When he was with her at Siena, he described what had taken place with all the accuracy in his power. “He has intermittent days,” said Emily. “Tomorrow he will be in quite another frame of mind—melancholy, silent perhaps, and self-reproachful. We will both go tomorrow, and we shall find probably that he has forgotten altogether what has passed today between you and him.”
So their plans for the morrow were formed.
XCIII
“Say That You Forgive Me”
On the following day, again early in the morning, Mrs. Trevelyan and Stanbury were driven out to Casalunga. The country people along the road knew the carriage well, and the lady who occupied it, and would say that the English wife was going to see her mad husband. Mrs. Trevelyan knew that these words were common in the people’s mouths, and explained to her companion how necessary it would be to use these rumours, to aid her in putting some restraint over her husband even in this country, should they fail in their effort to take him to England. She saw the doctor in Siena constantly, and had learned from him how such steps might be taken. The measure proposed would be slow, difficult, inefficient, and very hard to set aside, if once taken;—but still it might be indispensable that something should be done. “He would be so much worse off here than he would be at home,” she said;—“if we could only make him understand that it would be so.” Then Stanbury asked about the wine. It seemed that of late Trevelyan had taken to drink freely, but only of the wine of the country. But the wine of the country in these parts is sufficiently stimulating, and Mrs. Trevelyan acknowledged that hence had arisen a further cause of fear.
They walked up the hill together, and Mrs. Trevelyan, now well knowing the ways of the place, went round at once to the front terrace. There he was, seated in his armchair, dressed in the same way as yesterday, dirty, dishevelled, and gaudy with various colours; but Stanbury could see at once that his mood had greatly changed. He rose slowly, dragging himself up out of his chair, as they came up to him, but showing as he did so—and perhaps somewhat assuming—the impotency of querulous sickness. His wife went to him, and took him by the hand, and placed him back in his chair. He was weak, he said, and had not slept, and suffered from the heat; and then he begged her to give him wine. This she did, half filling for him a tumbler, of which he swallowed the contents greedily. “You see me very poorly, Stanbury—very poorly,” he said, seeming to ignore all that had taken place on the previous day.
“You want change of climate, old fellow,” said Stanbury.
“Change of everything;—I want change of everything,” he said. “If I could have a new body and a new mind, and a new soul!”
“The mind and soul, dear, will do well enough, if you will let us look after the body,” said his wife, seating herself on a stool near his feet. Stanbury, who had settled beforehand how he would conduct himself, took out a cigar and lighted it;—and then they sat together silent, or nearly silent, for half an hour. She had said that if Hugh would do so, Trevelyan would soon become used to the presence of his old friend, and it seemed that he had already done so. More than once, when he coughed, his wife fetched him some drink in a cup, which he took from her without a word. And Stanbury the while went on smoking in silence.
“You have heard, Louis,” she said at last, “that, after all, Nora and Mr. Stanbury are going to be married?”
“Ah;—yes; I think I was told of it. I hope you may be happy, Stanbury;—happier than I have been.” This was unfortunate, but neither of the visitors winced, or said a word.
“It will be a pity that papa and mamma cannot be present at the wedding,” said Mrs. Trevelyan.
“If I had to do it again, I should not regret your father’s absence; I must say that. He has been my enemy. Yes, Stanbury—my enemy. I don’t care who hears me say so. I am obliged to stay here, because that man would swear every shilling I have away from me if I were in England. He would strive to do so, and the struggle in my state of health would be too much for me.”
“But Sir Marmaduke sails from Southampton this very week,” said Stanbury.
“I don’t know. He is always sailing, and always coming back again. I never asked him for a shilling in my life, and yet he has treated me as though I were his bitterest enemy.”
“He will trouble you no more now, Louis,” said Mrs. Trevelyan.
“He cannot trouble you again. He will have left England before you can possibly reach it.”
“He will have left other traitors behind him—though none as bad as himself,” said Trevelyan.
Stanbury, when his cigar was finished, rose and left the husband and wife together on the terrace. There was little enough to be seen at Casalunga, but he strolled about looking at the place. He went into the huge granary, and then down among the olive trees, and up into the sheds which had been built for beasts. He stood and teased the lizards, and listened to the hum of the insects, and wiped away the perspiration which rose to his brow even as he was standing. And all the while he was thinking what he would do next, or what say next, with the view of getting Trevelyan away from the place. Hitherto he had been very tender with him, contradicting him in nothing, taking from him good humouredly any absurd insult which
