Маргарет Олифант
The Last of the Mortimers
PART VI.
THE LIEUTENANT’S WIFE
(Continued)
Chapter I
MY dear old relation whom we have found out so suddenly, and whom I am quite ashamed to have once thought to be a kind of usurper of something that belonged to me, has been too much distressed and troubled altogether about this business to have the trouble of writing it down as well; and I have so little, so strangely little, to take up my time just now. The days are somehow all blank, with nothing ever happening in them. In my mind I can always see the ship making way over the sea, with the same rush of green water, and the same low-falling, quiet sky, and no other ships in sight. It has been very quiet weather—that is a great mercy. They should be almost landed there by this time.
But that is not my business just now. My dear Aunt Milly—it is true she is only my father’s cousin, but cousin is an awkward title between people of such different age, and, according to Sara Cresswell, she is my aunt, à la mode de Bretagne, which I don’t mind adopting without any very close inquiry into its meaning—made an engagement with us to come to our house the next morning after that first day we met her. Harry came home from the Cresswells that night in raptures with Aunt Milly. It was rather hard upon me to see him so pleased. Of course I knew very well what made him so pleased. He thought he had secured a home for me. He was never tired praising her in his way. I am not exactly sure whether she herself would have relished the praises he gave her, because he has a sad habit of talking slang like all the rest. But apart from any reason, he took to her, which it is a great pleasure to think of now. When we got home Mr. Luigi’s window was blazing with light just as it had done when he returned before; for Domenico seems to be quite of the opinion that candles are articles of love and welcome as well as of devotion. Harry, who had quite made acquaintance with the Italian gentleman when he was at home before, went in to see him, and I went upstairs to baby. I used to take comfort in getting by myself a little, just at that time. Ten minutes in my own room in the dark did me a great deal of good. When one takes an opportunity and gets it out of one’s heart now and then, one can go on longer and better—at least I have found it so.
Lizzie, always watchful, was very ready to let me hear that she was close at hand. The moment she heard me open my own room-door, she began to move about in the back apartment where she kept watch over baby, and I do believe it was only by dint of strong self-denial that she did not burst in upon me at once. I can’t fancy what she thought would happen if I “gave way.” It must have taken some very terrible shape to her fancy. After I had my moment of repose, I went to baby’s room. He was asleep like a little cherub in Mrs. Goldsworthy’s old wicker-work cradle, which I had trimmed with chintz for him; and Lizzie sat by the table working, but looking up at me with her sharp suspicious eyes—sidelong inquisitive looks, full of doubts of my fortitude, and anxiety for me. It was all affection, poor child. When one has affectionate creatures about one, it is impossible to be hard or shut one’s self up. I had no choice but to stop and tell Lizzie about my new friend.
“Oh, it was thon leddy was at the muckle gates, and warned us away for the kingcough,” cried Lizzie; “I minded her the very moment at the door. I was sure as could be from the first look that it was some friend.”
“Some friend,” in Lizzie’s language meant some relation. I asked in wonder, “Why?”
But Lizzie could not explain why; it was one of those unreasonable impressions which are either instinctively prophetic, or which are adopted unconsciously after the event has proved them true.
“But you were never slow where help was needed or comfort,” said Lizzie, dropping her eyes and ashamed of her own compliment; “and I kent there was somebody to be sent to comfort you; and wha could it be but a friend? For naebody could take you like the way you took me.”
I suppose Lizzie’s view of things, being the simplest, had power over me. I was struck by this way of regarding it. Perhaps I had not just been thinking of what was sent. I felt as if that tight binding over my heart relaxed a little. Ah! so well as the Sender knew all about it—all my loneliness, dismay, and troubles; all my Harry’s risks and dangers; all our life beyond—inscrutable dread life which I dared not attempt to look at—and everything that was in it. I held my breath, and was silent in this wide world that opened out to me through Lizzie’s words.
“And eh, mem,” cried Lizzie, opening her eyes wide, “I was sent for down the stair.”
“Where?” cried I in astonishment.
