“Spare her, indeed! You have but to ask her, and she will spare herself. She won’t ask my leave. She is pining for a change. She even wanted to go into a convent by way of variety. She would think nothing of going over to Rome; and if you take her to Italy you will have to be very careful that the priests don’t get hold of her.”
“I will take care of her, Sophy. Benson and I will keep the priests at bay. Benson is a dragon of Protestantism.”
It was settled that Hester should meet Eve and her maid in Paris early in April, and that they should travel from that city, slowly and at their ease, by Basle and Lucerne to Milan, and thence to the Italian lakes, or possibly to Venice. Eve trembled as she spoke the name of that fatal city. She had a morbid longing to go there to look upon her brother’s grave before she died. She could afford to indulge any fancy in the way of travelling, for the pin-money sent her quarterly by the trustee to her marriage settlement was sufficient for her wants, and over and above this private income of hers the trustee, who was also her husband’s solicitor, sent her a hundred and fifty pounds quarterly, in accordance with Mr. Vansittart’s parting instructions. She had protested against this extra allowance, assuring the solicitor that the income under her settlement was sufficient for her maintenance, and the solicitor had replied that he was instructed to furnish her with six hundred a year during his client’s absence from Europe, and that as his client was in Africa, beyond the reach of letters, it was impossible to depart from his instructions. Eve was thus richer than her needs, and was able to be generous to the sisters, whose letters informed her of the result of her bounty, in the shape of a much smarter style of living at the Homestead. They had a page to open the door; they dined at eight o’clock, and they always had dessert on the table. They had their afternoon; and carriages—chiefly pony—came from far distances to take tea with them, Jenny assured her sister.
“Your marriage lifted us all out of the mire,” wrote Jenny; “but it is too sad to think of Jack in Africa and you a brokenhearted wanderer. It is awfully sad, and we can none of us guess the why or the wherefore. We feel that there must be some terrible secret. No light reason could have parted you. Mr. Sefton is at the Manor, hunting every day, and going long distances by rail when there are no hounds in the neighbourhood. We hear he has been paying attentions to Lord Haverstock’s only daughter, who will be enormously rich. No doubt he will end by marrying for money. Poor Sophy turned deadly pale the first Sunday she saw him in church. We were earlier than usual, and we were seated in our pew as he came up the nave, staring about him as if he had been in a theatre.”
With Hetty for her travelling companion, Eve felt more her own mistress, and, therefore, happier than she had felt with Sophy. Hetty was only fifteen, and might be treated as a child, and, indeed, she still possessed some of the best attributes of childhood; was incurious about the future save when it promised some novelty, change of place, new possession, amusement or excitement; was deeply interested in trifles, and had no margin of mind left for serious things.
Such a companion may do much for a heart weighed down by the burden of unavailing regret. Hetty, when allowed to give full scope to her own absorbing individuality, left very little room for anyone else’s feelings. Her delight in travelling was so intense as to be almost contagious. Everything interested her, and the newness of things was a perpetual surprise. She paused in her raptures only to pity the people who are doomed never to travel. She kept a list of the towns through which she passed, were it only sitting in a railway carriage. She had brought the shabby old family atlas from the Homestead, and had it open on her lap in the railway carriage, poring over it till her eyes ached, and rarely able to find the place she was looking for in that pale and faded type.
They stopped a couple of nights at Basle, where the Rhine was rapture. They stopped a week at the Schweitzerhoff, and exhausted the drives and excursions about Lucerne, and explored the lake of the Forest Cantons, and climbed the Righi, and did all that the veriest Cockney tourist can do, personally conducted by Hetty, who read her Baedeker every morning, and gave her sister no rest till the day’s excursion had been settled upon.
“Sophy said I was not to let you brood,” explained Hetty. “I was to take care you went about and enjoyed the scenery.”
Eve went about uncomplainingly, first to please Hetty, and next because days and weeks must be got rid of somehow, and sorrow must keep moving by day if it would court a few hours’ respite by night. Eve had her little cough still—only a little cough; but the experienced Benson heard that dull, hacking sound with some anxiety, remembering poor Peggy’s chance, and how little it had done for her. Would it ever come to that pass with her young mistress, Benson wondered? Was the fatal strain in the blood of all these fair sisters, with their transparent complexions and hectic bloom? Half a year ago Eve had seemed in exuberant health, as well as in exuberant spirits, the fairest type of youthful womanhood, dancing along the flowery path of life with foot so light as never to touch the thorns, or disturb the snake asleep in the sun. The parting with the man she adored had changed her whole being, and the sound of her laughter
