“Of course I see that she has been ill. She tells me that she was far from well at Salzburg.”
“Yes;—indeed for three or four days she frightened me much. She suffered terribly from headaches.”
“Nervous headaches?”
“So they said there. I feel quite angry with myself because I did not bring a doctor with us. The trouble and ceremony of such an accompaniment is no doubt disagreeable.”
“And I suppose seemed when you started to be unnecessary?”
“Quite unnecessary.”
“Does she complain again now?”
“She did today—a little.”
The next day Lady Mary could not leave her bed; and the Duke in his sorrow was obliged to apply to Mrs. Finn. After what had passed on the previous day Mrs. Finn of course called, and was shown at once up to her young friend’s room. There she found the girl in great pain, lying with her two thin hands up to her head, and hardly able to utter more than a word. Shortly after that Mrs. Finn was alone with the Duke, and then there took place a conversation between them which the lady thought to be very remarkable.
“Had I better send for a doctor from England?” he asked. In answer to this Mrs. Finn expressed her opinion that such a measure was hardly necessary, that the gentleman from the town who had been called in seemed to know what he was about, and that the illness, lamentable as it was, did not seem to be in any way dangerous. “One cannot tell what it comes from,” said the Duke dubiously.
“Young people, I fancy, are often subject to such maladies.”
“It must come from something wrong.”
“That may be said of all sickness.”
“And therefore one tries to find out the cause. She says that she is unhappy.” These last words he spoke slowly and in a low voice. To this Mrs. Finn could make no reply. She did not doubt but that the girl was unhappy, and she knew well why; but the source of Lady Mary’s misery was one to which she could not very well allude. “You know all the misery about that young man.”
“That is a trouble that requires time to cure it,” she said—not meaning to imply that time would cure it by enabling the girl to forget her lover; but because in truth she had not known what else to say.
“If time will cure it.”
“Time, they say, cures all sorrows.”
“But what should I do to help time? There is no sacrifice I would not make—no sacrifice! Of myself I mean. I would devote myself to her—leave everything else on one side. We purpose being back in England in October; but I would remain here if I thought it better for her comfort.”
“I cannot tell, Duke.”
“Neither can I. But you are a woman and might know better than I do. It is so hard that a man should be left with a charge of which from its very nature he cannot understand the duties.” Then he paused, but she could find no words which would suit at the moment. It was almost incredible to her that after what had passed he should speak to her at all as to the condition of his daughter. “I cannot, you know,” he said very seriously, “encourage a hope that she should be allowed to marry that man.”
“I do not know.”
“You yourself, Mrs. Finn, felt that when she told you about it at Matching.”
“I felt that you would disapprove of it.”
“Disapprove of it! How could it be otherwise? Of course you felt that. There are ranks in life in which the first comer that suits a maiden’s eye may be accepted as a fitting lover. I will not say but that they who are born to such a life may be the happier. They are, I am sure, free from troubles to which they are incident whom fate has called to a different sphere. But duty is—duty;—and whatever pang it may cost, duty should be performed.”
“Certainly.”
“Certainly;—certainly; certainly,” he said, reechoing her word.
“But then, Duke, one has to be so sure what duty requires. In many matters this is easy enough, and the only difficulty comes from temptation. There are cases in which it is so hard to know.”
“Is this one of them?”
“I think so.”
“Then the maiden should—in any class of life—be allowed to take the man—that just suits her eye?” As he said this his mind was intent on his Glencora and on Burgo Fitzgerald.
“I have not said so. A man may be bad, vicious, a spendthrift—eaten up by bad habits.” Then he frowned, thinking that she also had her mind intent on his Glencora and on that Burgo Fitzgerald, and being most unwilling to have the difference between Burgo and Frank Tregear pointed out to him. “Nor have I said,” she continued, “that even were none of these faults apparent in the character of a suitor, the lady should in all cases be advised to accept a young man because he has made himself agreeable to her. There may be discrepancies.”
“There are,” said he, still with a low voice, but with infinite energy—“insurmountable discrepancies.”
“I only said that this was a case in which it might be difficult for you to see your duty plainly.”
“Why should it be?”
“You would not have her—break her heart?” Then he was silent for awhile, turning over in his mind the proposition which now seemed to have been made to him. If the question came to that—should she be allowed to break her heart and die, or should he save her from that fate by sanctioning her marriage with Tregear? If the choice could be put to him plainly by some supernal power, what then would he choose? If duty required him to prevent this marriage, his
