Crosbie, not being in the least jealous, was a good boy, and sat himself down to rest, hidden behind a door.
For the first few minutes the conversation between Eames and Lily was of a very matter-of-fact kind. She repeated her wish that she might see him in London, and he said that of course he should come and call. Then there was silence for a little while, and they went through their figure dancing.
'I don't at all know yet when we are to be married,' said Lily, as soon as they were again standing together.
'No; I dare say not,' said Eames.
'But not this year, I suppose. Indeed, I should say, of course not.'
'In the spring, perhaps,' suggested Eames. He had an unconscious desire that it might be postponed to some Greek kalends, and yet he did not wish to injure Lily.
'The reason I mention it is this, that we should be so very glad if you could be here. We all love you so much, and I should so like to have you here on that day.'
Why is it that girls so constantly do this,—so frequently ask men who have loved them to be present at their marriages with other men? There is no triumph in it. It is done in sheer kindness and affection. They intend to offer something which shall soften and not aggravate the sorrow that they have caused. 'You can't marry me yourself,' the lady seems to say. 'But the next greatest blessing which I can offer you shall be yours;—you shall see me married to somebody else.' I fully appreciate the intention, but in honest truth, I doubt the eligibility of the proffered entertainment.
On the present occasion John Eames seemed to be of this opinion, for he did not at once accept the invitation.
'Will you not oblige me so far as that?' she said softly.
'I would do anything to oblige you,' said he gruffly; 'almost anything.'
'But not that?'
'No; not that. I could not do that.' Then he went off upon his figure, and when they were next both standing together, they remained silent till their turn for dancing had again come. Why was it, that after that night Lily thought more of John Eames than ever she had thought before;—felt for him, I mean, a higher respect, as for a man who had a will of his own?
And in that quadrille Crofts and Bell had been dancing together, and they also had been talking of Lily's marriage. 'A man may undergo what he likes for himself,' he had said, 'but he has no right to make a woman undergo poverty.'
'Perhaps not,' said Bell.
'That which is no suffering for a man,—which no man should think of for himself,—will make a hell on earth for a woman.'
'I suppose it would,' said Bell, answering him without a sign of feeling in her face or voice. But she took in every word that he spoke, and disputed their truth inwardly with all the strength of her heart and mind, and with the very vehemence of her soul. 'As if a woman cannot bear more than a man!' she said to herself, as she walked the length of the room alone, when she had got herself free from the doctor's arm.
X. Mrs Lupex and Amelia Roper
I should simply mislead a confiding reader if I were to tell him that Mrs Lupex was an amiable woman. Perhaps the fact that she was not amiable is the one great fault that should be laid to her charge; but that fault had spread itself so widely, and had cropped forth in so many different places of her life, like a strong rank plant that will show itself all over a garden, that it may almost be said that it made her odious in every branch of life, and detestable alike to those who knew her little and to those who knew her much. If a searcher could have got at the inside spirit of the woman, that searcher would have found that she wished to go right,—that she did make, or at any rate promise to herself that she would make, certain struggles to attain decency and propriety. But it was so natural to her to torment those whose misfortune brought them near to her, and especially that wretched man who in an evil day had taken her to his bosom as his wife, that decency fled from her, and propriety would not live in her quarters.
Mrs Lupex was, as I have already described her, a woman not without some feminine attraction in the eyes of those who like morning negligence and evening finery, and do not object to a long nose somewhat on one side. She was clever in her way, and could say smart things. She could flatter also, though her very flattery had always in it something that was disagreeable. And she must have had some power of will, as otherwise her husband would have escaped from her before the days of which I am writing. Otherwise, also, she could
