Kitabı oku: «A Mad Love», sayfa 20

CHAPTER LVI.
AN APPROACHING TEMPEST

The Countess of Lanswell was in despair. Any little social difficulty, the exposing of an adventuress, the setting aside of a marriage, intrigues, or a royal invitation, "dropping" people when it was convenient to do so, and courting them when she required them, to all and each of these deeds she was quite equal; but a serious case of cruel jealousy, a heart-broken, desolate wife on the one hand, an obstinate husband on the other, was past her power of management. Lady Chandos had written to ask her to come to Stoneland House that day.

"I have something of the greatest importance to say to you," she wrote. "Do not delay; to-morrow may be too late."

Lady Lanswell received this urgent note just as she was sipping her chocolate, luxuriously robed in a dressing-gown of silk and softest velvet, a pretty morning-cap of finest Mechlin lace on her head. Her handsome, haughty face grew pale as she read it.

"It is a wretched piece of business from beginning to end," she said to herself. "Now here is my peace of mind for the day gone. I was to have seen Madame Adelaide soon after noon about my dresses, and the dentist at three. I know absolutely nothing which I can say to a jealous wife, I know nothing of jealousy. Most of the wives whom I know are pleased rather than otherwise when their husbands are away from home. Marion takes things too seriously. I shall tell her so."

But any little speech of that kind she might have tried to make was forgotten when she caught the first glimpse of Lady Marion's white, tragic face.

"My dear child, what is the matter? What a face! why, you have been crying for hours, I am sure," said the countess. "Marion, you should not go on in this way, you will kill yourself."

"Lady Lanswell, I wish that I were dead; my husband has ceased to love me. Oh, God, let me die!" cried poor Lady Marion, and the countess was seriously alarmed.

"My dear child, pray be reasonable," she cried; "how can you say that Lance has ceased to love you?"

"It is true," said the unhappy wife; "he refused to give up Madame Vanira, and what seems to me more dreadful still, she is going to Berlin, and he insists on going also. I cannot bear it, Lady Lanswell!"

"We must reason with him," said the countess, grandly, and despite the tragedy of her sorrow, Lady Marion smiled.

"Reason with him? You might as well stand before a hard, white rock and ask roses to bloom on it; you might as well stand before the great heaving ocean and ask the tide not to roll in, as to try to reason with him. I do not understand it, but I am quite sure that he is infatuated by Madame Vanira; I could almost fancy that she had worked some spell over him. Why should he care for her? Why should he visit her? Why should he go to Berlin because she is there?"

The countess, listening, thanked Heaven that she did not know. If ever that secret became known, it was all over with the House of Lanswell.

"I have said all that I can say," she continued, rising in great agitation; "and it is of no use; he is utterly shameless."

"Hush, woman! I will not have you say such things of my son; he may like and admire Madame Vanira, but I trust him, and would trust him anywhere; you think too much of it, and you make more of it than you need. Let me pray of you to be prudent; want of prudence in a wife at such a juncture as this has very often occasioned misery for life. Are you quite sure that you cannot be generous enough to allow your husband the pleasure of this friendship, which I can certify is a good one?"

The countess sighed; the matter was indeed beyond her. In her artificial life, these bare, honest human passions had no place.

"Over the journey to Berlin," she said, "you are making too much of it. If he enjoys madame's society, and likes Berlin, where is the harm of his enjoying them together?"

So she spoke; but she shrunk from the clear gaze of those blue eyes.

"Lady Lanswell, you know all that is nonsense. My husband is mine, and I will not share his love or his affection with any one. Unless he gives up Madame Vanira, I shall leave him. If he goes to Berlin, I will never see him again."

"You are very foolish, my dear. I heard yesterday, on very good authority, that my son, Lord Chandos, will be offered the vacant Garter. I believe it is true, I feel sure of it. I would not for the world anything should happen now, any disgrace of any kind; and these matrimonial quarrels are disgraceful, Marion. You should trust your husband."

"I have done so, but he does not love me, Lady Lanswell; my mind is quite made up. If he goes to Berlin, I shall never see or speak to him again."

