“That is absurd. I have a right to demand from you such a pledge. I am willing to believe that you have not—”
“Have not what?”
“That you have not utterly disgraced me.”
“God in heaven, that I should hear this!” she exclaimed. “Louis Trevelyan, I have not disgraced you at all—in thought, in word, in deed, in look, or in gesture. It is you that have disgraced yourself, and ruined me, and degraded even your own child.”
“Is this the way in which you welcome me?”
“Certainly it is—in this way and in no other if you speak to me of what is past, without acknowledging your error.” Her brow became blacker and blacker as she continued to speak to him. “It would be best that nothing should be said—not a word. That it all should be regarded as an ugly dream. But, when you come to me and at once go back to it all, and ask me for a promise—”
“Am I to understand then that all idea of submission to your husband is to be at an end?”
“I will submit to no imputation on my honour—even from you. One would have thought that it would have been for you to preserve it untarnished.”
“And you will give me no assurance as to your future life?”
“None;—certainly none. If you want promises from me, there can be no hope for the future. What am I to promise? That I will not have—a lover? What respect can I enjoy as your wife if such a promise be needed? If you should choose to fancy that it had been broken you would set your policeman to watch me again! Louis, we can never live together again ever with comfort, unless you acknowledge in your own heart that you have used me shamefully.”
“Were you right to see him in Devonshire?”
“Of course I was right. Why should I not see him—or anyone?”
“And you will see him again?”
“When papa comes, of course I shall see him.”
“Then it is hopeless,” said he, turning away from her.
“If that man is to be a source of disquiet to you, it is hopeless,” she answered. “If you cannot so school yourself that he shall be the same to you as other men, it is quite hopeless. You must still be mad—as you have been mad hitherto.”
He walked about the room restlessly for a time, while she stood with assumed composure near the window. “Send me my child,” he said at last.
“He shall come to you, Louis—for a little; but he is not to be taken out from hence. Is that a promise?”
“You are to exact promises from me, where my own rights are concerned, while you refuse to give me any, though I am entitled to demand them! I order you to send the boy to me. Is he not my own?”
“Is he not mine too? And is he not all that you have left to me?”
He paused again, and then gave the promise. “Let him be brought to me. He shall not be removed now. I intend to have him. I tell you so fairly. He shall be taken from you unless you come back to me with such assurances as to your future conduct as I have a right to demand. There is much that the law cannot give me. It cannot procure wife-like submission, love, gratitude, or even decent matronly conduct. But that which it can give me, I will have.”
She walked off to the door, and then as she was quitting the room she spoke to him once again. “Alas, Louis,” she said, “neither can the law, nor medicine, nor religion, restore to you that fine intellect which foolish suspicions have destroyed.” Then she left him and returned to the room in which her aunt, and Nora, and the child were all clustered together, waiting to learn the effects of the interview. The two women asked their questions with their eyes, rather than with spoken words. “It is all over,” said Mrs. Trevelyan. “There is nothing left for me but to go back to papa. I only hear the same accusations, repeated again and again, and make myself subject to the old insults.” Then Mrs. Outhouse knew that she could interfere no further, and that in truth nothing could be done till the return of Sir Marmaduke should relieve her and her husband from all further active concern in the matter.
But Trevelyan was still downstairs waiting for the child. At last it was arranged that Nora should take the boy into the drawing-room, and that Mrs. Outhouse should fetch the father up from the parlour to the room above it. Angry as was Mrs. Trevelyan with her husband, not the less was she anxious to make the boy good-looking and seemly in his father’s eyes. She washed the child’s face, put on him a clean frill and a pretty ribbon; and, as she did so, she bade him kiss his papa, and speak nicely to him, and love him. “Poor papa is unhappy,” she said, “and Louey must be very good to him.” The boy, child though he was, understood much more of what was passing around him than his mother knew. How was he to love papa when mamma did not do so? In some shape that idea had framed itself in his mind; and, as he was taken down, he knew it was impossible that he should speak nicely to his papa. Nora did as she was bidden, and went down to the first-floor. Mrs. Outhouse, promising that even if she were put out of the room by Mr. Trevelyan she would not stir from the landing outside the door, descended to the parlour and quickly returned with the unfortunate father. Mr. Outhouse, in the meantime, was still sitting in his closet, tormented with curiosity, but yet determined not to be seen till the intruder should have left his house.
“I hope you are well, Nora,” he said, as he entered the room with Mrs. Outhouse.
“Quite well, thank
