Saturday morning, the day after that on which Joyce had sent off the eventful letter to Marian. Twelve o'clock, and no appearance as yet of Lady Caroline Mansergh, who had sent word that she had a slight headache, and would take her breakfast in her room. Lady Hetherington hated people having breakfast in their rooms: it did not, of course, inconvenience her in the least; she herself was never particularly lively in the morning, and spoke very little, and disliked being spoken to, so that it was not the loss of companionship that she regretted; it was merely what people called a "fad" of hers, that the household generally should assemble at the breakfast-table, and she was annoyed when anything occurred to prevent it.
Her ladyship was generally out of temper that morning, several things having conspired to disturb her equanimity. They were about to move the establishment to London, which was always a sore trial for her at the best of times; but now that they were going up before Easter, it was specially hard to bear. She had told Lord Hetherington, as she pathetically narrated both orally and by letter to all her friends, that it was useless their going to Hetherington House at that time of the year, when they would find no one in town but members' wives who had come up for the session, and the wretched people who live there all their lives; there wouldn't be a soul they knew, and the draughts at Hetherington House were perfectly awful; and yet Lord Hetherington would go. She could not imagine what had come to him. The last morning's post had brought her a letter from her milliner, asking for money; and even the greatest ladies sometimes not merely dislike being asked for money, but have difficulty in finding it; and the countess's stock of ready cash happened to be very low at that moment. And the new housekeeper who had come from Lady Rundell Glasse's, and who was so highly recommended, had turned out a complete failure, and must be got rid of before they go to town; and old Mrs. Mason, the town housekeeper, must be telegraphed to to look out for some one else; and altogether her ladyship was thoroughly upset, and, wanting some one to vent her ill-humour on, and having lost her judgment as well as her temper, thought she would find that some one in Lady Caroline. So, when twelve o'clock arrived, and her sister-in-law had not put in an appearance, the countess went to her room, entered upon her knock, and found Lady Caroline buried in a huge chair in front of the fire reading a book, while her maid was combing her hair. There was scarcely anything which Lady Caroline liked better than having her hair combed--not dressed, that she hated--but quietly combed and brushed alternately. She almost purred under the sensation, like a cat whose fur is smoothed the right way; it was pleasant, it was refreshing, it soothed her, and put her on good terms with the world; so that when she looked up and saw Lady Hetherington, to whom she was not very partial, she received her with a smile, and expressed her delight at the visit.
"It is really immensely good of you to come and see me, Margaret, especially when I know you're not fond of taking trouble in a general way," she said, putting her book on to her lap and looking up languidly.
"They told me you were ill, or I don't know that I should have come," retorted Lady Hetherington with some asperity.
"Ah, that was quite right of them; I told them to say that.--You can go, Phillips"--to the maid--"I'll ring when I want you.--I don't suppose there's any harm in sending mendacious messages by the servants; do you? It would be far more demoralising to them if one were to tell the truth and say one was lazy, and that kind of thing, because it would provoke their contempt instead of their pity, and fill them with horrible revolutionary ideas that there was no reason why they shouldn't be lazy as well as we, and all sorts of dreadful things."
"If I had thought it was mere laziness that kept you to your room this morning, Caroline, I think my dislike 'of taking trouble in a general way' would have influenced me in this particular instance, and saved you the bore of my interrupting you."
"That's where you're so ungenerous, Margaret. Not the smallest bore in the world; the stupidity of this book, and Phillips's action with the hair-brush combined, were sending me off to sleep, and you interfered at an opportune moment to rescue me. How is West this morning?"
"Very much as he was last night. Intent on distinguishing himself on this--what do you call it?--irrigation scheme."
"Oh dear, still harping on those channels and pipes, and all the rest of it! Poor Mr. Joyce! there is plenty of work in store for him, poor fellow."
"Dreadful, will it not be, for that charming young man to be compelled to work to earn his wages?" said Lady Hetherington with a sneer.
Lady Caroline looked up, half astonished, half defiant. "Salary, not wages, Margaret," she said, after a moment's pause.
"Salary, then," said her ladyship shortly; "it's all the same thing."
"No, dear, it isn't. Salary isn't wages; just as the pin-money which West allows you isn't hire. You see the difference, dear?"
"I see that you're making a perfect fool of yourself with regard to this man!" exclaimed Lady Hetherington, thoroughly roused.
"What man?" asked Lady Caroline in all apparent simplicity.
"What man? Why, this Mr. Joyce! And I think, Caroline, that if you choose to forget your own position, you ought to think of us, and have some little regard for decency; at all events, so long as you're staying in our house!"
"All right, dear," said Lady Caroline with perfect coolness. "I'm sorry that my conduct gives you offence, but the remedy is easy. I'll tell West how you feel about it at luncheon, and I'll leave your house before dinner!"
A home-thrust, as Lady Caroline well knew. The only time that Lord Hetherington during his life had managed to pluck up a spirit was on the occasion of some real or fancied slight offered by his wife to his sister. Tail-lashings and roarings, and a display of fangs are expected from the tiger, if, as the poet finely puts it, "it is his nature to." But when the mild and inoffensive sheep paws the ground, and makes ready for an onslaught with his head, it is the more terrible because it is so unexpected. Lord Hetherington's assertion of his dignity and his rights on the one occasion in question was so tremendous that her ladyship never forgot it, and she was extremely unwilling to go through such another scene. So her manner was considerably modified, and her voice considerably lowered in tone as she said----
"No, but really, Caroline, you provoke me into saying things which you know I don't mean. You are so thoughtless and headstrong----"
"I never was cooler or calmer in my life! You complain of my conduct in your house. It would be utterly beneath me to defend that conduct, it requires no defence, so I take the only alternative left, and quit your house."