"But, my dearest Marion," cried the countess, "this is terrible. Think of appearances, think of the world – what will the world say? And yours was supposed to be a love-match. It must not be. Have you not the sense to see that such a course of proceeding would be simply to throw him into Madame Vanira's hands? You will be your own worst enemy if you do this!"

"I shall do what my own heart prompts," she said; "no matter what the world says; I care nothing for the world's opinion. Oh, Lady Lanswell, do not look so angry at me. I am miserable; my heart is broken!"

And the unhappy girl knelt at Lady Lanswell's feet, and laid her head on the silken folds of her dress.

If there was one creature in this world whom Lady Lanswell loved more than another, it was her son's wife, the fair, gentle girl who had been a most loving daughter to her; she could not endure the sight of her pain and distress.

"I have made up my mind," sobbed Lady Marion; "I shall appeal to the Duke of Lester; he will see that justice is done to me!"

"My dearest Marion, that is the very thing you must not do. If you appeal to the duke, it becomes at once a serious quarrel, and who shall say how such a quarrel may end? If you appeal to the duke, the whole thing will be known throughout the land; there is an end to all my hopes of the vacant Garter; in fact, I may say there is an end to the race of Lanswell. Think twice before you take such an important step!"

"No one thinks for me!" cried Lady Marion.

"Yes, I think of you and for you. Give me your promise that for a week at least you will say nothing to the Duke of Lester. Will you promise me that, Marion?"

"Yes," said Lady Chandos, wearily; "I promise you that, but not one day longer than a week; my heart is breaking! I cannot bear suspense!"

"I promise you that in a few days there shall be an end of all your trouble," said the countess, who had secretly made her own resolves. "Now, Marion, put your trust in me. You have had no breakfast this morning, I am sure."

Raising the delicate figure in her arms, the countess kissed the weeping face.

"Trust in me," she repeated; "all will be well. Let me see you take some coffee."

The countess rang and ordered some coffee; then, when she had compelled Lady Marion to drink it, she kissed her again.

"Do you know how it will end?" she said gently, "all this crying and fasting and sorrow? You will make yourself very ill, and then Lance will never forgive himself. Do be reasonable, Marion, and leave it all with me."

But after the countess had left her, Lady Marion still felt very ill; she had never felt so ill; she tried to walk from her dressing-room to her bedroom, and to the great alarm of her maid, she fell fainting to the ground.

The doctor came, the same physician who had attended her for some years since she was a child, and he looked very grave when he heard of the long deathlike swoon. He sat talking to her for some time.

"Do you think I am very ill, doctor?" she asked.

He answered:

"You are not very well, my dear Lady Chandos."

"Do you think I will die?"

"Not of this illness, please God," he said. "Now, if you will promise me not to be excited, I will tell you something," and, bending down, he whispered something in her ear.

A flood of light and rapture came in her face, her eyes filled with joy.

"Do you mean it? Is it really true?" she asked.

"Really true; but remember all depends on yourself;" and the doctor went away, leaving behind him a heart full of emotion, of pleasure, of pain, hope, and regret.

Meanwhile, the countess for the second time had sought her son. Her stern, grave face, her angry eyes, the repressed pride and emotion that he saw in every gesture, told him that the time for jesting or evasion had passed.

"Lance," said my lady, sternly, "you are a man now. I cannot command you as I did when you were a boy."

"No, mother; that is quite true. Apropos of what do you say that?"

"I am afraid the sin of your manhood will be greater than the follies of your youth," she said.

"It is just possible," he replied, indifferently.

"You have heard that you have been mentioned for the vacant Garter, and that it is highly probable you may receive it?"

"I have heard so," he answered, indifferently.

"I want to ask you a straightforward question. Do you think it worth your while to risk that, to risk the love and happiness of your wife, to risk your fair name, the name of your race, your position, and everything else that you ought to hold most dear? Do you think it worth while to risk all this for the sake of spending three months in Berlin, where you can see Madame Vanira every day?"

Lord Chandos looked straight in his mother's face.

"Since you ask me the question," he replied, "most decidedly I do."

My lady shrunk back as though she had received a blow.

"I am ashamed of you," she said.

