Маргарет Олифант
The Last of the Mortimers
PART III.
THE LADIES AT THE HALL
(Continued)
Chapter I
I CANNOT tell what it was that made me silent about this adventure while we were having tea. My mind was naturally full of it, but when, having the words just on my lips, I looked at Sarah, some strange influence held me back. That reluctance to speak of a matter which will turn out painful to somebody I have felt come across me like a sort of warning more than once in my life; and this time it was so powerful, that during our meal I said nothing whatever about the matter. You are not to suppose, though, that I was so good a dissembler as not to show that I had something on my mind. Little Sara found me out in a moment. She said, “What are you thinking of, godmamma?” before we had been two minutes at table, and persecuted me the whole time,—finding out whenever I made any little mistake; and, indeed, I made several, my mind being so much occupied. Sarah, on the contrary, took no notice; she seemed, indeed, to have recovered herself a good deal, and had a very good appetite. She never talked much at any time, and had said less than usual since ever little Sara arrived. So what with my abstraction and Sarah’s quiet occupation with herself, there was not much talk, you may suppose. Little Sara Cresswell’s eyes, however, quite danced with mischief when she saw me so deep in thought. She kept asking me all sorts of questions; whether there was any bit of the road haunted between the Park and the village? whether I had got some sermons from the rector to read? whether Dr. Appleby had been trying some of his new medicines (the doctor was certainly too much given to experiments) upon me? whether I had met anybody to frighten me? Tea was all but finished, and I had just rung the bell, when the little plague asked this last question; and you may imagine I was quite as much inclined to tell all my story as Sara was to draw me out.
“Now I’ll just tell you what I think has happened, godmamma,” cried Sara. “One of your old lovers has appeared to you, and told you that, but for you, he might have been a happy man; and that all his troubles began when you refused him. Now haven’t I guessed right?”
“Right? Why, I have told you a dozen times, Sara, that I never had any lovers,” said I,—“not till I was forty, at least.”
“But that is no answer at all,” cried the little puss. “And the poor man might die for you, when you were forty, all the same. Was it himself, quite pined away and heart-broken, that you saw, godmamma, or was it his ghost?”
“Hush, you little provoking thing,” said I; “you and I had a quarrel about an Italian the other evening. Now I know a deal better about him than you do, Sara. He is all the ghost I met.”
I gave a glance at Sarah, sidelong, as I spoke. I am sure what I said was light enough, and not very serious, but her ear had caught it; it was a sign to me that she was still as much on the watch as ever. She did not speak, nor lift up her head, except with a little momentary start, but she stopped knitting, which was something extraordinary to me.
And little Sara flushed up; whether it was with the recollection of our quarrel, or a private interest of her own in the young stranger, who, to be sure, being a handsome young man, and mysterious, and romantic, was quite likely to excite a foolish young imagination, I cannot tell; but her cheeks certainly reddened up at a great rate, and she looked exactly as if she were ready to pounce and bite, what between curiosity and wrath.
“I met him on the road; it is my belief he passed the gate the other evening when I was looking out. Poor young man! he speaks very good English for an Italian,” said I.
Then Sarah’s whisper interfered and stopped me; she spoke very sharply. “Who are you speaking of?” she said; “there are no Italians here.”
“There is one,” said I; “poor fellow. Little Sara there knows about him. It appears he came expecting to find a lady hereabouts, and can’t find her. I can’t think on the name myself; I never heard it that I know of; but I must allow that the young man looks like a gentleman; and for an Italian–”
“Be silent, Milly! What can a person like you know?” said Sarah, in an irritated shrill tone. “They’re a double-minded, deceitful, intriguing race; they’re vile story-tellers, every one; they’re a people no more fit to be considered like other Christians than dogs are, or slaves. Bah! What do you mean talking to me of Italians? None of you are the least aware of what you are speaking of. I know them well.”
Here little Sara struck boldly into the breach, and saved me from the necessity of struggling out an answer.
“Godmamma, you are frightfully unjust!” cried little Sara. “I wonder how you can speak of a whole people so; and such a people! as if everybody in the world did not know who they are, and what they have done!”
“They have done every kind of fraud and falsehood in existence,” said Sarah, so earnest that her voice sounded like a sort of smothered shriek. “I tell you, child, whoever trusts or believes in them gets deceived and betrayed. Don’t speak to me of Italians—I know them; and if any Italian comes here pretending to ask anything,” she said, suddenly turning round upon me, and catching at me, if I may say so, with her eye, “mind you, Milly, it’s a cheat! I say, recollect it’s a cheat! He does not want any living creature; he wants money, and profit, and what you have to give.”
