Romance and Reality (Landon)/Chapter 33
CHAPTER IX.
"Nobody dies but somebody's glad of it."
Three Courses and a Dessert.
We differ from our ancestors in many things—in none more than in cases of sentiment. Formerly, it was your susceptible school-girl, "your novel-reading miss"—now, women only grow romantic after forty. Your young beauty calculates the chances of her Grecian nose, her fine eyes, and her exquisite complexion—your young heiress dwells on the claims of her rent-roll, or the probabilities of her funded property: it is their mothers who run away—their aunts who marry handsome young men without a shilling. Well, the prudence of youth is very like selfishness, and the romance of age very like folly.
Mrs. Arundel was arrived at the romantic age; and Emily, on her return from a fortnight's stay at Norville, was somewhat surprised to hear from her own lips that her marriage with Mr. Boyne Sillery was to take place immediately. So soon! and was this all? A few months, and her uncle's memory seemed to have utterly passed away. Alas! oblivion is our moral death, and forgetfulness is the second grave which closes over the dead. In the same spirit with which a drowning man catches at a straw, Emily hoped that perhaps Mrs. Clarke might be induced to listen to arguments against such indecorous haste, and that her influence might prevail on the impatient gentleman and yielding lady to let the twelve months pass—and then, thought Emily, "I shall be glad it is no worse."
This hope was not a very promising one; for she could scarcely flatter herself that her opinion would have much weight: she well knew Mrs. Clarke entertained a very mediocre estimate of her understanding; she had never asked her for a receipt, nor offered her a pattern,—those alphas and omegas with her female accomplishments. But, however deficient in these sciences of the spoon and the scissors, there was a sweetness, a gentleness about Emily which it was impossible to dislike; Mrs. Clarke, therefore, always spoke of her only pityingly. "Miss Arundel might have been made a great deal of, but she had been so badly brought up."
The morning was raw and comfortless, as if Winter, just awakened from his sleep by an east wind, had started up in that unamiable mood which is the mood of most when untimely disturbed in their slumbers; and March, which, the day before, had seemed softening into April, was again chilled into January. Emily's health and habits were equally delicate; and a wet, cold walk was to her sufficiently distasteful, without the visit at the end: however, she summoned her resolution and her cloak, and set forth. She walked up the neatest of gravel walks, edged by box, where there was not a leaf out of place, and a turf whose silken smoothness seemed unconscious of a tread; as Mrs. Clarke justly observed, "It was such a comfort to have no children to run over it." She paused on the cleanest of steps; a lad in pepper-and-salt livery opened the door; and she entered the hall and an atmosphere of most savoury soup, where she seemed likely to remain—for the boy stood debating between his right hand and his left, evidently quite undecided whether he was to show her to the drawing or dining-room. This mental debate was, however, decided by the appearance of his mistress, who had just taken a peep to see who her visitor was,—her morning costume rendering such a precaution very necessary.
"Bless me, Miss Emily, who would have thought of seeing you in the rain? Do come in. Doctor, go on with your soup, my dear—it will do you no good if you let it get cold. Do take off that wet cloak—are your feet damp? Don't mind the Doctor—he is only an old married man—and there is no fire in the drawing-room."
With a shiver at the thought of the cold blue best room, always in papers and brown holland, Emily took the offered seat by the fire, almost glad she was wet, as it delayed her explanation. But time has a most feminine faculty of opposition—always hurries if we hesitate—and the Doctor finished his soup, and went out to hear the complaint of a man who applied to the justice because his wife insisted on giving him mint tea for breakfast. Mrs. Clarke arrived at the end of her apologies for being caught such a figure—but she had been so busy the whole morning pickling walnuts;—and Emily, finding speak she must, in a few words explained the object of her visit, and entreated Mrs. Clarke to use her influence in persuading her aunt to delay the marriage.