"And I, mother, have been ashamed of my cowardice; but I am a coward no longer."

"Are tears and prayers of any avail?" asked Lady Lanswell; and the answer was:

"No."

Then my lady, driven to despair between her son and his wife, resolved some evening to seek the principal cause of the mischief – Madame Vanira herself.

CHAPTER LVII.
A PROUD WOMAN HUMBLED

The Countess of Lanswell had never in all her life been defeated before; now all was over, and she went home with a sense of defeat such as she had never known before. Her son refused not only to obey her, but to listen to her remonstrances; he would not take heed of her fears, and my lady saw nothing but social disgrace before them. Her own life had been so crowned with social triumphs and success she could not realize or understand anything else. The one grand desire of her heart since her son's marriage had been that he should become a Knight of the Order of the Garter, and now, by the recent death of a famous peer, the desire was on the eve of accomplishment; but if, on the very brink of success, it were known that he had left all his duties, his home, his wife, to dance attendance on a singer, even though she were the first singer in Europe, it would be fatal to him. It would spoil his career. My lady had carried herself proudly among the mothers of other sons; hers had been a success, while some others had proved, after all, dead failures; was she to own to herself at the end of a long campaign that she was defeated? Ah, no! Besides which there was the other side of the question – Lady Marion declared she would not see him or speak to him again if he went to Berlin, and my lady knew that she would keep her word. If Lord Chandos persisted in going to Berlin his wife would appeal to the duke, would in all probability insist on taking refuge in his house, then there would be a grand social scandal; the whole household would be disbanded. Lady Chandos, an injured, almost deserted wife, living with the duke and the duchess; Lord Chandos abroad laughed at everywhere as a dupe.

My lady writhed again in anguish as she thought of it. It must not be. She said to herself that it would turn her hair gray, that it would strike her with worse than paralysis. Surely her brilliant life was not to end in such a fiasco as this. For the first time for many years hot tears blinded those fine eyes that had hitherto looked with such careless scorn on the world.

My lady was dispirited; she knew her son well enough to know that another appeal to him would be useless; that the more she said to him on the subject the more obstinate he would be. A note from Lady Chandos completed her misery, and made her take a desperate resolve – a sad little note, that said:

"Dear Lady Lanswell, – If you can do anything to help me, let it be done soon. Lance has begun to-day his preparations for going to Berlin. I heard him giving instructions over his traveling trunk. We have no time to lose if anything can be done to save him."

"I must do it," said the countess, to herself, with desperation. "Appeal to my son is worse than useless. I must appeal to the woman I fear he loves. Who could have imagined or prophesied that I should ever have been compelled to stoop to her, yet stoop I must, if I would save my son!"

With Lady Lanswell, to resolve was to do; when others would have beaten about the bush she went direct.

On the afternoon of that day she made out Leone's address, and ordered the carriage. It was a sign of fear with her that she was so particular with her toilet; it was seldom that she relied, even in the least, on the advantages of dress, but to-day she made a toilet almost imperial in its magnificence – rich silk and velvet that swept the ground in superb folds, here and there gleaming a rich jewel.

The countess smiled as she surveyed herself in the mirror, a regal, beautiful lady. Surely no person sprung from Leone's class would dare to oppose her.

It was on a beautiful, bright afternoon that my lady reached the pretty house where Madame Vanira lived. A warm afternoon, when the birds sung in the green shade of the trees, when the bees made rich honey from the choice carnations, and the butterflies hovered round the budding lilies.

The countess drove straight to the house. She left her carriage at the outer gates, and walked through the pretty lawn; she gave her card to the servant and was shown into the drawing-room.

The Countess of Lanswell would not have owned for the world that she was in the least embarrassed, but the color varied in her face, and her lips trembled ever so little. In a few minutes Leone entered – not the terrified, lowly, loving girl, who braved her presence because she loved her husband so well; this was a proud, beautiful, regal woman, haughty as the countess herself – a woman who, by force of her wondrous beauty and wondrous voice, had placed the world at her feet.

The countess stepped forward with outstretched hands.

"Madame Vanira," she said, "will you spare me a few minutes? I wish to speak most particularly with you."

