“What does he say?”
“Say;—what should he say?—just that he has behaved very badly, and that he hopes I shall forgive him.”
“Not quite that; does he?”
“That’s what it all means. Of course, there is ever so much of it—pages of it. It wouldn’t be Lord Fawn if he didn’t spin it all out like an Act of Parliament, with ‘whereas’ and ‘wherein,’ and ‘whereof.’ It is full of all that; but the meaning of it is that he’s at my feet again, and that I may pick him up if I choose to take him. I’d show you the letter, only perhaps it wouldn’t be fair to the poor man.”
“What excuse does he make?”
“Oh—as to that he’s rational enough. He calls the necklace the—bone of contention. That’s rather good for Lord Fawn; isn’t it? The bone of contention, he says, has been removed; and, therefore, there is no reason why we shouldn’t marry if we like it. He shall hear enough about the bone of contention if we do ‘marry.’ ”
“And what shall you do now?”
“Ah, yes; that’s easily asked; is it not? The man’s a good sort of man in his way, you know. He doesn’t drink or gamble; and I don’t think there is a bit of the King David about him—that I don’t.”
“Virtue personified, I should say.”
“And he isn’t extravagant.”
“Then why not have him and have done with it?” asked Mrs. Carbuncle.
“He is such a lumpy man,” said Lizzie;—“such an ass; such a load of Government waste-paper.”
“Come, my dear;—you’ve had troubles.”
“I have, indeed,” said Lizzie.
“And there’s no quite knowing yet how far they’re over.”
“What do you mean by that, Mrs. Carbuncle?”
“Nothing very much;—but still, you see, they may come again. As to Lord George, we all know that he has not got a penny-piece in the world that he can call his own.”
“If he had as many pennies as Judas, Lord George would be nothing to me,” said Lizzie.
“And your cousin really doesn’t seem to mean anything.”
“I know very well what my cousin means. He and I understand each other thoroughly; but cousins can love one another very well without marrying.”
“Of course you know your own business, but if I were you I would take Lord Fawn. I speak in true kindness—as one woman to another. After all, what does love signify? How much real love do we ever see among married people? Does Lady Glencora Palliser really love her husband, who thinks of nothing in the world but putting taxes on and off?”
“Do you love your husband, Mrs. Carbuncle?”
“No;—but that is a different kind of thing. Circumstances have caused me to live apart from him. The man is a good man, and there is no reason why you should not respect him, and treat him well. He will give you a fixed position—which really you want badly, Lady Eustace.”
“Tooriloo, tooriloo, tooriloo, looriloo,” said Lizzie, in contemptuous disdain of her friend’s caution.
“And then all this trouble about the diamonds and the robberies will be over,” continued Mrs. Carbuncle. Lizzie looked at her very intently. What should make Mrs. Carbuncle suppose that there need be, or, indeed, could be, any further trouble about the diamonds?
“So;—that’s your advice,” said Lizzie. “I’m half inclined to take it, and perhaps I shall. However, I have brought him round, and that’s something, my dear. And either one way or the other, I shall let him know that I like my triumph. I was determined to have it, and I’ve got it.”
Then she read the letter again very seriously. Could she possibly marry a man who in so many words told her that he didn’t want her? Well;—she thought she could. Was not everybody treating everybody else much in the same way? Had she not loved her Corsair truly—and how had he treated her? Had she not been true, disinterested, and most affectionate to Frank Greystock; and what had she got from him? To manage her business wisely, and put herself upon firm ground;—that was her duty at present. Mrs. Carbuncle was right there. The very name of Lady Fawn would be a rock to her—and she wanted a rock. She thought upon the whole that she could marry him;—unless Patience Crabstick and the police should again interfere with her prosperity.
LXVIII
The Major
Lady Eustace did not intend to take as much time in answering Lord Fawn’s letter as he had taken in writing it; but even she found that the subject was one which demanded a good deal of thought. Mrs. Carbuncle had very freely recommended her to take the man, supporting her advice by arguments which Lizzie felt to be valid; but then Mrs. Carbuncle did not know all the circumstances. Mrs. Carbuncle had not actually seen his lordship’s letter; and though the great part of the letter, the formal repetition, namely, of the writer’s offer of marriage, had been truly told to her, still, as the reader will have perceived, she had been kept in the dark as to some of the details. Lizzie did sit at her desk with the object of putting a few words together in order that she might see how they looked, and she found that there was a difficulty. “My dear Lord Fawn. As we have been engaged to marry each other, and as all our friends have been told, I think that the thing had better go on.” That, after various attempts, was, she thought, the best letter that she could send—if she should make up her mind to be Lady Fawn. But, on the morning of the 30th of March she had not sent her letter. She had told herself that she would take two days to think of her reply—and, on the Friday morning the few words she had prepared were still lying in her desk.
What was she to get by marrying a man she absolutely disliked? That he also absolutely disliked her was not a matter much in her thoughts. The man
