He met a look full of consternation, and of struggles between filial deference and the sense of injustice. All Louis allowed himself to say was, however, 'Surely, when I am her own nephew! when our poverty is a flagrant fact-she may be acquitted of anything but caring for me for-for my mother's sake.'
There was a silence that alarmed Louis, who had never before named his mother to the Earl. At last, Lord Ormersfield spoke clearly and sternly, in characteristic succinct sentences, but taking breath between each. 'You shall have no reason to think me prejudiced. I will tell you facts. There was a match which she desired for such causes as lead her to seek you. The poverty was greater, and she knew it. On one side there was strong affection; on that which she influenced there was-none whatever. If there were scruples, she smothered them. She worked on a young innocent mind to act out her deceit, and without a misgiving on-on his part that his feelings wore not returned, the marriage took place.'
'It could not have been all her own fault,' cried Louis. 'It must have been a willing instrument-much to blame-'
His father cut him short with sudden severity, such as startled him. 'Never say so, Louis. She was a mere child, educated for that sole purpose, her most sweet and docile nature wasted and perverted.'
'And you know this of your own knowledge?' said Fitzjocelyn, still striving to find some loophole to escape from such testimony.
The Earl paused, as if to collect himself, then repeated the words, slowly and decidedly, 'Of my own knowledge. I could not have spoken thus otherwise.'
'May I ask how it ended?'
'As those who marry for beauty alone have a right to expect. There was neither confidence nor sympathy. She died early. I-we-those who loved her as their own life-were thankful.'
Louis perceived the strong effort and great distress with which these words were uttered, and ventured no answer, glancing hastily through all his connexions to guess whose history could thus deeply affect his father; but he was entirely at a loss; and Lord Ormersfield, recovering himself, added, 'Say no more of this; but, believe me, it was to spare you from her manoeuvres that I kept you apart from that family.'
'The Northwold baths have been recommended for Louisa,' said Fitzjocelyn. 'Before we knew of your objections, we mentioned Miss Faithfull's lodgings.'
What the Earl was about to utter, he suppressed.
'You cannot look at those girls and name manoeuvring!' cried Louis.
'Poor things.'
After a silence, Lord Ormersfield added, with more anxiety than prudence, 'Set my mind at rest, Louis. There can have been no harm done yet, in so short a time.'
'I-don't-know-' said Louis, slowly. 'I have seldom spoken to her, to be sure. She actually makes me shy! I never saw anything half so lovely. I cannot help her reigning over my thoughts. I shall never believe a word against her, though I cannot dispute what you say of my aunt. She is of another mould, I wish you could let me hope that-'
A gesture of despair from his father cut him short.
'I will do whatever you please,' he concluded.
'You will find that time conquers the fancy,' said the Earl, quickly. 'I am relieved to find that you have at least not committed yourself: it would be no compliment to Mary Ponsonby.'
Louis's lip curled somewhat; but he said no more, and made no objections to the arrangements which his father proceeded to detail. Doubtful of the accommodations of Ebbscreek, Lord Ormersfield had prudently retained his fly, and though Louis, intending to sleep on the floor, protested that there was plenty of room, he chose to return to the inn at Bickleypool. He would call for Louis to-morrow, to take him for a formal call at Beauchastel; and the day after they would go together to Oakstead, leaving James to return home, about ten days sooner than had been previously concerted.
Lord Ormersfield had not been gone ten minutes, before James's quick bounding tread was heard far along the dry woodland paths. He vaulted over the gate, and entered by the open window, exclaiming, as he did so, 'Hurrah! The deed is done; the letter is off to engage the House Beautiful.'
'Doom is doom!' were the first words that occurred to Louis. 'The lion and the prince.'
'What's that?'
'There was once a king,' began Louis, as if the tale were the newest in the world, 'whose son was predestined to be killed by a lion. After much consideration, his majesty enclosed his royal highness in a tower, warranted wild- beast proof, and forbade the chase to be mentioned in his hearing. The result was, that the locked-up prince died of look-jaw in consequence of tearing his hand with a nail in the picture of the lion.'
'I shall send that apologue straight to Ormersfield.'
'You may spare that trouble. My father has been with me all the evening.'
'Oh! his double-ganger visits you. That accounts for your freaks.'
'Double-gangers seldom come in yellow-bodied flys.'
'His lordship in propria persona. You don't mean it.'
'He is sleeping at the 'George' at Bickleypool. There is a letter coming to-morrow by the post, to say he is coming to-day, with every imaginable civility to you; but I am to go to the rose-coloured pastor's with him on Wednesday.'
'So there's an end of our peace and comfort!'
'I am afraid we have sadly discomposed his peace.'
'Did you discover whether his warnings have the slightest foundation?'
'He told me a history that somewhat accounts for his distrust of my aunt. I think there must be another side to it, and nothing can be more unjust than to condemn all the family, but it affected him so exceedingly that I do not wonder at his doing so. He gave no names, but I am sure it touched him very nearly. Can you tell who it could have been?' And he narrated enough to make James exclaim, 'It ought to touch him nearly. He was talking of himself.'
'Impossible!-my mother!' cried Louis, leaping up.
'Yes-his own version of his married life.'
'How do you know? You cannot remember it,' said Louis, though too well convinced, as he recollected the suppressed anguish, and the horror with which all blame of the young wife had been silenced.
'I have heard of it again and again. It was an unhappy, ill-assorted marriage: she was gay, he was cold.'
'My Aunt Catharine says so?'
'As far as she can blame anything. Your mother was a sweet blossom in a cold wind. She loved and pitied her with all her heart. Your aunt was talking, this very evening, of your father having carried her sister to Ormersfield, away from all her family, and one reason of her desire to go to Northwold is to see those who were with her at last.'
Louis was confounded. 'Yes! I see,' he said. 'How obtuse not to read it in his own manner! How much it explains!' and he silently rested his brow on his hands.
'Depend upon it, there are two sides to the story. I would not be a pretty, petted, admired girl in his keeping.'
'Do you think it mends matters with me to fasten blame on either?' said Louis, sadly. 'No; I was realizing the perception of such a thread of misery woven into his life, and thinking how little I have felt for him.'
'Endowing him with your own feelings, and then feeling for him!'
'No. I cannot estimate his feeling. He is of harder, firmer stuff than I; and for that very reason, I suspect, suffering is a more terrific thing. I heard the doctors saying, when I bore pain badly, that it would probably do the less future harm: a bad moral, but I believe it is true of the mental as of the physical constitution.' Answering something between a look and a shrug of James, he mused on, aloud-'I understand better what the wreck of affection must have been.'
'For my part,' said James, 'I do not believe in the affection that can tyrannize over and blight a woman.'
'Nay, James! I cannot doubt. My very name-my having been called by it, are the more striking in one so fond of usage and precedent. Things that passed between him and Mrs. Ponsonby while I was ill- much that I little regarded and ill requited-show what force of love and grief there must have been. The cold, grave manner, is the broken, inaccessible edge of the cliff rent asunder.'
'If romance softens the rough edge, you are welcome to it! I may as well go to bed!'
'Not romance-the sad reality of my poor father's history. I trust I shall never treat his wishes so lightly-'
