The Duchess herself almost went to bed when the time came, so much did she dread the same thing. She was quite alone, having felt that she could not bring herself to give the affectionate embrace which the presence of others would require. She stood in the middle of the room and then came forward three steps to meet the bride. “Arabella,” she said, “I am very glad that everything has been settled so comfortably for you.”
“That is so kind of you, aunt,” said Arabella, who was watching the Duchess closely—ready to jump into her aunt’s arms if required to do so, or to stand quite aloof.
Then the Duchess signified her pleasure that her cheek should be touched—and it was touched. “Mrs. Pepper will show you your room. It is the same you had when you were here before. Perhaps you know that Mr. Green comes down to Stamford on the first, and that he will dine here on that day and on Sunday.”
“That will be very nice. He had told me how it was arranged.”
“It seems that he knows one of the clergymen in Stamford, and will stay at his house. Perhaps you will like to go upstairs now.”
That was all there was, and that had not been very bad. During the entire week the Duchess hardly spoke to her another word, and certainly did not speak to her a word in private. Arabella now could go where she pleased without any danger of meeting her aunt on her walks. When Sunday came nobody asked her to go to church. She did go twice, Mounser Green accompanying her to the morning service;—but there was no restraint. The Duchess only thought of her as a disagreeable ill-conducted incubus, who luckily was about to be taken away to Patagonia.
It had been settled on all sides that the marriage was to be very quiet. The bride was of course consulted about her bridesmaids, as to whom there was a little difficulty. But a distant Trefoil was found willing to act, in payment for the unaccustomed invitation to Mistletoe, and one Connop Green young lady, with one De Browne young lady, and one Smijth young lady came on the same terms. Arabella herself was surprised at the ease with which it was all done. On the Saturday Lady Augustus came, and on the Sunday Lord Augustus. The parents of course kissed their child, but there was very little said in the way either of congratulation or farewell. Lord Augustus did have some conversation with Mounser Green, but it all turned on the probability of there being whist in Patagonia. On the Monday morning they were married, and then Arabella was taken off by the happy bridegroom.
When the ceremony was over it was expected that Lady Augustus should take herself away as quickly as possible—not perhaps on that very afternoon, but at any rate, on the next morning. As soon as the carriage was gone, she went to her own room and wept bitterly. It was all done now. Everything was over. Though she had quarrelled daily with her daughter for the last twelve years—to such an extent lately that no decently civil word ever passed between them—still there had been something to interest her. There had been something to fear and something to hope. The girl had always had some prospect before her, more or less brilliant. Her life had had its occupation, and future triumph was possible. Now it was all over. The link by which she had been bound to the world was broken. The Connop Greens and the Smijths would no longer have her—unless it might be on short and special occasions, as a great favour. She knew that she was an old woman, without money, without blood, and without attraction, whom nobody would ever again desire to see. She had her things packed up, and herself taken off to London, almost without a word of farewell to the Duchess, telling herself as she went that the world had produced no other people so heartless as the family of the Trefoils.
“I wonder what you will think of Patagonia,” said Mounser Green as he took his bride away.
“I don’t suppose I shall think much. As far as I can see one place is always like another.”
“But then you will have duties.”
“Not very heavy I hope.”
Then he preached her a sermon, expressing a hope as he went on, that as she was leaving the pleasures of life behind her, she would learn to like the work of life. “I have found the pleasures very hard,” she said. He spoke to her of the companion he hoped to find, of the possible children who might be dependent on their mother, of the position which she would hold, and of the manner in which she should fill it. She, as she listened to him, was almost stunned by the change in the world around her. She need never again seem to be gay in order that men might be attracted. She made her promises and made them with an intention of keeping them; but it may, we fear, be doubted whether he was justified in expecting
