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CHAPTER VII
"NOT THE GODS CAN SHAKE THE PAST."
There was a sad silent week of waiting before the bride set forth upon her bridal tour, robed in deepest mourning. For six days the windows of Mount Royal were darkened, and Leonard and his newly wedded wife kept within the shadow of that house of death, almost as strictly as if they had been Jewish mourners, bound by ancient ceremonial laws, whereof the close observance is a kind of patriotism among a people who have no fatherland. All the hot-houses at Mount Royal gave out their treasures – white hyacinths, and rose-flushed cyclamen, gardenia, waxen camellias, faint Dijon roses – for the adornment of the death chamber. The corridor outside that darkened room had an odour of hot-house flowers. The house, folded in silence and darkness, felt like some splendid sepulchre. Leonard was deeply depressed by his mother's death; more shocked by its suddenness, by this discordant note in his triumphant marriage song, than by the actual fact; this loss having been long discounted in his own mind among the evils of the future.
Christabel's grief was terrible, albeit she had lived for the last year in constant fear of this affliction. Its bitterness was in no wise lessened because it had been long expected. Never even in her saddest moments had she realized the agony of that parting, the cold dull sense of loneliness, of dismal abandonment, in a loveless, joyless, world, when that one beloved friend was taken from her. Leonard tried his best to console her, putting aside his own sorrow, in the endeavour to comfort his bride; but his efforts at consolation were not happy, for the most part taking the form of philosophical truisms which may be very good in an almanack, or as padding for a country newspaper, but which sound dull and meaningless to the ear of the mourner who says in his heart there was never any sorrow like unto my sorrow.
In the low sunlight of the March afternoon they laid Mrs. Tregonell's coffin in the family vault, beside the niche where her faithful husband of ten years' wedded life took his last long rest. There, in the darkness, the perfume of many flowers mixing with the cold earthy odours of the tomb, they left her who had so long been the despotic mistress of Mount Royal; and then they drove back to the empty house, where the afternoon light that streamed in through newly opened windows had a garish look, as if it had no right to be there.
The widow's will was of the simplest. She left legacies to the old servants; her wardrobe, with the exception of laces and furs, to Dormer; mementoes to a few old friends; two thousand pounds in trust for certain small local charities; to Christabel all her jewels and books; and to her son everything else of which she died possessed. He was now by inheritance from his mother, and in right of his wife, master of the Champernowne estate, which, united to the Tregonell property, made him one of the largest landowners in the West of England. Christabel's fortune had been strictly settled on herself before her marriage, with reversion to Leonard in the failure of children; but the fact of this settlement, to which he had readily agreed, did not lessen Leonard's sense of importance as representative of the Tregonells and Champernownes.
Christabel and her husband started for the Continent on the day after the funeral, Leonard fervently hoping that change of scene and constant movement would help his wife to forget her grief. It was a dreary departure for a honeymoon tour – the sombre dress of bride and bridegroom, the doleful visage of Dormer, the late Mrs. Tregonell's faithful maid, whom the present Mrs. Tregonell retained for her own service, glad to have a person about her who had so dearly loved the dead. They travelled to Weymouth, crossed to Cherbourg, and thence to Paris, and on without stopping to Bordeaux; then, following the line southward, they visited all the most interesting towns of southern France – Albi, Montauban, Toulouse, Carcassonne, Narbonne, Montpellier, Nismes, and so to the fairy-like shores of the Mediterranean, lingering on their way to look at mediæval cathedrals, Roman baths and amphitheatres, citadels, prisons, palaces, aqueducts, all somewhat dry-as-dust and tiresome to Leonard, but full of interest to Christabel, who forgot her own griefs as she pored over these relics of pagan and Christian history.
Nice was in all its glory of late spring when, after a lingering progress, they arrived at that Brighton of the south. It was nearly six weeks since that March sunset which had lighted the funeral procession in Minster Churchyard, and Christabel was beginning to grow accustomed to the idea of her aunt's death – nay, had begun to look back with a dim sense of wonder at the happy time in which they two had been together, their love unclouded by any fear of doom and parting. That last year of Mrs. Tregonell's life had been Christabel's apprenticeship to grief. All the gladness and thoughtlessness of youth had been blighted by the knowledge of an inevitable parting – a farewell that must soon be spoken – a dear hand clasped fondly to-day, but which must be let go to-morrow.