"No; but, Caroline, can't you see----"
"I can see this, Lady Hetherington, and I shall mention it once for all. You have never treated that gentleman, Mr. Joyce, as he ought to be treated. He is a gentleman, in mind and thought and education, and he comes here and does for poor dear stupid West what West is totally unable to do himself, and yet is most anxious to have the credit of. The position which Mr. Joyce holds is a most delicate one, one which he fills most delicately, but one which any man with a less acute sense of honour and right might use to his own advantage, and to bring ridicule on his employer. Don't fancy I'm hard on dear old West in saying this; if he's your husband he's my brother, and you can't be more jealous of his name than I am. But it's best to be plainspoken about the matter now, it may save some serious difficulties hereafter. And how do you treat this gentleman? Until I spoke to you some months since you ignored his presence; although he was domesticated in your house you scarcely knew his personal appearance. Since then you bow, and give him an occasional word, but you're not half so polite to him as you are to the quadrille-bandsman when he is in much request, or to the Bond Street librarian when stalls for some particular performance are scarce. I am different; I am sick to death of 'us' and our 'set,' and our insipid fade ways, and our frightful conventionality and awful dulness! Our men are even more odious than our women, and that's saying a good deal; their conversation varies between insolence and inanity, and as they dare not talk the first to me, they're compelled to fall back on the second. When I meet this gentleman, I find him perfectly well-bred, perfectly at his ease, with a modest assurance which is totally different from the billiard-table swagger of the men of the day; perfectly respectful, full of talk on interesting topics, never for an instant pressing himself unduly forward, or forgetting that he is what he is--a gentleman! I find a charm in his society; I acknowledge it; I have never sought to disguise it. The fact that he saved my life at the hazard of his own does not tend to depreciate him in my eyes. And then, because I like him and have the honesty to say so, I am bid to 'think of' my relations, and 'have regard for decency!' A little too much, upon my word!"
People used to admire Lady Caroline's flashing eyes, but her sister-in-law had never seen them flash so brilliantly before, nor had her voice, even when singing its best, ever rung so keenly clear. For once in her life, Lady Hetherington was completely put down and extinguished; she muttered something about "not having meant anything," as she made her way to the door, and immediately afterwards she disappeared.
"That woman is quite too rude!" said Lady Caroline to herself, ringing the bell as soon as the door closed behind her sister-in-law. "If she thinks to try her tempers on me, she will find herself horribly mistaken. One sufferer is quite enough in a family, and poor West must have the entire monopoly of my lady's airs!--Now, Phillips, please to go on brushing my hair!"
Meantime, the cause of all this commotion and outbreak between these two ladies, Walter Joyce, utterly unconscious of the excitement he was creating, was pursuing the even tenor of his way as calmly as the novel circumstances of his position would admit. Of course, with the chance of an entire change in his life hanging over him--a change involving marriage, residence in a foreign country, and an occupation which was almost entirely strange to him--it was not possible for him to apply his mind unreservedly to the work before him. Marian's face would keep floating before him instead of the lovely countenance of Eleanor de Sackville, erst maid of honour to Queen Elizabeth, who had this in common with Marmion's friend, Lady Heron, that fame "whispered light tales" of her. Instead of Westhope, as it was in the old days, with its fosse, drawbridge, portcullis, ramparts, and all the mediaevalisms which it is in duty bound to have, Walter's fancy was endeavouring to realise to itself the modern city of Berlin, on the river Spree, while his brain was busied in conjecturing the nature of his forthcoming duties, and in wondering whether he possessed the requisite ability for executing them. Yes! he could get through them, and not merely that, but do them well, do anything well with Marian by his side. Brightened in every possible way by the prospect before him, better even in health and certainly in spirits, he looked back with wonder on his past few months' career; he could not understand how he had been so calm, so unexpectant, so unimpassioned. He could not understand how the only real hopes and fears of his life, those with which Marian was connected, had fallen into a kind of quiescent state, which he had borne with and accepted. He could not understand that now, when the hopes had been aroused and sent springing within him, and the fears had been banished, at least for a while. For a while?--for ever! The mere existence of any fear was an injustice to Marian. She had been true and steadfast, and good and loving. She had proved it nobly enough. The one weakness which formed part of her character, an inability to contend with poverty--a venial failing enough, Walter Joyce thought, especially in a girl who must have known, more particularly in one notable instance, the sad results of the want of means--would never now be tried. There would be no need for her to struggle, no necessity for pinching and screwing. Accustomed since his childhood to live on the poorest pittance, Joyce looked at the salary now offered to him as real wealth, position-giving, and commanding all comforts, if not luxuries. The thought of this, and the knowledge that she would be able to take her mother with her to share her new home, would give Marian the greatest pleasure. He pictured her in that new home, bright, sunny, and cheerful; the look of care and anxiety, the two deep brow-lines which her face had worn during the last year of their residence at............