If she had said all this quietly, and there had been nothing beforehand to rouse my attention, I should not have been surprised; for to be sure, that was very much like what I had always believed; and as for lying, and seeking their own advantage, I rather think that is just about what an English person, who knows no better, thinks of most foreigners, right or wrong. But Sarah’s way of speaking was breathless and excited. She was no more thinking of Italians in general than I was, or than little Sara was. She was thinking on some one thing, and some one person; she alone knew who and what. All her anger, and her quickness, and her dreadful look of being in earnest, were personal to herself; and I cannot describe to anybody how my sister’s unexplainable anxiety and excitement bewildered and excited me.
“But, Sarah, you don’t know anything of this poor friend man; he may be as honest as ever was. I do believe he is, for my part,” said I; “and what he wants is–”
“Don’t tell me!” cried Sarah. “I don’t want to hear what he wants. How should I know anything about him? Hold your tongue, Milly, I tell you. What! you go and take a fancy to a young villain and impostor, and neglect me!”
“Neglect you! but, dear, not for the poor young Italian gentleman’s sake; you can’t think that!” said I, more and more amazed.
“You all neglect me!” said Sarah, throwing down her knitting, and rising up in her passion. “I don’t want to hear of reasons or causes. You are not to tell me what young impostors you may fish up in the streets, or what ridiculous things your protégés may want. Don’t say anything to me, I tell you! I desire to hear nothing about it. Make up what pretty romance you please, you are quite fit to do it; but I clear my hands of all such matters—you shall not even tell them to me!”
And as she said this,—could I believe my eyes?—Sarah thrust her footstool out of the way, pushed back her screen, and making a momentary pause to search round all the dim depths of the room with her eyes, went out, leaving us two, Sara and me, staring at each other. What had affronted her? What could be the cause of her displeasure. She left her knitting thrown down into the basket, and the Times lying on the chair beside her seat. Nobody had done or said anything to displease her, unless my mention of the young Italian had done it. What strange secret irritation could be working in her, to produce these outbursts of passion without any cause?
Little Sara stared at me with her bright eyes wide open, till Sarah had quite gone out of the room; then the wicked little creature, struck, I suppose, with something comic in my blank distressed look, burst out laughing. I cannot tell you how the sound of her laugh, thoughtless as she was, jarred upon me.
“Is this how you live so amicably at the Park, godmamma?” cried Sara. “The people say you have the temper of an angel, and that nobody else could live with godmamma Sarah. I never believed it was true till now. You have the temper of an angel, godmamma. You forgave me the other night when I was so naughty; you kissed me, though I did not expect you would. And now here you have been kind to poor Italian Mr. Luigi, and you have got paid for it. What have the Italians done to godmamma Sarah to make her so savage at their very name?”
“Ah! that is the question—what is it?” said I. “God knows!”
“Then you don’t know?” said little Sara. “Yet I could have thought you did, you looked so.”
“How did I look?” cried I.
“As if there were a secret somewhere; as if you were thinking how godmamma Sarah would take it; as if you were—well, just watching her a little, and trying to see whether she cared,” said the observant little girl.
“Was I, indeed? was I so? Ah! I deserve to be punished. What right have I to go and dream over anybody’s looks and frame romances, as she says? Heaven forgive me! I’ll go and beg her pardon. I did not mean to do it. To think I should be so mean and suspicious! Little Sara, let me go.”
Sara held me fast, clinging with her arms round my waist—and her provoking little face the little witch turned up close to mine. “Tell me first what the romance was, godmamma?” said Sara. “She accused you of it, and you confess; and I am sure a romance is far more in my way than yours. Tell me, please, this very moment, what romance you are making up? Has Mr. Luigi anything to do with it? Is it all about godmamma Sarah? Tell me directly, or I don’t know what I shall do. Sit down in this great chair, and begin—romance of real life.”
“Ah, you foolish little girl! there’s many a romance of real life you durst not listen to, and I durst not tell you,” cried I. “I am not making up any romance. Nonsense! Child, get up. I’ll tell you about your Mr. Luigi, which is the only story in my head. He is looking for a lady; but that you know–”
“Oh yes, and he can’t find her; the Countess Sermoneta,” said Sara, in her careless way.