Under that soft southern sky a faint bloom came back to Christabel's cheeks, which had not until now lost the wan whiteness they had worn on her wedding-day. She grew more cheerful, talked brightly and pleasantly to her husband, and put off the aspect of gloom with the heavy crape-shrouded gown which marked the first period of her mourning. She came down to dinner one evening in a gown of rich lustreless black silk, with a cluster of Cape jasmine among the folds of her white crape fichu, whereat Leonard rejoiced exceedingly, his being one of those philosophic minds which believe that the too brief days of the living should never be frittered away upon lamentations for the dead.
"You're looking uncommonly jolly, Belle," said Leonard, as his wife took her seat at the little table in front of an open window overlooking the blue water and the amphitheatre of hills, glorified by the sunset. They were dining at a private table in the public room of the hotel, Leonard having a fancy for the life and bustle of the table d'hôte rather than the seclusion of his own apartments. Christabel hated sitting down with a herd of strangers; so, by way of compromise, they dined at their own particular table, and looked on at the public banquet, as at a stage-play enacted for their amusement.
There were others who preferred the exclusiveness of a separate table: among these two middle-aged men – one military, both new arrivals – who sat within earshot of Mr. and Mrs. Tregonell.
"That's a fascinating get-up, Belle," pursued Leonard, proud of his wife's beauty, and not displeased at a few respectful glances from the men at the neighbouring table which that beauty had elicited. "By-the-by, why shouldn't we go to the opera to-night? They do 'Traviata;' none of your Wagner stuff, but one of the few operas a fellow can understand. It will cheer you up a bit."
"Thank you, Leonard. You are very good to think of it; but I had rather not go to any place of amusement – this year."
"That's rank rubbish, Belle. What can it matter – here, where nobody knows us? And do you suppose it can make any difference to my poor mother? Her sleep will be none the less tranquil."
"I know that: but it pleases me to honour her memory. I will go to the opera as often as you like next year, Leonard."
"You may go or stay away, so far as I'm concerned," answered Leonard, with a sulky air. "I only suggested the thing on your account. I hate their squalling."
This was not the first time that Mr. Tregonell had shown the cloven foot during that prolonged honeymoon. He was not actually unkind to his wife. He indulged her fancies for the most part, even when they went counter to his; he would have loaded her with gifts, had she been willing to accept them; he was the kind of spouse who, in the estimation of the outside world, passes as a perfect husband – proud, fond, indulgent, lavish – just the kind of husband whom a sensuous, selfish woman would consider absolutely adorable from a practical standpoint; supplementing him, perhaps, with the ideal, in the person of a lover.
So far, Christabel's wedded life had gone smoothly; for in the measure of her sacrifice she had included obedience and duty after marriage. Yet there was not an hour in which she did not feel the utter want of sympathy between her and the man she had married – not a day in which she did not discover his inability to understand her, to think as she thought, to see as she saw. Religion, conscience, honour – for all these husband and wife had a different standard. That which was right to one was wrong to the other. Their sense of the beautiful, their estimation of art, were as wide apart as earth and heaven. How could any union prove happy – how could there be even that smooth peacefulness which blesses some passionless unions – when the husband and wife were of so different a clay? Long as Leonard had known and loved his cousin, he was no more at home with her than he would have been with Undine, or with that ivory image which Aphrodite warmed into life at the prayer of Pygmalion the sculptor.
More than once during these six weeks of matrimony Leonard had betrayed a jealous temper, which threatened evil in the future. His courtship had been one long struggle at self-repression. Marriage gave him back his liberty, and he used it on more than one occasion to sneer at his wife's former lover, or at her fidelity to a cancelled vow. Christabel had understood his meaning only too well; but she had heard him in a scornful silence which was more humiliating than any other form of reproof.
After that offer of the opera, Mr. Tregonell lapsed into silence. His subjects for conversation were not widely varied, and his present position, aloof from all sporting pursuits, and poorly provided with the London papers, reduced him almost to dumbness. Just now he was silent from temper, and went on sulkily with his dinner, pretending to be absorbed by consideration of the wines and dishes, most of which he pronounced abominable.