"Delay is all I ask—she is her own mistress—and if she can reconcile to herself the prudence and propriety of such a step, let her marry, and I am sure I hope she will be happy; but do implore her, for the sake of my uncle's memory—for her own sake, not to use such disreputable haste. If there is no affection—and there can be none—let there be some decency observed."
Consternation and surprise had kept Mrs. Clarke silent; but at last she burst into a series of ejaculations—"Going to be married, and her husband not dead seven months?—Disgraceful! I thought what would come of leaving off her caps. And so you saw the white silk bonnet she means to be married in?—A fine price she has paid for it, I dare say. She never consulted me; but she is very much mistaken if she thinks Dr. Clarke will countenance such proceedings—he shall not marry them."
"If you did but know how grateful I shall be if you can but prevail!"
"Ah! Miss Emily, it is all your fault. If you had but married him yourself—I am sure I thought you would, when I asked him down— I had planned it all, I do assure you; you would have made such a nice couple."
Emily felt any thing but inclined to thank her for this arrangement; however, in spite of Mrs. Opie, it is not always proper to say all one thinks; so she only observed, "You must not blame me—it was my misfortune, not my fault."
"True, true. Poor dear! it was too bad of your aunt to take Francis from you, and so I shall tell her. Going to be married, indeed! and a widow only seven months! I wonder what will become of all her nice new mourning! What shameful waste!"
Before they parted, it was settled that Mrs. Clarke should call on Mrs. Arundel, and join her persuasions to those of Emily. Mr. Boyne Sillery had, excepting one short visit, been away for the last fortnight; and during his absence, she might probably be more open to conviction.
Emily returned home, and passed perhaps one of the most wretched days of her life. Great misfortunes have at least their dignity to support them; but the many and small miseries of life, how they do gall and wear away the spirit! The contrast with the elegance and cheerfulness of Norville Abbey, and the vivacity and kindness of Lady Mandeville, compared with the coldness, the talking-at-you style of conversation in which her aunt's dislike found its narrow and acrid channel, was too much to be borne. Strange, that one whose opinion we neither respect nor admit should yet have power to wound!—not stranger, though, than that it should have power to please. One may live to be indifferent to everything but opinion. We may reject friendship which has often deceived us; renounce love, whose belief once found false, leaves us atheists of the heart; we may turn from pleasures which have palled—from employments which have become wearisome: but the opinion of our kind, whether for good or for evil, still retains its hold; that once broken, every social and moral tie is broken too—the prisoner then may go to his solitary cell—the anchorite to his hermitage—the last link with life and society is rent in twain.
Emily was pained, more than she would have admitted, by the various signs of dress and decoration scattered around; but the worst was as yet unseen. Passing along the gallery, there was one door open—one door which she never saw without a shudder—one door which she had never entered—the one through which her uncle's coffin had been carried.
"No, no—impossible!" exclaimed she aloud. With an effort she entered the apartment, and saw that her glance through the open door was right. A great empty room, it had been so convenient for Mrs. Arundel's dresses, which were all laid out in different directions: a large glass, evidently used in trying them on, stood in the middle; and on the very bed where her uncle had died was spread out a crimson silk pelisse, and, on the pillow above, a blonde cap and flowers.
Emily's indignation was at first the uppermost, the only feeling. She hurried from the place; but her own chamber once gained, anger only gave bitterness to grief. She reproached herself for having forgotten her sorrow; every lighter thought that had crossed her mind—every hope in which she had indulged, seemed like a crime; and her aunt's unfeeling levity was forgotten in her own melancholy remembrances. All was, however, recalled by a message from Mrs. Clarke, who requested she would join her in the drawing-room.
Sick at heart, her eyes red with crying, Emily obeyed the summons, and heard the voices of both ladies considerably louder than should be permitted to any debate which is not to end in blows.
The first words she caught, on her entrance, were, "I'll tell you what, ma'am, if you will make such an old fool of yourself, Dr. Clarke shall have no hand in it; he won't marry you."
"Dr. Clarke may wait till I ask him; and I tell you, once for all, I will not be dictated to by any body;—clever as you think yourself, you shall not manage me. And pray, Miss Emily, what brings you here?"
