“And how will that affect him?”
“Less powerfully than many others, because he is not impassioned. He is, perhaps—lethargic.”
“No, Wally, he is not lethargic.”
“If you ask me I must speak. It would harass some men almost to death; it will not do so with him. He would probably find his happiness best in leaving his old country and coming among your people.”
The idea of Mr. Glascock—the future Lord Peterborough—leaving England, abandoning Monkhams, deserting his duty in the House of Lords, and going away to live in an American town, in order that he might escape the miseries which his wife had brought upon him in his own country, was more than Caroline could bear. She knew that, at any rate, it would not come to that. The lord of Monkhams would live at Monkhams, though the heavens should fall—in regard to domestic comforts. It was clear to Caroline that Wallachia Petrie had in truth never brought home to her own imagination the position of an English peer. “I don’t think you understand the people at all,” she said angrily.
“You think that you can understand them better because you are engaged to this man!” said Miss Petrie, with well-pronounced irony. “You have found generally that when the sun shines in your eyes your sight is improved by it! You think that the love-talk of a few weeks gives clearer instruction than the laborious reading of many volumes and thoughtful converse with thinking persons! I hope that you may find it so, Caroline.” So saying Wallachia Petrie walked off in great dudgeon.
Miss Petrie, not having learned from her many volumes and her much converse with thoughtful persons to read human nature aright, was convinced by this conversation that her friend Caroline was blind to all results, and was determined to go on with this dangerous marriage, having the rays of that sun of Monkhams so full upon her eyes that she could not see at all. She was specially indignant at finding that her own words had no effect. But, unfortunately, her words had had much effect; and Caroline, though she had contested her points, had done so only with the intention of producing her Mentor’s admonitions. Of course it was out of the question that Mr. Glascock should go and live in Providence, Rhode Island, from which thriving town Caroline Spalding had come; but, because that was impossible, it was not the less probable that he might be degraded and made miserable in his own home. That suggested jury of British matrons was a frightful conclave to contemplate, and Caroline was disposed to believe that the verdict given in reference to herself would be adverse to her. So she sat and meditated, and spoke not a word further to anyone on the subject till she was alone with the man that she loved.
Mr. Spalding at this time inhabited the ground floor of a large palace in the city, from which there was access to a garden which at this period of the year was green, bright, and shady, and which as being in the centre of a city was large and luxurious. From one end of the house there projected a covered terrace, or loggia, in which there were chairs and tables, sculptured ornaments, busts, and old monumental relics let into the wall in profusion. It was half chamber and half garden—such an adjunct to a house as in our climate would give only an idea of cold, rheumatism, and a false romance, but under an Italian sky, is a luxury daily to be enjoyed during most months of the year. Here Mr. Glascock and Caroline had passed many hours—and here they were now seated, late in the evening, while all others of the family were away. As far as regarded the rooms occupied by the American Minister, they had the house and garden to themselves, and there never could come a time more appropriate for the saying of a thing difficult to be said. Mr. Glascock had heard from his father’s physician, and had said that it was nearly certain now that he need not go down to Naples again before his marriage. Caroline was trembling, not knowing how to speak, not knowing how to begin;—but resolved that the thing should be done. “He will never know you, Carry,” said Mr. Glascock. “It is, perhaps, hardly a sorrow to me, but it is a regret.”
“It would have been a sorrow perhaps to him had he been able to know me,” said she, taking the opportunity of rushing at her subject.
“Why so? Of all human beings he was the softest-hearted.”
“Not softer-hearted than you, Charles. But soft hearts have to be hardened.”
“What do you mean? Am I becoming obdurate?”
“I am, Charles,” she said. “I have got something to say to you. What will your uncles and aunts and your mother’s relations say of me when they see me at Monkhams?”
“They will swear to me that you are charming; and then—when my back is turned—they’ll pick you to pieces a little among themselves. I believe that is the way of the world, and I don’t suppose that we are to do better than others.”
“And if you had married an English girl, a Lady Augusta Somebody—would they pick her to pieces?”
“I guess they would, as you say.”
“Just the same?”
“I don’t think anybody escapes, as far as I can see. But that won’t prevent their becoming your bosom friends in a few weeks time.”
“No one will say that you have been wrong to marry an American girl?”
“Now, Carry, what is the meaning of all this?”
“Do you know any man in your position who ever did marry an American girl;—any man of your rank in England?” Mr. Glascock began to think of the case, and could not at the moment remember any instance. “Charles, I do not think you ought to be