When he had finished his dinner, he took out his cigarette case, and went out on the balcony to smoke, leaving Christabel sitting alone at her little table.
The two Englishmen at the table in the next window were talking in a comfortable, genial kind of way, and in voices quite loud enough to be overheard by their immediate neighbours. The soldier-like man sat back to back with Christabel, and she could not avoid hearing the greater part of his conversation.
She heard with listless ears, neither understanding nor interested in understanding the drift of his talk – her mind far away in the home she had left, a desolate and ruined home, as it seemed to her, now that her aunt was dead. But by-and-by the sound of a too familiar name rivetted her attention.
"Angus Hamleigh, yes! I saw his name in the visitor's book. He was here last month – gone on to Italy," said the soldier.
"You knew him?" asked the other.
"Dans le temps. I saw a good deal of him when he was about town."
"Went a mucker, didn't he?"
"I believe he spent a good deal of money – but he never belonged to an out-and-out fast lot. Went in for art and literature, and that kind of thing, don't you know? Garrick Club, behind the scenes at the swell theatres – Richmond and Greenwich dinners – Maidenhead – Henley – lived in a houseboat one summer, men used to go down by the last train to moonlit suppers after the play. He had some very good ideas, and carried them out on a large scale – but he never dropped money on cards, or racing – rather looked down upon the amusements of the million. By-the-by I was at rather a curious wedding just before I left London."
"Whose?"
"Little Fishky's. The Colonel came up to time, at last."
"Fishky," interrogated the civilian vaguely.
"Don't you know Fishky, alias Psyche, the name by which Stella Mayne condescended to be known by her intimate friends, during the run of 'Cupid and Psyche.' Colonel Luscomb married her last week at St. George's, and I was at the wedding."
"Rather feeble of him, wasn't it?" asked the civilian.
"Well, you see, he could hardly sink himself lower than he had done already by his infatuation for the lady. He knew that all his chances at the Horseguards were gone; so if a plain gold ring could gratify a young person who had been surfeited with diamonds, why should our friend withhold that simple and inexpensive ornament? Whether the lady and gentleman will be any the happier for this rehabilitation of their domestic circumstances, is a question that can only be answered in the future. The wedding was decidedly queer."
"In what way?"
"It was a case of vaulting ambition which o'er-leaps itself. The Colonel wanted a quiet wedding. I think he would have preferred the registrar's office – no church-going, or fuss of any kind – but the lady, to whom matrimony was a new idea, willed otherwise. So she decided that the nest in St. John's Wood was not spacious enough to accommodate the wedding guests. She sent her invitations far and wide, and ordered a recherché breakfast at an hotel in Brook Street. Of the sixty people she expected about fifteen appeared, and there was a rowdy air about those select few, male and female, which was by no means congenial to the broad glare of day. Night birds, every one – painted cheeks – dyed moustachios – tremulous hands – a foreshadowing of del. trem. in the very way some of them swallowed their champagne. I was sorry for Fishky, who looked lovely in her white satin frock and orange-blossoms, but who had a piteous droop about the corners of her lips, like a child whose birthday feast has gone wrong. I felt still sorrier for the Colonel – a proud man debased by low surroundings."
"He will take her off the stage, I suppose," suggested the other.
"Naturally, he will try to do so. He'll make a good fight for it, I dare say; but whether he can keep Fishky from the footlights is an open question. I know he's in debt, and I don't very clearly see how they are to live."
"She is very fond of him, isn't she?"
"Yes, I believe so. She jilted Hamleigh, a man who worshipped her, to take up with Luscomb, so I suppose it was a case of real affection."
"I was told that she was in very bad health – consumptive?"
"That sort of little person is always dying," answered the other carelessly. "It is a part of the métier– the Marguerite Gauthier, drooping lily kind of young woman. But I believe this one is sickly."
