keep them in a pleasing uncertainty. But as long as he is afraid that she will take proceedings against him, he will take none, you may be sure, against her. So you may throw aside all your precautions and be happy over your treasure in your own way."