CHAPTER XII.

Les gens vertueux sont rares, mais ceux qui estiment la vertu ne le sont pas; d’autant moins qu’il y a mille occasions dans la vie, où l’on a absolument besoin des personnes qui en ont.—_Marivaux._

Lord Montreville recovered slowly, but satisfactorily. The doctor, the servants, Milly, all on different occasions, and in different manners, conveyed to his mind an impression of Lucy’s unceasing attention to him during his illness. Indeed, the old doctor had imbibed such an enthusiastic admiration for Lady Montreville’s unpresuming, frank, and affectionate character, that he could scarcely speak of her without tears in his eyes.

Lord Montreville found his gratitude daily increase his affection; and when she brought him his child whose caresses and opening intelligence awoke in him emotions from as yet unexplored recesses of his heart, his love for his wife assumed a new character, and he felt for her as he had never yet felt for woman. He had hitherto seldom considered them in any light but as a mistress, a plaything, a necessary appendage to a large house and an establishment, or an object of conquest, either gained or to be gained. He had thought absence of harm, their highest recommendation. In Lucy he had first discovered that strong affections, strength of mind, patience, and perseverance could be perfectly compatible with almost childish candour, and singleness of heart.

While this revolution had taken place in Lord Montreville’s feelings, what were Lucy’s? The increased tenderness of his manner perplexed and confounded her. At moments, especially when her husband was playing with her boy, and watching with delight his attempts to walk, marking his recognition of familiar objects, and listening to the first half-uttered lispings of infancy, she almost yielded to her longing desire to be happy and affectionate, when the thought of Alicia Mowbray shot through her heart, and chilled the kindly smile on her lip, the soft expression of her eye, the tender intonation of her voice.

One day the child was playing on Lord Montreville’s sofa, when he beckoned her to sit there likewise. He passed his fingers through the curls of the boy’s fair hair, and looking at him with tenderness remarked, “I never knew before what engaging creatures children were! that clear white forehead, and those blue eyes, with such shady eyelashes, are just like yours, Lucy, and I do not love him the less for that.”

She thought how delightful such expressions would have been to her, could she have trusted them, and yet she felt almost guilty at receiving them so coldly. He passed his arm round her waist as he spoke. She dared not repel the caress, but she burst into tears, and suddenly rising, she said, “I must not be so foolish and nervous. I believe I want a little fresh air, for I have not been out these two days. I will go and take a turn in the park this lovely evening.”

She hastened to quit the room, leaving Lord Montreville surprised, and yet pleased, for he could not attribute this agitation to any cause except love for himself.

She sought the most retired part of the park. The sun was getting low, and lighted up the grey rough boles of the old oaks, while the slant beams tipped every object in the landscape with gold, and increased the rich variety of foliage, of form, and of colouring. The distant mountains were purple, the nearer ones adorned with every hue and tint, which blended most softly into the other. The young fawns were skipping and sporting on the smooth glades, between the tufts of trees, while the belling of the deer among the fern mingled with the hum of bees, the chirp of birds, and the summer sounds of evening.

She gazed around and thought, “How lovely, how beautiful is nature! How calm and cheerful every thing looks! It is more painful to feel unhappy while every thing seems so gay around one, than if all was as dreary and desolate as one’s own heart. Oh! how I do long to be happy!” and she began to think that perhaps she tormented herself foolishly; that there might be some excuse for her husband, of which she was not aware; that it was impossible any one could seem so affectionate as Lord Montreville, without feeling what he showed: she yielded to the genial influence of the scene around her, and vaguely hoped that all would yet come right.

“He will soon be well enough to read his letters,” she thought, “and as I am sure he is very fond of me now, whatever he may have been hitherto, he will be miserable when he finds the letter from that shocking woman; and he will be humble and penitent, and tell me the whole truth, and then I will forgive him, and then he must love me a great deal better than ever, for being so very kind.”

With the exception perhaps of a few singular persons who seem to enjoy being miserable, there is so strong a desire of happiness in the youthful mind, and something so painful in a continued state of depression, that the spirits will spring up, unless new causes of unhappiness arise; and Lucy returned from her walk with an elastic step, and a sensation as if a weight had been taken off her mind, although nothing had occurred which in the slightest degree altered her situation.