Christabel heard every word of this conversation, heard and understood for the first time that her renunciation of her lover had been useless – that the reparation she had deemed it his duty to make, was past making – that the woman to whose wounded character she had sacrificed her own happiness was false and unworthy. She had been fooled – betrayed by her own generous instincts – her own emotional impulses. It would have been better for her and for Angus if she had been more worldly-minded – less innocent of the knowledge of evil. She had blighted her own life, and perhaps his, for an imaginary good. Nothing had been gained to any one living by her sacrifice.
"I thought I was doing my duty," she told herself helplessly, as she sat looking out at the dark water, above which the moon was rising in the cloudless purple of a southern night. "Oh! how wicked that woman was to hide the truth from me – to let me sacrifice my love and my lover – knowing her own falsehood all the time. And now she is the wife of another man! How she must have laughed at my folly! I thought it was Angus who had deserted her, and that if I gave him up, his own honourable feeling would lead him to atone for that past wrong. And now I know that no good has been done – only infinite evil."
She thought of Angus, a lonely wanderer on the face of the earth; jilted by the first woman he had loved, renounced by the second, with no close ties of kindred – uncared for and alone. It was hard for her to think of this, whose dearest hope had once been to devote her life to caring for him and cherishing him – prolonging that frail existence by the tender ministrations of a boundless love. She pictured him in his loneliness, careless of his health, wasting his brief remnant of life – reckless, hopeless, indifferent.
"God grant he may fall in love with some good woman, who will cherish him as I would have done," was her unselfish prayer; for she knew that domestic affection is the only spell that can prolong a fragile life.
It was a weak thing no doubt next morning, when she was passing through the hall of the hotel, to stop at the desk on which the visitors' book was kept, and to look back through the signatures of the last three weeks for that one familiar autograph which she had such faint chance of ever seeing again in the future. How boldly that one name seemed to stand out from the page; and even coming upon it after a deliberate search, what a thrill it sent through her veins! The signature was as firm as of old. She tried to think that this was an indication of health and strength – but later in the same day, when she was alone in her sitting-room, and her tea was brought to her by a German waiter – one of those superior men whom it is hard to think of as a menial – she ventured to ask a question.
"There was an English gentleman staying here about three weeks ago: a Mr. Hamleigh. Do you remember him?" she asked.
The waiter interrogated himself silently for half a minute, and then replied in the affirmative.
"Was he an invalid?"
"Not quite an invalid, Madame. He went out a little – but he did not seem robust. He never went to the opera – or to any public entertainment. He rode a little – and drove a little – and read a great deal. He was much fonder of books than most English gentlemen."
"Do you know where he went when he left here?"
"He was going to the Italian lakes."
Christabel asked no further question. It seemed to her a great privilege to have heard even so much as this. There was very little hope that in her road of life she would often come so nearly on her lost lover's footsteps. She was too wise to desire that they should ever meet face to face – that she, Leonard's wife, should ever again be moved by the magic of that voice, thrilled by the pathos of those dreamy eyes; but it was a privilege to hear something about him she had lost, to know what spot of earth held him, what skies looked down upon him.
CHAPTER VIII
"I HAVE PUT MY DAYS AND MY DREAMS OUT OF MIND."
It was the end of May, when Christabel and her husband went back to England and to Mount Royal. Leonard wanted to stay in London for the season, and to participate in the amusements and dissipation of that golden time; but this his wife most steadfastly refused. She would be guilty of no act which could imply want of respect for her beloved dead. She would not make her curtsy to her sovereign in her new character of a matron, or go into society, within the year of her aunt's death.
"You will be horribly moped in Cornwall," remonstrated Leonard. "Everything about the place will remind you of my poor mother. We shall be in the dolefuls all the year."
"I would rather grieve for her, than forget her," answered Christabel. "It is too easy to forget."
"Well, you must have your own way, I suppose. You generally do," retorted Leonard, churlishly; "and, after having dragged me about a lot of mouldy old French towns, and made me look at churches, and Roman baths, and the sites of ancient circuses, until I hated the very name of antiquity, you will expect me to vegetate at Mount Royal for the next six months."
"I don't see any reason why a quiet life should be mere vegetation," said Christabel; "but if you would prefer to spend part of the year in London I can stay at Mount Royal."
"And get on uncommonly well without me," cried Leonard. "I perfectly comprehend your meaning. But I am not going in for that kind of thing. You and I must not offer the world another example of the semi-attached couple; or else people might begin to say you had married a man you did not care for."