Just then, to my still greater wonder, Sarah returned to the room. Evidently she had heard the child’s words. I saw her come to a dead stop in the shadow close by the door, and put her hand upon her side, as if she were out of breath and had to recover herself. What did this strange flitting about mean? In her usual way she never moved from her seat, except to go to dinner. Her going away was extraordinary, and her coming back more extraordinary still. I could but gaze at her in amazement as she came slowly up, threading through the furniture in the half light. But Sara, who had still her arms clasped round me, had of course her back to her godmamma, and did not see that she had come back to the room.
“Wasn’t it the Countess Sermoneta?” said Sara, “I know he was asking all over Chester for such a person, and was so disappointed. Did you never hear of a Countess Sermoneta, godmamma? If you heard it once you surely would remember the name.”
Sarah had stopped again while the girl was speaking. Could she have been running up and downstairs that her breath came so quick, and she had to make such pauses to recover herself? I could not answer Sara for watching my sister, feeling somehow fascinated; but then, remembering that Sara had detected me in anxious observation of her godmother, I hurried on with the conversation to avoid any suspicion of that.
“That is just what I told the young man, my dear child—that I never had heard the name,” said I; “but I promised to try all I could to get some news for him. It is very sad he should be disappointed, poor young fellow. I promised to ask Ellis, who has been centuries with the Mortimers, you know; and I thought, perhaps, your godmamma and I, if we had a talk together, might recollect somebody that married a foreigner–”
Here I made a dead pause in spite of myself. Sarah had somehow managed to get back into her seat. She was wonderfully pale and haggard, and looked like a different creature. She looked to me as if all her powers were strained for some purpose, and that at any moment the pressure might be too much, and she might give way under it. I could not go on; I stopped short all at once, with a feeling that somehow I had been cruel. “Not to-night,” I said softly to Sara, “another time.” Sara was obedient for a miracle. We broke off the conversation just at that point, with an uneasy feeling among us that it had been far more interesting and exciting than it ought to have been; and that the best thing to be done was to bury it up, and conceal what we had been talking about. Such was the immediate result of my easy promise to consult my sister. Sarah sat very steadily through all that evening, remaining up even later than usual. She took no notice of anything that was said, nor mentioned why she went away. We were all very quiet, and had little to say for ourselves. What was this forbidden ground?
Chapter II
IT is very odd, when there happens to be any one bit of tabooed ground in a family, how impossible it is to keep off it. I daresay every member of a household, above childhood, knows that, more or less. If there is one matter that some two people are quite sure to disagree upon, whom it is quite the business of your life to keep comfortable and on good terms, isn’t that matter always turning up somehow? Doesn’t it float about in the air, and hover over your head, always ready to poke in when it is not wanted, and do what mischief it can? That is my experience, at least. And it was so much the worse in our case, because little Sara had no idea of keeping quiet, and no notion that her innocent mischief and meddling could do any real harm, or have any worse effect than putting her godmamma “in a passion.” Putting people in a passion was fun to the thoughtless little girl; it never came into her little saucy inconsiderate head that Sarah’s passion was not a flash of harmless lightning like her own, or that it meant anything which could disturb and overturn all my sister’s quiet life, and put me into a fever of bewilderment and anxiety. For days after I kept carefully off the subject, thinking it would be better to leave a polite message with Ellis for the Italian young gentleman if he called, and say I was sorry I could not get him any information, than to worry my poor sister, who was so unaccountably disturbed by hearing of him. Not that Sarah said anything about it; but she looked so haggard and anxious that it went to my heart. She came down even earlier than usual and sat up later; listened eagerly to all the conversation going on; sometimes, even, missed her drive; sat on the watch, as one might have supposed; but when she had gone out for her airing one day, I met the carriage,—and, can you believe it, the very blinds were down! If, when all was quiet, and nothing had happened, I used to wonder sometimes what sort of life she had led when she was younger, what friends she might have had, and what was her history when she was abroad, you may fancy how busy my mind was on that subject now.
