The Claverings Part 36

He understood it all as well as the reader will understand it. He knew how it was with her, and was aware that he was at that instant false almost equally to her and to Florence. He knew that the question he had asked was one to which there could be made a true and satisfactory answer, but that his safety lay in the fact that that answer was all but impossible for her to give. Could she say, "Yes, you can comfort me.

Tell me that you yet love me, and I will be comforted?" But he had not designed to bring her into such difficulty as this. He had not intended to be cruel. He had drifted into treachery unawares, and was torturing her, not because he was wicked, but because he was weak. He had held her hand now for some minute or two, but still she did not speak to him.

Then he raised it and pressed it warmly to his lips.

"No, Harry," she said, jumping from her seat and drawing her hand rapidly from him; "no; it shall not be like that. Let it be Lady Ongar again if the sound of the other name brings back too closely the memory of other days. Let it be Lady Ongar again. I can understand that it will be better." As she spoke she walked away from him across the room, and he followed her.

"Are you angry?" he asked her.

"No, Harry; not angry. How should I be angry with you who alone are left to me of my old friends? But, Harry, you must think for me, and spare me in my difficulty."

"Spare you, Julia?"

"Yes, Harry, spare me; you must be good to me and considerate, and make yourself like a brother to me. But people will know you are not a brother, and you must remember all that for my sake. But you must not leave me or desert me. Anything that people might say would be better than that."

"Was I wrong to kiss your hand?"

"Yes, wrong, certainly wrong--that is, not wrong, but unmindful."

"I did it," he said, "because I love you." As he spoke the tears stood in both his eyes.

"Yes; you love me, and I you; but not with love that may show itself in that form. That was the old love, which I threw away, and which has been lost. That was at an end when I--jilted you. I am not angry; but you will remember that that love exists no longer? You will remember that, Harry?"

He sat himself down in a chair in the far part of the room, and two tears coursed their way down his cheeks. She stood over him and watched him as he wept. "I did not mean to make you sad," she said. "Come, we will be sad no longer. I understand it all. I know how it is with you.

The old love is lost, but we shall not the less be friends." Then he rose suddenly from his chair, and taking her in his arms, and holding her closely to his bosom, pressed his lips to hers.

He was so quick in this that she had not the power, even if she had the wish, to restrain him. But she struggled in his arms, and held her face aloof from him as she gently rebuked his pa.s.sion. "No, Harry, no; not so," she said, "it must not be so."

"Yes, Julia, yes; it shall be so; ever so--always so." And he was still holding her in his arms, when the door opened, and with stealthy, cat-like steps Sophie Gordeloup entered the room. Harry immediately retreated from his position, and Lady Ongar turned upon her friend, and glared upon her with angry eyes.

"Ah," said the little Franco-Pole, with an expression of infinite delight on her detestable visage, "ah, my dears, is it not well that I thus announce myself?"

"No," said Lady Ongar, "it is not well. It is anything but well."

"And why not well, Julie? Come, do not be foolish. Mr. Clavering is only a cousin, and a very handsome cousin, too. What does it signify before me?"

"It signifies nothing before you," said Lady Ongar.

"But before the servant, Julie--?"

"It would signify nothing before anybody."

"Come, come, Julie, dear; that is nonsense."

"Nonsense or no nonsense, I would wish to be private when I please. Will you tell me, Madam Gordeloup, what is your pleasure at the present moment?"

"My pleasure is to beg your pardon and to say you must forgive your poor friend. Your fine man-servant is out, and Bessy let me in. I told Bessy I would go up by myself, and that is all. If I have come too late I beg pardon."

"Not too late, certainly--as I am still up."

"And I wanted to ask you about the pictures to-morrow? You said, perhaps you would go to-morrow--perhaps not."

Clavering had found himself to be somewhat awkwardly situated while Madam Gordeloup was thus explaining the causes of her having come unannounced into the room; as soon, therefore, as he found it practicable, he took his leave. "Julia," he said, "as Madam Gordeloup is with you, I will now go."

"But you will let me see you soon?"

"Yes, very soon; that is, as soon as I return from Clavering. I leave town early to-morrow morning."