"I will try and make your life as agreeable as I can at the Manor, Leonard," Christabel answered, with supreme equanimity – it was an aggravation to her husband that she so rarely lost her temper – "so long as you do not ask me to fill the house with visitors, or to do anything that might look like want of reverence for your mother's memory."
"Look!" ejaculated Leonard. "What does it matter how things look? We both know that we are sorry for having lost her – that we shall miss her more or less every day of our lives – visitors or no visitors. However, you needn't invite any people. I can rub on with a little fishin' and boatin'."
They went back to Mount Royal, where all things had gone as if by clockwork during their absence, under Miss Bridgeman's sage administration. To relieve her loneliness, Christabel had invited two of the younger sisters from Shepherd's Bush to spend the spring months at the Manor House – and these damsels – tall, vigorous, active – had revelled exceedingly in all the luxuries and pleasures of a rural life under the most advantageous circumstances. They had scoured the hills – had rifled the hedges of their abundant wild flowers – had made friends with all Christabel's chosen families in the surrounding cottages – had fallen in love with the curate who was doing duty at Minster and Forrabury – had been buffeted by the winds and tossed by the waves in many a delightful boating excursion – had climbed the rocky steeps of Tintagel so often that they seemed to know every stone of that ruined citadel – and now had gone home to Shepherd's Bush, their cheeks bright with country bloom, and their meagre trunks overshadowed by a gigantic hamper of country produce.
Christabel felt a bitter pang as the carriage drew up to the porch, and she saw the neat little figure in a black gown waiting to receive her – thinking of that tall and noble form which should have stood there – the welcoming arms which should have received her, rewarding and blessing her for her self-sacrifice. The sacrifice had been made, but death had swallowed up the blessing and reward: and in that intermediate land of slumber where the widow lay there could be no knowledge of gain – no satisfaction in the thought of her son's happiness: even granting that Leonard was supremely happy in his marriage, a fact which Christabel deemed open to doubt. No, there had been nothing gained, except that Diana Tregonell's last days had been full of peace – her one cherished hope realized on the very threshold of the tomb. Christabel tried to take comfort from this knowledge.
"If I had denied her to the last, if she had died with her wish ungratified, I think I should be still more sorry for her loss," she told herself.
There was bitter pain in the return to a home where that one familiar figure had been the central point, the very axis of life. Jessie led the new Mrs. Tregonell into the panelled parlour, where every object was arranged just as in the old days; the tea-table on the left of the wide fireplace, the large low armchair and the book-table on the right. The room was bright with white and crimson may, azaleas, tea-roses.
"I thought it was best for you to get accustomed to the rooms without her," said Jessie, in a low voice, as she placed Christabel in the widow's old chair, and helped to take off her hat and mantle, "and I thought you would not like anything changed."
"Not for worlds. The house is a part of her, in my mind. It was she who planned everything as it now is – just adding as many new things as were needful to brighten the old. I will never alter a detail unless I am absolutely obliged."
"I am so thankful to hear you say that. Major Bree is coming to dinner. He wanted to be among the first to welcome you. I hope you don't mind my having told him he might come."
"I shall be very glad to see him: he is a part of my old life here. I hope he is very well."
"Splendid – the soul of activity and good temper. I can't tell you how good he was to my sisters – taking them about everywhere. I believe they both went away deeply in love with him; or at least, with their affections divided between him and Mr. Ponsonby."
Mr. Ponsonby was the curate, a bachelor, and of pleasing appearance.
Leonard had submitted reluctantly to the continued residence of Miss Bridgeman at Mount Royal. He had been for dismissing her, as a natural consequence of his mother's death; but here again Christabel had been firm.
"Jessie is my only intimate friend," she said, "and she is associated with every year of my girlhood. She shall be no trouble to you, Leonard, and she will help me to save your money."
This last argument had a softening effect. Mr. Tregonell knew that Jessie Bridgeman was a good manager. He had affected to despise her economies while it was his mother's purse which was spared; but now that the supplies were drawn from his own resources he was less disposed to be contemptuous of care in the administrator of his household.