"A wish, madam, to at least endeavour to save you from taking a step so inconsistent with the respect you owe my uncle's memory. Surely Mr. Sillery can wait till"
"Yes," interrupted Mrs. Clarke, "he can wait very well. He is not so old as to make a few months so precious."
Emily saw such an argument was not a very convincing one; and approaching Mrs. Arundel, urged, in the most conciliating tone, every consideration that was likely to either touch or soften her. "I only ask a few months of respect to the opinion of the world—to the memory of the dead. You say you find them solitary: I will not leave home again—nothing of attention on my part shall be wanting for your comfort; and if Mr. Sillery visits here, he shall meet at least with civility from me."
"And if you can take him from your silly old aunt, you have my full consent," cried Mrs. Clarke.
This was too much; and snatching her hand from Emily, Mrs. Arundel said, "Settle it all your own way;" and left the room, which shook with the door she slammed after her.
"She'll repent it, Miss Emily;—never mind, she'll repent it;" and with this consolatory prediction, Mrs. Clarke also departed.
Emily saw no more of her aunt that evening. She was told Mrs. Arundel was engaged with a gentleman. Who it was, her niece could easily guess; and, mortified and harassed, she retired early to her room. Her maid's face was evidently full of news, but Emily was in no mood to listen; and the girl was dismissed, as discontented as the possessor of untold information could well be.
Early the next morning she was awakened by the noise of wheels in the court-yard. Surprise at such an unusual sound made her unclose the window a little to discover whence it proceeded; and she was just in time to see Mr. Boyne Sillery hand her aunt into a carriage, jump in himself, when it drove off with a rapidity which scarcely allowed her to observe that a large imperial was on the top, and her aunt's servant, with a huge bandbox, on the dickey.
Emily rang her bell. It was answered by the housemaid, with a great white satin bow, by way of favour, in her cap.
"What carriage was that?"
"Lord, miss! don't you know that mistress is gone to be married this morning?"
"Married! Where?"
"Lord love you, miss! we did think you were to be bridemaid, till mistress told us not to call you."
"But where is Mrs. Arundel gone?"
This the girl did not know.
Emily soon learned that Mr. Boyne Sillery's late absence was in the way of business. He had been residing at the little town of C, and there her infatuated aunt was to be married. A lady's-maid from town, recommended by Mr. Sillery, had been her only confidante, as she was now her only companion.
Emily wandered up and down the house disconsolately. How large, how empty, how miserable, every thing looked! She thought of writing to Mr. Delawarr, who had been named as her guardian, to Norville Abbey; but her head swam round—she could not see the paper before her. The noise from the servants' hall was rendered more acutely painful by her headach; for her aunt, partly with a view of annoying her niece, whom she disliked—as we always dislike those we have used ill—had left orders for a general regale. Most of the establishment were new. Mr. Arundel had pensioned off his few more ancient domestics; and his wife was not one whose service was a heritage. There was hence little to restrain their mirth or their intemperance. Loud bursts of laughter sounded through the hall. Emily rose to ring the bell, but sank down quite insensible.
Something she remembered of partial revival, of motion in a carriage, of being conveyed to bed; but it was not till after some hours of stupor that she revived sufficiently to recognise her French bed at Norville Abbey, and Lady Mandeville bending anxiously over her pillow.
Ill news travel fast; and Mrs. Arundel's marriage was like the sun in the child's riddle, for it went "round each house, and round each house, and looked in at every window." Norville Abbey was soon enlightened, like the rest; and Lady Mandeville immediately set off to rescue her young friend from "the solitude which comes when the bride is gone forth." She had been more amused with the accounts of Mrs. Arundel's wedding than Emily might have quite liked; but her favourite's illness put mirth to flight. All Lady Mandeville's kindness and affection were called forth; and Emily might have said with another invalid, "It is worth while to be ill, to be so petted and nursed."