It was well he was not under his sister's eye, for he could not read this letter calmly, and he was obliged to take several turns along the walk before he could recover his composure enough to appear in the breakfast-room, where he found his sister alone, dealing her letters into separate packets of important and unimportant.
'Good morning, Philip. Dr. Henley is obliged to go to Bramshaw this morning, and has had an early breakfast. Have you been out?'
'Yes, it is very fine--I mean it will be--the haze is clearing.'
Margaret saw that he was unusually agitated, and not by grief; applied herself to tea-making, and hoped his walk had given him an appetite; but there seemed little chance of this so long were his pauses between each morsel, and so often did he lean back in his chair.
'I am going to leave you on--on Friday,' he said at length, abruptly.
'Oh, are you going to Redclyffe?'
'No; to Hollywell. Lady Morville wishes me to be her little girl's sponsor; I shall go to London on Friday, and on, the next day.'
'I am glad they have asked you. Does she write herself? Is she pretty well?
'Yes; she is to go down-stairs in a day or two.'
'I am rejoiced that she is recovering so well. Do you know whether she is in tolerable spirits?'
'She writes cheerfully.'
'How many years is it since I saw her? She was quite a child, but very sweet-tempered and attentive to poor Charles,' said Mrs. Henley, feeling most amiably disposed towards her future sister-in-law.
'Just so. Her gentleness and sweet temper were always beautiful; and she has shown herself under her trials what it would be presumptuous to praise.'
Margaret had no doubt now, and thought he was ready for more open sympathy.
'You must let me congratulate you now on this unexpected dawn of hope, after your long trial, my dear brother. It is a sort of unconscious encouragement you could hardly hope for.'
'I did not know you knew anything of it,' said Philip.
'Ah! my dear brother, you betrayed yourself. You need not be disconcerted; only a sister could see the real cause of your want of spirits. Your manner at each mention of her, your anxiety, coupled with your resolute avoidance of her--'
'Of whom? Do you know what you are talking of, sister!' said Philip, sternly.
'Of Amabel, of course.'
Philip rose, perfectly awful in his height and indignation.
'Sister!' he said--paused, and began again. 'I have been attached to Laura Edmonstone for years past, and Lady Morville knows it.'
'To Laura!' cried Mrs. Henley, in amaze. 'Are you engaged?' and, as he was hardly prepared to answer, she continued, 'If you have not gone too far to recede, only consider before you take any rash step. You come into this property without ready money, you will find endless claims, and if you marry at once, and without fortune, you will never be clear from difficulties.'
'I have considered,' he replied, with cold loftiness that would have silenced any one, not of the same determined mould.
'You are positively committed, then!' she said, much vexed. 'Oh, Philip! I did not think you would have married for mere beauty.'
'I can hear no more discussion on this point,' answered Philip, in the serious, calm tone that showed so much power over himself and every one else.
It put Margaret to silence, though she was excessively disappointed to find him thus involved just at his outset, when he might have married so much more advantageously. She was sorry, too, that she had shown her opinion so plainly, since it was to be, and hurt his feelings just as he seemed to be thawing. She would fain have learned more; but he was completely shut up within himself, and never opened again to her. She had never before so grated on every delicate feeling in his mind; and he only remained at her house because in his present state of health, he hardly knew where to bestow himself till it was time for him to go to Hollywell.
He went to call on Miss Wellwood, to whom his name was no slight recommendation, and she met him eagerly, asking after Lady Morville, who, she said, had twice written to her most kindly about little Marianne.
It was a very pleasant visit, and a great relief. He looked at the plans, heard the fresh arrangements, admired, was interested, and took pleasure in having something to tell Amabel. He asked for Marianne, and heard that she was one of the best of children--amiable, well- disposed, only almost too sensitive. Miss Wellwood said it was remarkable how deep an impression Sir Guy had made upon her, and how affectionately she remembered his kindness; and her distress at hearing of his death had been far beyond what such a child could have been supposed to feel, both in violence and in duration. Philip asked to see her, knowing it would please Amabel, and in she came--a long, thin, nine-year-old child, just grown into the encumbering shyness, that is by no means one of the graces of 'la vieillesse de l'enfance'.
He wished to be kind and encouraging; but melancholy, added to his natural stateliness, made him very formidable; and poor Marianne was capable of nothing beyond 'yes' or 'no.'
He told her he was going to see Lady Morville and her little girl, whereat she eagerly raised her eyes, then shrank in affright at anything so tall, and so unlike Sir Guy. He said the baby was to be christened next Sunday, and Miss Wellwood helped him out by asking the name.
'Mary,' he said, for he was by no means inclined to explain the Verena, though he knew not half what it conveyed to Amabel.
Lastly, he asked if Marianne had any message; when she hung down her head, and whispered to Miss Wellwood, what proved to be 'My love to dear little cousin Mary.'
He promised to deliver it, and departed, wishing he could more easily unbend.
CHAPTER 40
Blest, though every tear that falls
Doth in its silence of past sorrow tell,
And makes a meeting seem most like a dear farewell.--WORDSWORTH
On Saturday afternoon, about half-past five, Philip Morville found himself driving up to the well-known front door of Hollywell. At the door he heard that every one was out excepting Lady Morville, who never came down till the evening, save for a drive in the carriage.
He entered the drawing-room, and gazed on the scene where he had spent so many happy hours, only darkened by that one evil spot, that had grown till it not only poisoned his own mind, but cast a gloom over that bright home.
All was as usual. Charles's sofa, little table, books, and inkstand, the work-boxes on the table, the newspaper in Mr. Edmonstone's old folds. Only the piano was closed, and an accumulation of books on the hinge told how long it had been so; and the plants in the bay window were brown and dry, not as when they were Amabel's cherished nurslings. He remembered Amabel's laughing face and abundant curls, when she carried in the camellia, and thought how little he guessed then that he should be the destroyer of the happiness of her young life. How should he meet her--a widow in her father's house--or look at her fatherless child? He wondered how he had borne to come thither at all, and shrank at the thought that this very evening, in a few hours, he must see her.
The outer door opened, there was a soft step, and Amabel stood before him, pale, quiet, and with a smile of welcome. Her bands of hair looked glossy under her widow's cap, and the deep black of her dress was relieved by the white robes of the babe that lay on her arm. She held out her hand, and he pressed it in silence.
'I thought you would like just to see baby,' said she, in a voice something like apology.
He held out his arms to take it, for which Amy was by no means prepared. She was not quite happy even in trusting it in her sister's arms, and she supposed he had never before touched an infant. But that was all nonsense, and she would not vex him with showing any reluctance; so she laid the little one on his arm, and saw his great hand holding it most carefully, but the next moment he turned abruptly from her. Poor silly little Amy, her heart beat not a little till he turned back, restored the babe, and while he walked hastily to the window, she saw that two large tear-drops had fallen on the white folds of its mantle. She did not speak; she guessed how much he must feel in thus holding Guy's child, and, besides, her own tears would now flow so easily that she must be on her guard. She sat down, settled the little one on her knee, and gave him time to recover himself.