Leone rang the bell and gave orders that she was not to be disturbed. Then the two ladies looked at each other. Leone knew that hostilities were at hand, although she could not quite tell why.

The countess opened the battle by saying, boldly:

"I ought, perhaps, to tell you, Madame Vanira, that I recognize you."

Leone looked at her with proud unconcern.

"I recognize you now, although I failed to do so when I first saw you. I congratulate you most heartily on your success."

"On what success?" she asked.

"On your success as an actress and a singer. I consider you owe me some thanks."

"Truly," said Leone, "I owe you some thanks."

The countess did not quite like the tone of voice in which those words were uttered; but it was her policy to be amiable.

"Your genius has taken me by surprise," she said; "yet, when I recall the only interview I ever had with you, I recognize the dramatic talent you displayed."

"I should think the less you say of that interview, the better," said Leone; "it was not much to your ladyship's credit."

Lady Lanswell smiled.

"We will not speak of it," she said. "But you do not ask me to sit down. Madame Vanira, what a charming house you have here."

With grave courtesy Leone drew a chair near the window, and the countess sat down. She looked at the beautiful woman with a winning smile.

"Will you not be seated, madame?" she said. "I find it so much easier to talk when one is seated."

"How did you recognize me?" asked Leone, abruptly.

"I cannot say truthfully that I recognized your face," she said; "you will not mind my saying that if I had done so I would not have invited you to my house, neither should I have permitted my daughter-in-law to do so. It has placed us all in a false position. I knew you from something my son said about you. I guessed at once that you must be Leone Noel. I must repeat my congratulations; how hard you must have worked."

Her eyes wandered over the magnificent face and figure, over the faultless lines and graceful curves, over the artistic dress, and the beautiful, picturesque head.

"You have done well," said the countess. "Years ago you thought me hard, unfeeling, prejudiced, cruel, but it was kindness in the end. You have achieved for yourself fame, which no one could have won for you. Better to be as you are, queen of song, and so queen of half the world of fashion, than the wife of a man whose family and friends would never have received you, and who would soon have looked on you as an incumbrance."

"Pray pardon me, Lady Lanswell, if I say that I have no wish whatever to hear your views on the subject."

My lady's face flushed.

"I meant no offense," she said, "I merely wished to show you that I have not been so much your enemy as you perhaps have thought me," and by the sudden softening of my lady's face, and the sudden tremor of her voice, Leone knew that she had some favor to ask.

"I think," she said, after a pause, "that in all truth, Madame Vanira, you ought to be grateful to me. You would never have known the extent of your own genius and power if you had not gone on the stage."

"The happiness of the stage resembles the happiness of real life about as much as the tinsel crown of the mock queen resembles the regalia of the sovereign," replied Leone. "It would be far better if your ladyship would not mention the past."

"I only mention it because I wish you to see that I am not so much your enemy as you have thought me to be."

"Nothing can ever change my opinion on that point," said Leone.

"You think I was your enemy?" said the countess, blandly.

"The most cruel and the most relentless enemy any young girl could have," said Leone.

"I am sorry you think that," said my lady, kindly. "The more so as I find you so happy and so prosperous."

"You cannot answer for my happiness," said Leone, briefly.

"I acted for the best," said the countess, with more meekness than Leone had ever seen in her before.

"It was a miserable best," said Leone, her indignation fast rising, despite her self-control. "A wretched best, and the results have not been in any way so grand that you can boast of them."

"So far as you are concerned, Madame Vanira, I have nothing to repent of," said my lady.

Leone's dark eyes flashed fire.

"I am but one," she said, "your cruelty made two people miserable. What of your son? Have you made him so happy that you can come here and boast of what you have done?"

My lady's head fell on her breast. Ah, no, Heaven knew her son was not a happy man.

"Leone," she said, in a low, hurried voice, "it is of my son I wish to speak to you. It is for my son's sake I am here – it is because I believe you to be his true friend and a noble woman that I am here, Leone – it is the first time I have called you by your name – I humble myself to you – will you listen to me?"

CHAPTER LVIII.
"BEHOLD MY REVENGE!"

