Can You Forgive Her? (53 page)

‘Then, Alice, I will tell you what is my belief. He will drain you of every shilling of your
money, and when that is gone, there will be no more heard of the marriage. We must take a small house in some cheap part of the town and live on my income as best we may. I shall go and insure my life, so that you may not absolutely starve when I die.’ Having said this, Mr Vavasor went away, not immediately to the insurance office, as his words seemed to imply, but to his club where he sat alone,
reading the newspaper, very gloomily, till the time came for his afternoon rubber of whist, and the club dinner bill for the day was brought under his eye.

Alice had no such consolations in her solitude. She had fought her battle with her father tolerably well, but she was now called upon to fight a battle with herself, which was one much more difficult to win. Was her cousin, her betrothed as
she now must regard him, the worthless, heartless, mercenary rascal which her father painted him? There had certainly been a time, and that not very long distant, in which Alice herself had been almost constrained so to regard him. Since that any change for the better in her opinion of him had been grounded on evidence given either by himself or by his sister Kate. He had done nothing to inspire
her with any confidence, unless his reckless daring in coming forward to contest a seat in Parliament could be regarded as a doing of something. And he had owned himself to be a man almost penniless; he had spoken of himself as being utterly reckless, – as being one whose standing in the world was and must continue to
be a perch on the edge of a precipice, from which any accident might knock him
headlong. Alice believed in her heart that this last profession or trade to which he had applied himself, was becoming as nothing to him, – that he received from it no certain income; – no income that a man could make to appear respectable to fathers or guardians when seeking a girl in marriage. Her father declared that all men spoke badly of him. Alice knew her father to be an idle man, a man
given to pleasure, to be one who thought by far too much of the good things of the world; but she had never found him to be either false or malicious. His unwonted energy in this matter was in itself evidence that he believed himself to be right in what he said.

To tell the truth, Alice was frightened at what she had done, and almost repented of it already. Her acceptance of her cousin’s offer
had not come of love; – nor had it, in truth, come chiefly of ambition. She had not so much asked herself why she should do this thing, as why she should not do it, – seeing that it was required of her by her friend. What after all did it matter? That was her argument with herself. It cannot be supposed that she looked back on the past events of her life with any self-satisfaction. There was no
self-satisfaction, but in truth there was more self-reproach than she deserved. As a girl she had loved her cousin George passionately, and that love had failed her. She did not tell herself that she had been wrong when she gave him up, but she thought herself to have been most unfortunate in the one necessity. After such an experience as that, would it not have been better for her to have remained
without further thought of marriage?

Then came that terrible episode in her life for which she never could forgive herself. She had accepted Mr Grey because she liked him and honoured him. ‘And I did love him,’ she said to herself, now on this morning. Poor, wretched, heart-wrung woman! As she sat there thinking of it all in her solitude she was to be pitied at any rate, if not to be forgiven.
Now, as she thought of Nether-coats, with its quiet life, its gardens, its books, and the peaceful affectionate ascendancy of him who would have been her lord and master, her feelings were very different from those which had
induced her to resolve that she would not stoop to put her neck beneath that yoke. Would it not have been well for her to have a master who by his wisdom and strength could
save her from such wretched doubtings as these? But she had refused to bend, and then she had found herself desolate and alone in the world.

‘If I can do him good why should I not marry him?’ In that feeling had been the chief argument which had induced her to return such an answer as she had sent to her cousin. ‘Yor myself, what does it matter? As to this life of mine and all that belongs to
it, why should I regard it otherwise than to make it of some service to some one who is dear to me?’ He had been ever dear to her from her earliest years. She believed in his intellect, even if she could not believe in his conduct. Kate, her friend, longed for this thing. As for that dream of love, it meant nothing; and as for those arguments of prudence, – that cold calculation about her money,
which all people seemed to expect from her, – she would throw it to the winds. What if she were ruined! There was always the other chance. She might save him from ruin, and help him to honour and fortune.

But then, when the word was once past her lips, there returned to her that true woman’s feeling which made her plead for a long day, – which made her feel that that long day would be all too
short, – which made her already dread the coming of the end of the year. She had said that she would become George Vavasor’s wife, but she wished that the saying so might be the end of it When he came to her to embrace her how should she receive him? The memory of John Grey’s last kiss still lingered on her lips. She had told herself that she scorned the delights of love; if it were so, was she not
bound to keep herself far from them; if it were so, – would not her cousin’s kiss pollute her?

‘It may be as my father says,’ she thought. It may be that he wants my money only; if so, let him have it. Surely when the year is over I shall know.’ Then a plan formed itself in her head, which she did not make willingly, with any voluntary action of her mind, – but which came upon her as plans do
come, – and recommended itself to her in despite of herself. He should have her money as he might call for it, – all of it excepting some small
portion of her income, which might suffice to keep her from burdening her father. Then, if he were contented, he should go free, without reproach, and there should be an end of all question of marriage for her.

As she thought of this, and matured it in
her mind, the door opened, and the servant announced her cousin George.

I
T
had not occurred to Alice that her accepted lover would come to her so soon. She had not told him expressly of the day on which she would return, and had not reflected that Kate would certainly inform him. She had been thinking so much of the distant perils of his engagement, that this peril, so sure to come upon her before many days or hours could pass by,
had been forgotten. When the name struck her ear, and George’s step was heard outside on the landing-place, she felt the blood rush violently to her heart, and she jumped up from her seat panic-stricken and in utter dismay. How should she receive him? And then again, with what form of affection would she be accosted by him? But he was there in the room with her before she had had a moment allowed
to her for thought.