“I was sent for down the stair,” said Lizzie, with the oddest blush and twist of her person. “Menico, he’s aye been awfu’ ill at me since I wouldna gang to the playhouse after it was a’ settled—as if I could gang to play mysel’ the very day the news came! and eh, when he came up and glowered in at the door, and Mrs. Goldsworthy beside him, and no a person but me in oor house, I was awfu’ feared. Her being English, they were like twa foreigners thegither; and how was I to ken what they were wantin’? The only comfort I had was mindin’ upon the Captain’s sword. It was aye like a protection. But a’ they said was that Mrs. Goldsworthy would stop beside baby, and I was to gang down the stair and speak to the gentleman. I thought shame to look as if I was feared—but I was awfu’ feared for a’ that.”
“And what then?”
“I had to gang,” said Lizzie, holding down her head; “he was sleeping sound, and I kent I could hear the first word of greetin’ that was in his head; I could hear in ony corner o’ the house; and Mrs. Goldsworthy gied me her word she would sit awfu’ quiet and not disturb him. Eh, mem, are ye angry? I never did it afore, and I’ll never do it again.”
“No, you must not do it again,” said I; “but who wanted you downstairs?”
“Eh, it was the Italian gentleman,” said Lizzie; “and it was a’ about the leddy that was here the day. He wanted to ken if she was wanting him; and then he wanted to hear if I kent her, and what friend she was to you; but it was mostly a’ to make certain that it wasn’t him she wanted—as if a leddy like yon was likely to have ony troke wi’ foreigners or strange men! and there was aye the other blatter to Menico in their ain language—and ower again, and ower again to me, if it wasna him she asked for. And me standing close at the door listening for baby, and thinking shame to be there, and awfu’ feared you would be angry. I would like to ken what the like of him had to do wi’ leddies?—and Menico, too, that might have kent better—but there’s naebody will behave to please folk perfect in this world.”
“But this is very strange news,” said I. “What did you say, Lizzie? did you say it was Miss Mortimer, and that she was a relation of mine.”
“Eh, no me!” cried Lizzie. “Ye might think it to see me so silly, but I wasna that daft. I said it was ane on a visit to the leddy. I had nae ado with it ony mair than that, and I’m sure neither had he.”
Here Harry’s voice sounded from below, calling me, and I left Lizzie somewhat amused by her cautious and prudent answer, and not a little curious to see that the Italian was interested about the old lady as well as she about him. I found Harry quite full of the same story. Mr. Luigi had questioned him with great caution about Miss Mortimer, and of course had heard the entire story from Harry of our relationship, and how we found each other out. He had received it very quietly, without expressing any feeling at all, and had asked some very close questions about her and about the Park, and her other sister. Harry could not make him out. Of course neither of us knew the other sister. Evidently it was a mysterious business somehow. But as we knew nothing whatever about it, we soon came to an end of our speculations. The morning, perhaps, as Aunt Milly thought, would clear it all up.
Chapter II
THE morning came, and a very lovely morning it was, as bright and almost as warm as summer, one of those glimpses of real spring which come to us only by days at a time. Aunt Milly came almost before we had finished breakfast. I dare say she is accustomed to early hours; but it was evidently strong anxiety and excitement that had brought her out so soon to-day. I had told Lizzie she was coming, and Lizzie, either with some perception of the real nature of her visit, which I could not in any way account for, or with natural Scotch jealousy and reluctance to satisfy the curiosity of strangers as to our relationship, kept on the watch after she had given baby into my charge, and got her triumphantly into the house without any intervention on the part of Domenico. Aunt Milly sank into a chair, very breathless and agitated. It was some time before she could even notice little Harry. To see her so made me more and more aware how serious this business, whatever it was, must be.
“But I am too early, I suppose?” she said with a little gasp.
Harry thought it was rather too early, unless he were to tell Mr. Luigi plainly what he was wanted for, which she would not permit him to do. It was a very uncomfortable interval. She sat silent, evidently with her whole mind bent upon the approaching interview. We, neither knowing the subject of it, nor what her anxiety was, had nothing to say, and I was very glad when Harry went downstairs to find the Italian. Then Aunt Milly made a hurried communication to me when we were alone, which certainly did not explain anything, but which still she evidently felt to be taking me into her confidence.