Even as she spoke the words Lady Lanswell's heart sunk within her. No softening came to the beautiful face, no tenderness, no kindliness; it seemed rather as though her last words had turned Leone to stone. She grew pale even to her lips, she folded her hands with a hard clasp, her beautiful figure grew more erect and dignified – the words dropped slowly, each one seeming to cut the air as it fell.

"You call me noble, Lady Lanswell! you, who did your best to sully my fair name; you call me your son's best friend, when you flung me aside from him as though I had been of no more worth than the dust underneath his feet!"

Lady Lanswell bent forward.

"Will you not forget that?" she said. "Let the past die. I will own now that I was harsh, unjust, even cruel to you; but I repent it – I have never said as much before – I repent it, and I apologize to you! Will you accept my apology?"

The effort was so great for a proud woman to make, that the countess seemed almost to struggle for breath as she said the words. Leone looked on in proud, angry scorn.

"You apologize, Lady Lanswell! You think that a few words can wash away the most cruel wrong one woman did to another? Do you know what you did? – you robbed me of my husband, of a man I loved as I shall love no other; you blighted my fair name. What was I when that marriage was set aside? You – you tortured me – you broke my heart, you slew all that was best in me, and now all these years afterward you come to me, and think to overwhelm me with faint, feeble words of apology. Why, if you gave me your heart's blood, your very soul, even, it would not atone me! I had but one life, and you have spoiled it! I had but one love, you trampled on it with wicked, relentless feet! Ah, why do I speak? Words are but sound. No, Lady Lanswell, I refuse your apology now or at any time! We are enemies, and shall remain so until we die!"

The countess shrunk from the passion of her indignant words.

"You are right in some measure," she said, sadly. "I was very hard, but it was for my son's sake! Ah, believe me, all for him."

"Your son," retorted Leone; "you make your son the excuse for your own vanity, pride, and ambition. What you did, Lady Lanswell, proved how little you loved your son; you parted us knowing that he loved me, knowing that his whole heart was bound up in me, knowing that he had but one wish, and it was to spend his whole life with me; you parted us knowing that he could never love another woman as he loved me, knowing that you were destroying his life, even as you have destroyed mine. Did love for your son actuate you then?"

"What I believed to be my love for my son and care for his interests alone guided me," said Lady Lanswell.

"Love for your son!" laughed Leone. "Have you ever read the story of the mother of the Maccabees, who held her twin sons to die rather than they live to deny the Christian faith? Have you read of the English mother who, when her fair-haired son grew pale at the sound of the first cannon, cried, 'Be brave, my son, death does not last one minute – glory is immortal.' I call such love as that the love of a mother for her son – the love that teaches a man to be true, if it cost his life; to be brave, if courage brings him death; to be loyal and noble. True motherly love shows itself in that fashion, Lady Lanswell."

The proud head of Lucia, Countess of Lanswell, drooped before this girl as it had never done before any power on earth.

"What has your love done for your son, Lady Lanswell?" she asked. "Shall I tell you? You made him a traitor, a coward, a liar – through your intrigues, he perjured himself. You made him disloyal and ignoble – you made him false. And yet you call that love! I would rather have the love of a pagan mother than such as yours.

"What have you done for him?" she continued, the fire of her passion rising – "what have you done for him? He is young and has a long life before him. Is he happy? Look at his face – look at his restless, weary eyes – listen to the forced bitter laugh! Is he happy, after all your false love has done for him? You have taken from him the woman he loves, and you have given him one for whom he cares so little he would leave her to-morrow! Have you done so well, Lady Lanswell for your son?"

"No, indeed I have not!" came with a great sigh from Lady Lanswell's lips. "Perhaps, if it were to be – but no, I will not say that. You have noble thoughts and noble ideas – tell me, Leone, will you help me?"

"Help you in what?" she asked, proudly.

The countess flung aside the laces and ribbons that seemed to stifle her.

"Help me over my son!" she cried; "be generous to me. Many people in my place would look on you as an enemy – I do not. If you have ever really loved my son you cannot be an enemy of mine. I appeal to the higher and nobler part of you. Some people would be afraid that you should triumph over them – I am not. I hold you for a generous foe."