She hardly ventured to look up at him; but, nevertheless, she became aware that there was something in his appearance and dress brighter, more loverlike, perhaps newer, than was usual with him. This in itself was an affliction to her. He ought to have understood that such an engagement as theirs not only did not require, but absolutely forbade, any such symptom of young love
as this. Even when their marriage came, if it must come, it should come without any customary sign of smartness, without any outward mark of exaltation. It would have been very good in him to have remained away from her for weeks and months; but to come upon her thus, on the first morning of her return, was a cruelty not to be forgiven. These were the feelings with
which Alice regarded her betrothed
when he came to see her.

‘Alice,’ said he, coming up to her with his extended hand, – ‘Dearest Alice!’

She gave him her hand, and muttered some word which was inaudible even to him; she gave him her hand, and immediately endeavoured to resume it, but he held it clenched within his own, and she felt that she was his prisoner. He was standing close to her now, and she could not escape from him.
She was trembling with fear lest worse might betide her even than this. She had promised to marry him, and now she was covered with dismay as she felt rather than thought how very far she was from loving the man to whom she had given this promise.

‘Alice,’ he said, ‘I am a man once again. It is only now that I can tell you what I have suffered during these last few years.’ He still held her hand,
but he had not as yet attempted any closer embrace. She knew that she was standing away from him awkwardly, almost showing her repugnance to him; but it was altogether beyond her power to assume an attitude of ordinary ease. ‘Alice,’ he continued, ‘I feel that I am a strong man again, armed to meet the world at all points. Will you not let me thank you for what you have done for me?’

She must
speak to him! Though the doing so should be ever so painful to her, she must say some word to him which should have in it a sound of kindness. After all, it was his undoubted right to come to her, and the footing on which he assumed to stand was simply that which she herself had given to him. It was not his fault if at this moment he inspired her with disgust rather than with love.

‘I have done
nothing for you, George,’ she said, ‘nothing at all.’ Then she got her hand away from him, and retreated back to a sofa where she seated herself, leaving him still standing in the space before the fire. ‘That you may do much for yourself is my greatest hope. If I can help you, I will do so most heartily.’ Then she became thoroughly ashamed of her words, feeling that she was at once offering to
him the use of her purse.

‘Of course you will help me,’ he said. ‘I am full of plans, all of which you must share with me. But now, at this moment, my one
great plan is that in which you have already consented to be my partner. Alice, you are my wife now. Tell me that it will make you happy to call me your husband.’

Not for worlds could she have said so at this moment. It was ill-judged in him
to press her thus. He should already have seen, with half an eye, that no such triumph as that which he now demanded could be his on this occasion. He had had his triumph when, in the solitude of his own room, with quiet sarcasm he had thrown on one side of him the letter in which she had accepted him, as though the matter had been one almost indifferent to him. He had no right to expect the double
triumph. Then he had frankly told himself that her money would be useful to him. He should have been contented with that conviction, and not have required her also to speak to him soft winning words of love.

‘That must be still distant, George,’ she said. ‘I have suffered so much!’

‘And it has been my fault that you have suffered; I know that These years of misery have been my doing.’ It was,
however, the year of coming misery that was the most to be dreaded.

‘I do not say that,’ she replied, ‘nor have I ever thought it. I have myself and myself only to blame.’ Here he altogether misunderstood her, believing her to mean that the fault for which she blamed herself had been committed in separating herself from him on that former occasion.

‘Alice, dear, let bygones be bygones.’

‘Bygones
will not be bygones. It may be well for people to say so, but it is never true. One might as well say so to one’s body as to one’s heart. But the hairs will grow grey, and the heart will grow cold.’

‘I do not see that one follows upon the other,’ said George. ‘My hair is growing very grey;’ – and to show that it was so, he lifted the dark lock from the side of his forehead, and displayed the
incipient grizzling of the hair from behind. ‘If grey hairs make an old man, Alice, you will marry an old husband; but even you shall not be allowed to say that my heart is old.’

That word husband, which her cousin had twice used, was painful to Alice’s ear. She shrunk from it with palpable bodily
suffering. Marry an old husband! His age was nothing to the purpose, though he had been as old as
Enoch
¹
. But she was again obliged to answer him. ‘I spoke of my own heart,’ said she: ‘I sometimes feel that it has grown very old.’

‘Alice, that is hardly cheering to me.’

‘You have come to me too quickly, George, and do not reflect how much there is that I must remember. You have said that bygones should be bygones. Let them be so, at any rate as far as words are concerned. Give me a few months
in which I may learn, – not to forget them, for that will be impossible, – but to abstain from speaking of them.’

There was something in her look as she spoke, and in the tone of her voice that was very sad. It struck him forcibly, but it struck him with anger rather than with sadness. Doubtless her money had been his chief object when he offered to renew his engagement with her. Doubtless he
would have made no such offer had she been penniless, or even had his own need been less pressing. But, nevertheless, he desired something more than money. The triumph of being preferred to John Grey, – of having John Grey sent altogether adrift, in order that his old love might be recovered, would have been too costly a luxury for him to seek, had he not in seeking it been able to combine prudence
with the luxury. But though his prudence had been undoubted, he desired the luxury also. It was on a calculation of the combined advantage that he had made his second offer to his cousin. As he would by no means have consented to proceed with the arrangement without the benefit of his cousin’s money, so also did he feel unwilling to dispense with some expression of her love for him, which would
be to him triumphant. Hitherto in their present interview there had certainly been no expression of her love.

‘Alice,’ he said, ‘your greeting to me is hardly all that I had hoped.’

‘Is it not?’ said she. ‘Indeed, George, I am sorry that you should be disappointed; but what can I say? You would not have me affect a lightness of spirit which I do not feel?’