“It is impossible to make you ashamed of anything,” he said.
“I certainly don’t like being ashamed,” she answered; “and don’t feel any necessity on this occasion.”
“If you don’t object, Mr. Palliser,” said Alice, “I will go to bed. You can think over all this at night—and so can I. Good night, Glencora.” Then Alice took her candle, and marched off to her own room, with all the dignity of which she was mistress.
LXIX
From Baden to Lucerne
The second week in July saw Mr. Palliser’s party, carriage and all, established at Lucerne, in Switzerland, safe beyond the reach of the German gambling tables. Alice Vavasor was still with them; and the reader will therefore understand that that quarrel about Lady Glencora’s wickedness had been settled without any rupture. It had been settled amicably, and by the time that they had reached Lucerne, Alice was inclined to acknowledge that the whole thing was not worth notice; but for many days her anger against Mr. Palliser had not been removed, and her intimacy with him had been much checked. It was now a month since the occurrence of that little scene in the salon at Baden, which was described in the last chapter—since Mr. Palliser had marched off with his wife, leaving Alice to follow as she best could by herself. After that, as the reader may remember, he had almost told her that she was to be blamed because of his wife’s indiscretion; and when she had declared her intention of leaving him, and making her way home to England by herself, he had answered her not at all, and had allowed her to go off to her own room under the full ban of his displeasure. Since that he had made no apology to her; he had not, in so many words, acknowledged that he had wronged her; but Alice had become aware that he intended to apologize by his conduct, and she had been content so far to indulge his obstinacy as to accept this conduct on his part in lieu of any outspoken petition for pardon. The acknowledgement of a mistake and the asking for grace is almost too much for any woman to expect from such a man as Mr. Palliser.
Early on the morning after the scene in question, Lady Glencora had gone into Alice’s bedroom, and had found her cousin in her dressing-gown, packing up her things, or looking as though she intended to do so. “You are not such a fool,” she said, “as to think anything of what occurred yesterday?” Alice assured her that, whether fool or not, she did think a great deal of it. “In point of fact,” said Alice, “I can’t stand it. He expects me to take care of you, and chooses to show himself offended if you don’t do just what he thinks proper; whereas, as you know well enough, I have not the slightest influence over you.” All these positions Lady Glencora contradicted vigorously. Of course, Mr. Palliser had been wrong in walking out of the Assembly Rooms as he had done, leaving Alice behind him. So much Lady Glencora admitted. But this had come of his intense anxiety. “And you know what a man he is,” said his wife—“how stiff, and hard, and unpleasant he can be without meaning it.”—“There is no reason why I should bear his unpleasantness,” said Alice. “Yes, there is—great reason. You are to do it for the sake of friendship. And as for my not doing what you tell me, you know that’s not true.”
“Did I not beg you to keep away from the table?”
“Of course you did, and of course I was naughty; but that was only once. Alice, I want you more than I ever wanted you before. I cannot tell you more now, but you must stay with me.”
Alice consented to come down to breakfast without any immediate continuance of her active preparations for going, and at last, of course, she stayed. When she entered the breakfast-room Mr. Palliser came up to her, and offered her his hand. She had no alternative but to take it, and then seated herself. That there was an intended apology in the manner in which he offered her toast and butter, she was convinced; and the special courtesy with which he handed her to the carriage, when she and Lady Glencora went out for their drive, after dinner, was almost as good as a petition for pardon. So the thing went on, and by degrees Mr. Palliser and Miss Vavasor were again friends.
But Alice never knew in what way the matter was settled between Mr. Palliser and his wife, or whether there was any such settling. Probably there was none. “Of course, he understands that it didn’t mean anything,” Lady Glencora had said. “He knows that I don’t want to gamble.” But let that be as it might, their sojourn at Baden was curtailed, and none of the party went up again to the Assembly Rooms before their departure.
Before establishing themselves at Lucerne they made a little tour round by the Falls of the Rhine and Zurich. In their preparations for this journey, Alice made a struggle, but a struggle in vain, to avoid a passage through Basle. It was only too clear to her that Mr. Palliser was determined to go by Basle. She could not bring herself to say that she had recollections connected with that place which would make a return to it unpleasant to her. If she could have said as much, even to Glencora, Mr. Palliser would no doubt have gone round—round by any more distant route that might have been necessary to avoid that eternal gateway into Switzerland. But she could not say it. She was very averse to talking about herself and her own affairs, even with her cousin. Of course Lady Glencora knew the whole story of Mr. John Grey and his rejection—and knew much also of that other