"Good-by then," and she put out her hand to him frankly, smiling sweetly on him. As he felt the warm pressure of her hand he hardly knew whether to return it or reject it. But he had gone too far now for retreat, and he held it firmly for a moment in his own. She smiled again upon him, oh! so pa.s.sionately, and nodded her head at him. He had never, he thought, seen a woman look so lovely, or move light of heart. How different was her countenance now from that she had worn when she told him, earlier on that fatal evening, of all the sorrows that made her wretched! That nod of hers said so much. "We understand each other now--do we not? Yes; although this spiteful woman has for the moment come between us, we understand each other. And is it not sweet? Ah! the troubles of which I told you you, you have cured them all." All that had been said plainly in her farewell salutation, and Harry had not dared to contradict it by any expression of his countenance.

"By, by, Mr. Clavering," said Sophie.

"Good evening, Madam Gordeloup," said Harry, turning upon her a look of bitter anger. Then he went, leaving the two women together, and walked home to Bloomsbury Square--not with the heart of a joyous, thriving lover.

Chapter XXV

The Day of the Funeral

Harry Clavering, when he had walked away from Bolton Street after the scene in which he had been interrupted by Sophie Gordeloup, was not in a happy frame of mind, nor did he make his journey down to Clavering with much comfort to himself. Whether or not he was now to be regarded as a villain, at any rate he was not a villain capable of doing his villainy without extreme remorse and agony of mind. It did not seem to him to be even yet possible that he should be altogether untrue to Florence. It hardly occurred to him to think that he could free himself from the contract by which he was bound to her: No; it was toward Lady Ongar that his treachery must be exhibited toward the woman whom he had sworn to befriend, and whom he now, in his distress, imagined to be the dearer to him of the two. He should, according to his custom, have written to Florence a day or two before he left London, and, as he went to Bolton Street, had determined to do so that evening on his return home; but when he reached his rooms he found it impossible to write such a letter.

What could he say to her that would not be false? How could he tell her that he loved her, and speak as he was wont to do of his impatience, after that which had just occurred in Bolton Street?

But what was he to do in regard to Julia? He was bound to let her know at once what was his position, and to tell her that in treating her as he had treated her, he had simply insulted her. That look of gratified contentment with which she had greeted him as he was leaving her, clung to his memory and tormented him. Of that contentment he must now rob her, and he was bound to do so with as little delay as was possible.

Early in the morning before he started on his journey he did make an attempt, a vain attempt, to write, not to Florence but to Julia. The letter would not get itself written. He had not the hardihood to inform her that he had amused himself with her sorrows, and that he had injured her by the exhibition of his love. And then that horrid Franco-Pole, whose prying eyes Julia had dared to disregard, because she had been proud of his love! If she had not been there, the case might have been easier. Harry, as he thought of this, forgot to remind himself that if Sophie had not interrupted him he would have floundered on from one danger to another till he would have committed himself more thoroughly even than he had done, and have made promises which it would have been as shameful to break as it would be to keep them. But even as it was, had he not made such promises? Was there not such a promise in that embrace, in the half-forgotten word or two which he had spoken while she was in his arms, and in the parting grasp of his hand? He could not write that letter then, on that morning, hurried as he was with the necessity of his journey; and he started for Clavering resolving that it should be written from his father's house.

It was a tedious, sad journey to him, and he was silent and out of spirits when he reached his home; but he had gone there for the purpose of his cousin's funeral, and his mood was not at first noticed, as it might have been had the occasion been different. His father's countenance wore that well-known look of customary solemnity which is found to be necessary on such occasions, and his mother was still thinking of the sorrows of Lady Clavering, who had been at the rectory for the last day or two.

"Have you seen Lady Ongar since she heard of the poor child's death?"

his mother asked.

"Yes; I was with her yesterday evening."

"Do you see her often?" f.a.n.n.y inquired.

"What do you call often? No; not often. I went to her last night because she had given me a commission. I have seen her three or four times altogether."

"Is she as handsome as she used to be?" said f.a.n.n.y.

"I cannot tell; I do not know."

"You used to think her very handsome, Harry."

"Of course she is handsome. There has never been a doubt about that; but when a woman is in deep mourning one hardly thinks about her beauty."

Oh, Harry, Harry, how could you be so false?

"I thought young widows were always particularly charming," said f.a.n.n.y; "and when one remembers about Lord Ongar one does not think of her being a widow so much as one would do if he had been different."