The more I thought it over, of course, the more I could make nothing of it. And what do you think at last was the conclusion I came to? That Sarah, being a great beauty, and always accustomed to admiration and almost a kind of worship, had forgotten, poor dear soul, that Time had changed all that, and that she was an old woman; and that she imagined the Italian we talked of, to be one of her old lovers come here to look for her, and was quite frightened he should see her, and know she was at the Park, and disturb us all with his raptures and passions. After turning it over for days and days, that was the very best explanation I could come to. Why she should be so tragical about it, to be sure, I could not tell. Perhaps she thought the story of all her old gay doings, if they were to come to my ears, would not sound just what a quiet old maid like me would approve of. Possibly, it might be somebody she had jilted that she was frightened to see; perhaps she was afraid of that Italian revenge one reads of in books. I do suppose people are still stabbed out of jealousy and revenge in Italy; and everybody carries a stiletto about him. If that was what Sarah thought of, no wonder she was frightened, poor dear. And I must say it quite went to my heart to see her so anxious and unsettled, watching every word that was said, and turning her keen eyes towards me—for she would not yield to change her seat, so that she might see for herself who came in—every time the door was opened, to know who it was by my face; and, above all, going out that dreary drive with the carriage blinds down, carrying all her dismal thoughts with her! If she would only have confidence in me, what a difference it would make! I could very soon have relieved her mind about it, I am sure. What was it to me if she had been very gay and foolish when she was young? that was all over, and she was my very own sister. To think that I should stand upon my dignity, or blame Sarah for anything that was past. But then she was so proud! she always was so proud! she would never own to being less than perfect. The best thing was to disabuse her mind, if possible, and to make it evident that this Italian was a young man, far too young ever to have been a lover of Sarah’s. A lover! why, she might have been his mother as far as age was concerned—and that he was seeking, quite openly, an entirely different person. If I had been a courageous woman I should have gone through with my story the first night, and most likely saved my poor sister a great deal of unnecessary anxiety. But I never was brave at going into disagreeable conversation. I can’t say I ever was clever at conversation at all. And when a person runs away with a mistaken idea, and you can’t manage to get it out of her head, and the further you go the worse it becomes, what can you do? I tried to nerve myself up to going into it, but I could not. Whatever it was, it made her vastly uncomfortable, that was evident; and really when Sarah gets into her passions there is no reasoning with her, and I get flustered immediately, and she won’t listen to explanations. So on the whole I never had a more troublesome piece of business on my hands.
As for little Sara Cresswell, she was the greatest tease and plague that ever was in a house. She worried me morning and night about the romance I was making up, and did not hesitate the least to carry on her persecution before Sarah, who looked at her with a kind of silent rage, which the saucy little puss never found out. But occupied and troubled as my mind was, it was impossible not to be amused at that inconsistent little creature and her goings on. She had brought out two great trunks with her, big enough to have held the whole of my wardrobe for winter and summer, though she knew very well we saw no company, and never required her to dress in the evening. And as for her lace and worked muslin, and all that foolish extravagance, that is so much in fashion again, there was no end to the store she had. Years before this I gave her the name of puss in velvet, for a very good reason. What do you think, at eleven years old, she had persuaded that poor innocent helpless man, her unfortunate papa, to do? Why, to get her a velvet frock, to be sure—not a pelisse, but a dress for evenings like any dowager old lady! Did ever anybody hear of anything so preposterous? And she kept up her fancy still, with velvet jackets, and even a little ridiculous velvet apron all trimmed and ornamented. Poor Mr. Cresswell, to be sure, was well off, and, indeed, rich in his way; but she might have ruined any man with her extravagance; and as to being ashamed of it, would lift up her face coolly, and tell you she never pretended to want to save papa’s money. At the same time she was as great as ever on the subject of dividing it all, and keeping just enough to live on. When that condition of things came about, she was to have no servants, but to do everything herself, and so were all the other people who were to share poor Mr. Cresswell’s money among them. When she went into the village with me she gave a wary eye to the cottages, how things were put tidy—and was quite resolved she should do it all, and be as happy as possible. But as for anything genteel, or middling, she scouted at it with the greatest contempt in the world. It was as good as a play to hear her. If my mind had been free to amuse myself, I should have quite enjoyed Sara’s vagaries; but, as it was, I could only be amused and provoked by them now and then. I do believe she was much happier at the Park than at home. That big dull house, with all the unchangeable furniture, was not a place for a fantastical young girl; she poked about the greenhouses in all the back corners where the gardener did not want her, and where she was always sweeping down his flower-pots; she rummaged through the great suites of rooms that nobody ever occupied; she came into the library to help me with my accounts, and tease me out of my wits; she went fishing about the house through all the nooks and corners, and read all the old novels over again; and then she could not persuade and worry me into doing everything she pleased, as she could her father. I believe just at that moment Sara being at the Park was a great comfort to me.