“My dear, Sarah knows something about him,” said Aunt Milly; “somehow or other Sarah knows that he has a claim upon us. When she heard of the inquiries he was making, she was in a state of desperation—used to drive out with the carriage blinds down, poor soul, and kept watching all day long, so wretched and anxious that it would have broken your heart. But how it all is, and how about this Countess, and his being named Luigi, and his claim upon the estate, and her knowing him—though, so far as I can judge, he could be no more than born when she came home—Hark! was that somebody coming upstairs?”
It was only some of the people of the house moving about. Aunt Milly gave a sigh of relief. “My dear, I’m more and more anxious since I’ve found you, to know the worst,” she said. “It is as great a mystery to you as to your baby, how he can have any connection with us. Dear, dear! to think of a quiet family, and such a family as the Mortimers, plunged all at once into some mystery! it is enough to break one’s heart;—but then, you see, Sarah was so long abroad.”
“Was she long abroad?” said I, with a little cry. All at once, and in spite of myself, my old fancy about that old Miss Mortimer, whom I imagined living in my grandfather’s house, came back to my mind. The great beauty whom my good Mrs. Saltoun had seen abroad—how strange if this should be her after all! Somehow my old imaginations had looked so true at the time, that I seemed to remember them as if they were matters of fact and not of fancy. I looked up, quite with a consciousness that I knew something about it, in Aunt Milly’s face.
“What do you know about her?” cried Aunt Milly, rising up quite erect and rigid out of her chair. Her excitement was extreme. She had evidently gone beyond the point at which she could be surprised to find any stranger throwing light upon her mystery. But at that moment those steps for which we had been listening did ascend the stairs. We could hear them talking as they approached, the Italian with his accent and rather solemn dictionary English, and Harry’s voice that sounded so easy in comparison. Aunt Milly sank back again into her chair. She grasped the arms of it to support herself, and gave me a strange half-terrified, half-courageous look. In another moment they had entered the room.
Mr. Luigi came in without any idea, I dare say, of the anxiety with which we awaited him; but he had not been a minute in the room when his quick eye caught Aunt Milly, though she had drawn back with an involuntary movement of withdrawal from the crisis she had herself brought on. I could read in his face, the instant he saw her, that he divined the little contrivance by which he had been brought here. He stood facing her after he had paid his respects to me, and took no notice of the chair Harry offered him. As for Harry and I, not knowing whether they really knew each other, or whether they ought to be named to each other, or what to do, we stood very uncomfortable and embarrassed behind. I said “Miss Mortimer,” instinctively, to lessen the embarrassment if I could. I don’t believe he heard me. He knew Miss Mortimer very well, however it was.
And it was he who was the first to break the silence. He made a kind of reverence to her, more than a bow, like some sort of old-fashioned filial demonstration. “Madame has something to say to me?” he asked, with an anxiety in his face almost equal to her own.
“Yes,” cried Aunt Milly, “I—I have something to say to you. Sit down, and let me get breath.”
He sat down, and so did we. To see her struggling to overcome the great tremor of excitement she had fallen into, and we all waiting in silence for her words, must have been a very strange scene. It was the merest wonder and curiosity, of course, with Harry and me; but I remember noticing even at that moment that Mr. Luigi was not surprised. He evidently knew something to account for her agitation. He sat looking at her, bending towards her with visible expectation of something. It was no mystery to him.
“Sir—young man,” cried Aunt Milly, with a gasp, “I do not know you; you are a stranger, a foreigner; you have nothing to do with this place. What, in the name of heaven, is it that you have to do with mine or me?”
Mr. Luigi’s countenance fell. He was bitterly disappointed; it was evident in his face. He drew a long breath and clasped his hands together, half in resignation, half appealing against some hard fate. “Ah!” he said, “I did hope otherwise—is it, indeed, indeed, that you know not me?”
Aunt Milly gave a cry half of terror. “I recognise your voice,” she said. “I see gleams in your face of faces I know. I am going out of my wits with bewilderment and trouble; but as sure as you are there before me, I know no more who you are than does the child who cannot speak.”
