After tea Hortense went upstairs. She had not rummaged her drawers for a month past, and the impulse to perform that operation was now become resistless. During her absence the talk passed into Caroline’s hands. She took it up with ease; she fell into her best tone of conversation. A pleasing facility and elegance of language gave fresh charm to familiar topics; a new music in the always soft voice gently surprised and pleasingly captivated the listener; unwonted shades and lights of expression elevated the young countenance with character, and kindled it with animation.
“Caroline, you look as if you had heard good tidings,” said Moore, after earnestly gazing at her for some minutes.
“Do I?”
“I sent for you this evening that I might be cheered; but you cheer me more than I had calculated.”
“I am glad of that. And I really cheer you?”
“You look brightly, move buoyantly, speak musically.”
“It is pleasant to be here again.”
“Truly it is pleasant; I feel it so. And to see health on your cheek and hope in your eye is pleasant, Cary; but what is this hope, and what is the source of this sunshine I perceive about you?”
“For one thing, I am happy in mamma. I love her so much, and she loves me. Long and tenderly she nursed me. Now, when her care has made me well, I can occupy myself for and with her all the day. I say it is my turn to attend to her; and I do attend to her. I am her waiting-woman as well as her child. I like—you would laugh if you knew what pleasure I have in making dresses and sewing for her. She looks so nice now, Robert; I will not let her be old-fashioned. And then, she is charming to talk to—full of wisdom, ripe in judgment, rich in information, exhaustless in stores her observant faculties have quietly amassed. Every day that I live with her I like her better, I esteem her more highly, I love her more tenderly.”
“That for one thing, then, Cary. You talk in such a way about ‘mamma’ it is enough to make one jealous of the old lady.”
“She is not old, Robert.”
“Of the young lady, then.”
“She does not pretend to be young.”
“Well, of the matron. But you said mamma’s affection was one thing that made you happy; now for the other thing.”
“I am glad you are better.”
“What besides?”
“I am glad we are friends.”
“You and I?”
“Yes. I once thought we never should be.”
“Cary, some day I mean to tell you a thing about myself that is not to my credit, and consequently will not please you.”
“Ah, don’t! I cannot bear to think ill of you.”
“And I cannot bear that you should think better of me than I deserve.”
“Well, but I half know your ‘thing;’ indeed, I believe I know all about it.”
“You do not.”
“I believe I do.”
“Whom does it concern besides me?”
She coloured; she hesitated; she was silent.
“Speak, Cary! Whom does it concern?”
She tried to utter a name, and could not.
“Tell me; there is none present but ourselves. Be frank.”
“But if I guess wrong?”
“I will forgive. Whisper, Cary.”
He bent his ear to her lips. Still she would not, or could not, speak clearly to the point. Seeing that Moore waited and was resolved to hear something, she at last said, “Miss Keeldar spent a day at the rectory about a week since. The evening came on very wintry, and we persuaded her to stay all night.”
“And you and she curled your hair together?”
“How do you know that?”
“And then you chattered, and she told you—”
“It was not at curling-hair time, so you are not as wise as you think; and, besides, she didn’t tell me.”
“You slept together afterwards?”
“We occupied the same room and bed. We did not sleep much; we talked the whole night through.”
“I’ll be sworn you did! And then it all came out—tant pis. I would rather you had heard it from myself.”
“You are quite wrong. She did not tell me what you suspect—she is not the person to proclaim such things; but yet I inferred something from parts of her discourse. I gathered more from rumour, and I made out the rest by instinct.”
“But if she did not tell you that I wanted to marry her for the sake of her money, and that she refused me indignantly and scornfully (you need neither start nor blush; nor yet need you prick your trembling fingers with your needle. That is the plain truth, whether you like it or not)—if such was not the subject of her august confidences, on what point did they turn? You say you talked the whole night through; what about?”
“About things we never thoroughly discussed before, intimate friends as we have been; but you hardly expect I should tell you?”
“Yes, yes, Cary; you will tell me. You said we were friends, and friends should always confide in each other.”
“But you are sure you won’t repeat it?”
“Quite sure.”
“Not to Louis?”
“Not even to Louis. What does Louis care for young ladies’ secrets?”
“Robert, Shirley is a curious, magnanimous being.”
“I dare say. I can imagine there are both odd points and grand points about her.”
“I have found her chary in showing her feelings; but when they rush out, river-like, and pass full and powerful before you—almost without leave from her—you gaze, wonder; you admire, and—I think—love her.”
“You saw this spectacle?”
“Yes; at dead of night, when all the house was silent, and starlight and the cold reflection from the snow glimmered in our chamber, then I saw Shirley’s heart.”
“Her heart’s core? Do you think she showed you that?”
“Her heart’s core.”
“And how was it?”
“Like a shrine, for it was holy; like snow, for it was pure; like flame, for it was warm; like death, for it was strong.”
“Can she love? tell me that.”
“What think you?”
“She has loved none that have loved her yet.”
“Who are those that have loved her?”
He named a list of gentlemen, closing
