Hester

at the same time he would never let her alone, he would still let her see that she was in his mind. She disliked him, yet⁠—She almost loved him, but still⁠—Nothing could be more tantalising, more entirely unlike indifference. To think of meeting Edward in society, yet not under Catherine’s eye, made her heart beat loudly. She had never done this hitherto. She had met him by chance on the Common or in the country roads about, and his voice had been almost that of a lover. She had met him before the world, and he had scarcely seemed to know her. But how could these meetings test what he meant? This it was that made Ellen’s proposal exciting, even while she herself half scorned it. Harry? no! Poor Harry! she would not disturb his peace, nor say a word, nor even look a look which should put him in jeopardy. But Edward?⁠—ah! that was a different matter. It was with all the vehemence of a quarrel that she snatched at the chance put into her hands, even when she had seemed to scorn it. To know what he meant⁠—to know what was his real state of mind. If he would be afraid of what the world would say, as well as of what Catherine would say⁠—in that case there was no scorn which Hester did not feel herself capable of pouring out upon her unworthy admirer; but if things proved different? Ah! then she did not know what softening, what yielding, she might not be capable of. The very thought melted her heart.

And yet she had thought herself more “interested” (this was what she called it) in Roland Ashton than in any man whom she had ever heard of before. The world had seemed all blank to her when he went away. His step at the door had made her heart thrill: the commonplace day had brightened up into something smiling and sweet when he came in. But then she had not been fighting a duel with him half her life as she had been doing with Edward. She was not curious, intriguée, to know what Roland meant. She thought (with a blush) that she did know⁠—more or less⁠—what he meant. But Edward was a sort of sphinx; he was an enemy to be beaten, a riddle to be read. She said to herself, what would please her best would be to force him into self-abandonment, to carry him so out of himself that he should give up all pretences and own himself at her disposal, and then to turn her back upon him and scorn him. Would she have done so? she thought she would, and that in this lay the secret of her interest in Edward and his crooked ways. And now, here was the trial approaching. She would see what was his true mettle, she would be able indeed to judge of him now.

“Hester,” said Mrs. John appearing at the open door, “what do you mean by lingering in the cold, to get your death? You will be chilled to your very bones. You have not even a shawl on, and in this cold place. What are you doing? I have called you three times, and you never paid any attention. Even to stand here for five minutes freezes me.”

“Then don’t stand here, mamma,” said Hester, taking hold of her mother’s arm and thus leading her back in the old way. They did not walk about very much together now. Hester preferred her own thoughts to her mother’s society, and Mrs. John was not sorry to be left quietly by herself at the fireside. How long it seemed since the time when she held her mother’s arm clasped in hers whenever she moved, and used it as a helm to guide that timid and trustful woman wherever she would! A little compunction came over her as she made use of that well-known expedient again, and steered her mother (all the more gently for that thought) back to her own chair.

“Yes, yes, dear, this is very comfortable,” said Mrs. John, “but I wish you had come at once, when I called you, for we must not lose any time in thinking about your dresses. You must do Ellen credit, that is one thing clear. I can’t have you dowdy, Hester. The Merridew girls shall not have a word to say about the Vernons on your account. Oh, I know they will if they can; they will whisper and say how proud we all are, and give ourselves airs, and just look at Hester in a washed muslin! I would rather go without my dinner,” said Mrs. John with vehemence, “for a whole year.”

“But I shall not let you do that, mamma.”

“Oh, Hester, just hold your tongue. What do you know about it? I would rather sell my Indian shawl, or my pearls⁠—Dear me, what a good thing I did not part with my pearls! that is something nobody can turn up their noses at. And you can say you got them from your mother, and your grandmother before her⁠—which is more than they ever had. But there are the dresses to be thought of,” said the tender mother, looking in Hester’s face, half awed, half appealing: for even in the pride of descent she was forced to remember that you cannot send your child to a Thé Dansante with nothing but a string of pearls round her neck, however fine, and however long in the family it may have been.

“Dresses! one will do,” said Hester, with a little flush of pleasure, yet determination to repress her mother’s unnecessary liberality. “You forget what you are talking of, mother dear. One dress is as much as⁠—”

“And to whom do you suppose you are speaking,” said Mrs. John with dignity; “there are a great many things which you think you know better than I. Perhaps you are wrong there too; but I am not going to bandy words