Major Bree was in the drawing-room when Christabel came down dressed for dinner, looking delicately lovely in her flowing gown of soft dull black, with white flowers and white crape about her neck. The Major's cheerful presence did much to help Mr. Tregonell and his wife through that first dinner at Mount Royal. He had so many small local events to tell them about, news too insignificant to be recorded in Jessie's letters, but not without interest for Christabel, who loved place and people. Then after dinner he begged his hostess to play, declaring that he had not heard any good music during her absence, and Christabel, who had cultivated her musical talents assiduously in every interval of loneliness and leisure which had occurred in the course of her bridal tour, was delighted to play to a listener who could understand and appreciate the loftiest flights in harmony.
The Major was struck with the improvement in her style. She had always played sweetly, but not with this breadth and power.
"You must have worked very hard in these last few months," he said.
"Yes, I made the best use of every opportunity. I had some lessons from a very clever German professor at Nice. Music kept me from brooding on my loss," she added, in a low voice.
"I hope you will not grow less industrious now you have come home," said the Major. "Most women give Mozart and Beethoven to the winds when they marry, shut up their piano altogether, or at most aspire to play a waltz for their children's dancing."
"I shall not be one of those. Music will be my chief pursuit – now."
The Major felt that although this was a very proper state of things from an artistic point of view, it argued hardly so well for the chances of matrimonial bliss. That need of a pursuit after marriage indicated a certain emptiness in the existence of the wife. A life closed and rounded in the narrow circle of a wedding ring hardly leaves room for the assiduous study of art.
And now began for Christabel a life which seemed to her to be in some wise a piece of mechanism, an automatic performance of daily recurring duties, an hourly submission to society which had no charm for her – a life which would have hung as heavily upon her spirit as the joyless monotony of a convict prison, had it not been for the richness of her own mental resources, and her love of the country in which she lived. She could not be altogether unhappy roaming with her old friend Jessie over those wild romantic hills, or facing the might of that tremendous ocean, grand and somewhat awful even in its calmest aspect. Nor was she unhappy seated in her own snug morning-room among the books she loved – books which were always opening new worlds of thought and wonder, books of such inexhaustible interest that she was often inclined to give way to absolute despair at the idea of how much of this world's wisdom must remain unexplored even at the end of a long life. De Quincey has shown by figures that not the hardest reader can read half the good old books that are worth reading; to say nothing of those new books daily claiming to be read.
No, for a thoroughly intellectual woman, loving music, loving the country, tender and benevolent to the poor, such a life as Christabel was called upon to lead in this first year of marriage could not be altogether unhappy. Here were two people joined by the strongest of all human ties, and yet utterly unsympathetic; but they were not always in each other's company, and when they were together the wife did her best to appear contented with her lot, and to make life agreeable to her husband. She was more punctilious in the performance of every duty she owed him than she would have been had she loved him better. She never forgot that his welfare was a charge which she had taken upon herself to please the kinswoman to whom she owed so much. The debt was all the more sacred since she to whom it was due had passed away to the land where there is no knowledge of earthly conduct.
The glory of summer grew and faded, the everlasting hills changed with all the varying lights and shadows of autumn and winter; and in the tender early spring, when all the trees were budding, and the hawthorn hedges were unfolding crinkly green leaves among the brown, Christabel's heart melted with the new strange emotion of maternal love. A son was born to the lord of the manor; and while all Boscastle rejoiced at this important addition to the population, Christabel's pale face shone with a new radiance, as the baby-face looked up at her from the pillow by her side – eyes clear and star-like, with a dreamy, far-away gaze, which was almost more lovely than the recognizing looks of older eyes – a being hardly sentient of the things of earth, but bright with memories of the spirit world.
The advent of this baby-boy gave a new impulse to Christabel's life. She gave herself up to these new cares and duties with intense devotion; and for the next six months of her life was so entirely engrossed by her child that Leonard considered himself neglected. She deferred her presentation at Court till the next season, and Leonard was compelled to be satisfied with an occasional brief holiday in London, during which he naturally relapsed into the habits of his bachelor days – dined and gamed at the old clubs, and went about everywhere with his friend and ally, Jack Vandeleur.