Mr. Luigi made no reply for some minutes. Then he made some exclamations in Italian, scarcely knowing, I am sure, what he was saying. Then he remembered himself. “Thing most strange! thing most terrible!” cried the young man; “not even now!—not even now!” and he looked round to us with such distress and amazement in his face, and with such an involuntary call for our sympathy, though we knew nothing about it, that his look went to my heart. Aunt Milly saw it, and was confounded by it. His genuine wonder and strange grieved consciousness that she ought to have known this secret, whatever it was, stopped her questions upon her lips. She sat leaning forward looking at him, struck dumb by his looks. I was so excited by the evident reserve on both sides, which implied the existence of a third person whom neither would name, that I burst into it, on the spur of the moment, without thinking whether what I said was sensible or foolish. “Who?” I cried, “who is the other person that knows?”
Both of them started violently; then their eyes met in a strange look of intelligence. Aunt Milly fell back in her chair trembling dreadfully, trembling so much that her teeth chattered. Mr. Luigi rose. “I am at Madame’s disposition,” he said softly; “but what can I say? It is better I be gone while I do not harm Madame, and make her ill. Pardon! it is not I who am to blame!”
Saying so, he took Aunt Milly’s hand, kissed it, and turned to the door. She called him back faintly. “Stop, I have not asked you rightly,” said poor Aunt Milly. “Could not you tell me, without minding anybody else? Are you—are you?—oh! who are you? I do beseech you tell me. If wrong is done you, I have no hand in it. What is there to prevent you telling me?”
“Ah, pardon. I know my duty,” said the young man. “If she will reject me—then! but it is yet too early. I wait—I expect—she has not yet said it to me.”
Aunt Milly gathered herself up gradually, with a strange fluttered look in her eyes. “Reject you! God bless us! it is some mistake, after all. Do you know who it is you are speaking of? Do you know if it is my sister Sarah? She is my elder sister, ten years older than me,—old enough to be your mother—is it she? or, oh, God help us! is it a mistake?”
Mr. Luigi turned towards me for a moment, with a face melted out of all reserve, into such affectionateness and emotion as I scarcely ever saw on a man’s face. When she named her sister’s age, he said, “Ah!” with a tone as if her words went to his heart. But that was all. He shook his head. He said, “No more, no more,” and went slowly but steadily away. It was no mistake. What she said conveyed no information to him. He knew that Sarah’s age and all about her, better than her sister did, or I was mistaken. What he said, and still more what he looked, brought a strong sudden impression to my mind. I don’t know yet how I can be right—if I am right it is the strangest thing in the world; but I know it darted into my head that morning when Luigi’s face melted out so strongly, and that cry which explained nothing came from his heart.
In the meantime, however, poor Aunt Milly sat wringing her hands and more troubled than ever, repeating to herself bits of the conversation which had just passed, and bits of other conversations which we knew nothing about. Harry and I, a little uncomfortable, still tried to occupy ourselves so that we should not hear anything she did not want us to hear; but we did not wish to leave her either. At last Harry went out altogether and left her alone with me, and by degrees she calmed down. I do not wonder she was painfully excited. There could be little doubt some strange, unnatural secret was concealed in her house.
“But you heard him say reject,” said Aunt Milly,—“if she rejected him—do you feel quite sure he understood my last question? Not knowing a language very well makes a wonderful difference; and what if he supposed my sister a young woman, Milly? When I began to be troubled about this business, I couldn’t but think that it was some old lover Sarah was afraid of meeting, forgetting the lapse of time. She was a great beauty once, you know. How do you suppose, now, an old woman could reject a young man?”
“But there are other meanings of the word than as it is between young women and young men,” said I; “he might mean disown.”
“He might mean disown,” repeated Aunt Milly slowly,—“disown; but, dear, dear child,” she cried, immediately throwing off her first puzzled hypothesis, and falling back at once into the real subject of her trouble, “what can he be to Sarah that she could disown him? Before you can disown a person he must belong to you. How could Mr. Luigi belong to my sister? but, to be sure, it is folly to put such questions to you that know nothing about it. Milly, dear, I’ll have to go home.”
“I am very, very sorry you are going home disappointed,” said I.