"What appeal do you wish to make to me?" asked Leone, quite ignoring all the compliments which the countess paid her.

Lady Lanswell looked as she felt – embarrassed; it was one thing to carry this interview through in fancy, but still another when face to face with the foe, and that foe a beautiful, haughty woman, with right on her side. My lady was less at ease than she had ever been in her life before, her eyes fell, her lips trembled, her gemmed fingers played nervously with her laces and ribbons.

"That I should come to you at all, Leone, proves that I think you a noble woman," she said; "my trouble is great – the happiness of many lives lies in your hands."

"I do not understand how," said Leone.

"I will tell you," continued the countess. "You are going to Berlin, are you not?"

She saw a quiver of pain pass over the beautiful face as she asked the question.

"Yes," replied Leone; "I have an engagement there."

"And Lord Chandos, my son, has said something about going there, too?"

"Yes," replied Leone; "and I hope he will; he knows the city well, and I shall be glad to see a familiar face."

There was a minute's silence, during which Lady Lanswell brought all her wit and courage to bear on the situation. She continued:

"Lady Chandos does not wish my son to go to Berlin. I suppose it is no secret from you that she entirely disapproves of her husband's friendship with you?"

Leone bowed her proud, beautiful head.

"That is a matter of little moment to me," she said.

My lady's face flushed at the words.

"I may tell you," she went on, "that since Lady Chandos heard of this friendship, she has been very unhappy."

"No one cared when I was unhappy," said Leone; "no one pleaded for me."

"I do plead for Lady Marion," said the countess, "whatever you may think of me. She has done you no harm; why should you make mischief between her and her husband?"

"Why did you make mischief between me and mine?" retorted Leone; and my lady shrunk as she spoke.

"Listen to me, Leone," she said; "you must help me, you must be my friend. If my son goes to Berlin against his wife's prayers and wishes, she has declared that she will never speak to him or see him again."

"That cannot concern me," said Leone.

"For Heaven's sake listen, and do not speak to me so heartlessly. If he goes to Berlin, Lady Chandos will appeal to the Duke of Lester, who has just obtained for my son the greatest honor that can be conferred on an English gentleman – the Order of the Garter. In plain words, Leone, if my son follows you to Berlin, he will lose his wife, he will lose his good name, he will lose caste, his social position, his chance of courtly honors, the respect of his own class. He will be laughed at as a dupe, as a man who has given up all the honors of life to dance attendance on an actress; in short, if he goes either with you, or after you, to Berlin, he is, in every sense of the word, a ruined man!" and my lady's voice faltered as she said the words.

"Why not tell Lord Chandos all this himself, and see what he says?" asked Leone.

Perfect desperation brings about perfect frankness – my lady knew that it was quite useless to conceal anything.

"I have said all this and more to my son, but he will not even listen to me."

A scornful smile curved those lovely lips.

"He persists in going to Berlin, then?" said Leone, quietly.

"Yes," replied my lady, "he persists in it."

"Then why come to me? If your son persists in a certain course of action, why come to me?"

"Because you can influence him. I ask you to be noble beyond the nobility of women, I ask you to be generous beyond the generosity of women, I ask you to forget the past and forbid my son to follow you to Berlin. You know the end must be a bad one – forbid it. I ask you with the warmest of prayers and of tears!"

It was then that Leone rose in righteous wrath, in not indignation, in angry passion; rose and stood erect before the woman who had been her enemy.

"I refuse," she said. "Years ago I went to you a simple-hearted, loving girl, and I prayed you for Heaven's sake to have mercy on me. You received me with scorn and contumely; you insulted, outraged, tortured me; you laughed at my tears, you enjoyed my humiliation. I told you then that I would have my revenge, even should I lose everything on earth to obtain that revenge. Now it lays in my hands, and I grasp it – I glory in it. Your son shall follow me, shall lose wife, home, friends, position, fair name, as I lost all years ago at your bidding. Oh, cruel and wicked woman, behold my revenge! I repay you now. Oh, God," she continued, with a passionate cry, "I thank Thee that I hold my vengeance in my hand; I will slay and spare not!"

Then she stood silent for some minutes, exhausted by the passion of her own words.