“Yes,” said Aunt Milly, with a great sigh, “it is hard to think one’s somehow involved in doing wrong, my dear; it’s hard to live in the house with your nearest friend, and not to know any more of her than if she were a stranger. What was I saying? I never said so much to any creature before. I take you as if you belonged to me, though you scarcely know me yet, Milly. I’d like you to settle to come out as soon as possible, dear. I’d like you to see Sarah, and tell me what you think. Perhaps—there is no telling—she might say something to you.”
“But will she be pleased to know about us?” said I.
“It was her desire to seek for you,” said Aunt Milly. “She thought of that, somehow, just before this trouble came on. Sometimes it has come into my mind, that she thought if she found your father, he would have protected her somehow. I can’t tell: it is all a great mystery to me.”
And so she went away after a while, looking very sorrowful; but came back to tell me to put my bonnet on and come with her to Mr. Cresswell’s, who was to drive her home. On our way there I suddenly felt her grasp my arm and point forward a little way before us, where Mr. Luigi was walking slowly along the road by Sara Cresswell’s side. Aunt Milly came almost to a dead stop, looking at them. They were not arm-in-arm, nor did they look as if they had met on purpose. I dare say it was only by accident. Sara, as usual, was dressed in a great velvet jacket, much larger and wider than the one she wore indoors, and held her little head high, as if she quite meant to impress an idea of her dignity upon the Italian, who had to stoop down a long way, and perhaps did stoop down more than Aunt Milly and I saw to be exactly necessary. They went the length of the street together, quite unconscious of the critics behind them, and then separated, Mr. Luigi marching off at a very brisk pace, and Sara continuing her way home. We came up to her just as she reached her own door. She was certainly a very pretty creature, and looked so fresh and blooming in the morning air that I could not have scolded her a great deal, though I own I had a very good mind to do my best in that way, while we were walking behind. The moment she saw us she took guilt to herself. Her face glowed into the most overpowering blush, and the little parasol in her hand fell out of her trembling fingers. But, of course, her spirit did not forsake her. She was not the person to yield to any such emergency.
“We have been walking after you for a long time,” said dear Aunt Milly, in a voice which I have no doubt she supposed to be severe. “I should have called you to wait for us, had I not seen you were otherwise engaged.”
“Oh! then you saw Mr. Luigi, godmamma?” said Sara, quite innocently. “He says he thinks he has found out where the Countess Sermoneta is.”
“The Countess Sermoneta!—oh, child, child, how can you speak so to me?” cried Aunt Milly. “I don’t believe there is any such person in the world. I believe he only makes a fuss about a name, no one ever heard of, to cover his real designs, whatever they may be.”
“Godmamma!” cried Sara, with a flash of fury; “perhaps it will be better to come indoors,” cried the little wicked creature (as Aunt Milly calls her); “nobody, that I ever heard of, took away people’s characters in the open street.”
Aunt Milly went in quickly, shaking her head and deeply troubled. The renewal of this subject swept Sara’s enormity out of her head. We followed, Sara bidding me precede her with a sort of affronted grandeur, which, I confess, was a little amusing to me. When we came into the dining-room, where Aunt Milly went first, the little girl confronted us both, very ready to answer anything we had to say, and confute us to our faces. But much to Sara’s surprise, and perhaps annoyance, Aunt Milly did not say a word on the subject. She shook her head again more energetically than ever. She was so much shaken on this one subject, that other matters evidently glided out of her mind, whenever she was recalled to this.
“No, no! depend upon it there’s no Countess Sermoneta. I believed in it at first, naturally, as everybody else did. It may be a lady, but it isn’t an Italian lady. No, no,” said Aunt Milly, mournfully; “he knows better. He said nothing, you may be sure, about her to me.”
At this moment Mr. Cresswell entered the room, and a little after the brougham came to the door. There was nothing more said on the subject. Sara saw them drive away, with a flutter of fear, I could see; but she need not have been afraid. Aunt Milly had returned into the consideration of her own mystery, which swallowed up Sara’s. I do not think, for my own part, that I had very Christian feelings towards Mr. Luigi as I went home.