Lord Montreville was now able to bear the full light, and to move into the next room. He became anxious to see his letters. He asked for the key of the escrutoire, in which they were locked up. The moment was come when she had to impart to him that she had ventured to break the seal of some of them. With a beating heart, and trembling hand, she showed him that she had received from the agent, and told him how she had in consequence been obliged to open some of his letters, to find the papers required.

Lord Montreville’s colour changed. He repeated his request for the key, and without making any farther remark, he rang the bell for his own man, and taking his arm, walked into his morning-room. He dismissed the servant, and Lucy heard him lock the door, as if to preclude all chance of interruption.

She sat with a palpitating heart, counting and calculating the time it would take him to read through the mass of papers which had accumulated, and wondering when he would rush to her feet to crave mercy and forgiveness. It was evident by the change in his countenance, by his silence, by his ringing for his servant, instead of asking for her supporting arm, that he expected letters from this woman. She remained hoping, doubting, fearing.

Dinner-time arrived. Lord Montreville was not yet well enough to dine with her, so she ate, or rather could not eat, her solitary morsel.

They generally drank tea together. She wondered whether she should find him in the drawing-room as usual. She wondered how he would receive her. She did find him there as usual, but with him the nurse and child.

That evening their boy first toddled alone from the father’s sofa to the mother’s knee, and Lucy caught him up, and devoured him with kisses, in a transport of delight and pride, that mothers, and mothers only, can comprehend. “Oh!” she thought, “he will own all to me to-night, and I shall forgive him for the sake of that dear child.”

The boy went to bed—the candles came—Lucy took her work, and sat down with her back rather turned towards Lord Montreville, wondering when the moment would arrive. “He is waiting till tea is over—the servants will be coming in and out.”

Tea did come. It was generally with them a meal, as Lord Montreville dined at two o’clock. It was however a meal, to which neither of them, that evening, did justice. At length urn, toast, butter, bread, and cakes, were removed, and Lucy’s heart might almost have been heard to beat, when the last servant shut the door.

“He must speak now,” she thought. But the silence continued unbroken, and she determined not to be the first to break it. She sat, imagining in what words he would open the subject, till the first sound of his voice made her almost start from her seat. He asked her to put the shade over the candles a little lower down. He had to repeat the request, before she could collect her thoughts so as to comply with it. “He is ashamed I should see his countenance, when he speaks of this disgraceful connexion,” she thought; and she remained again in expectation.

Another silence succeeded. For very awkwardness Lucy wished to say something, but she could think of nothing that did not either lead away from the subject uppermost in both their minds, or else indirectly lead to it. Every sentence she planned, sounded either too formal, or too tender. At length she fell back upon the never-failing resource of the bankrupt in conversation; and after ten minutes’ reflection and consideration, she promulgated “It is very hot to-night!” He agreed, and begged her to look at Moore’s Almanack, to see what weather was there predicted. He continued to say a vast deal upon the subject, to which she replied in absent monosyllables.

There was no more to be extracted from this topic. Lord Montreville had foretold drought, and rain, wind and heat, storm and sunshine, and Lucy had assented to the probability of each in succession, when another silence ensued. She began to feel angry at being treated with such coldness, and such contempt, that he did not even deem any apology or explanation due to her; as if he imagined her only fit to be a nurse, only capable of talking about the weather. Her heart, which had been yearning towards the father of her child, became suddenly chilled and shut up.

Her wrongs rose before her eyes in fearful array against him; and if he had then entered upon the subject, he would have found her in a very different frame of mind from that in which she had been at the commencement of their tête-à-tête. She made a variety of the most insipid common-place remarks, in the most dry and indifferent tone of voice. Never was dialogue kept up between two strangers in a more constrained tone, than between this couple, who really entertained a great affection for each other, and on the evening of the day on which their first child had first walked alone.

The fact is, that Lord Montreville was thunderstruck when he found his letters had been opened; though, under the circumstances, he confessed to himself there had been no other course for Lucy to pursue. He was still more horrified, when he found the fatal letter among the number of those of which the seal had been broken. Even according to his own idea of morality, such a proceeding became wrong when it reached the wife’s knowledge: and his attachment to that wife had latterly so much increased, that he found his opinions upon the duties of matrimony vastly more strict than before his illness. The liaison which had appeared to him a matter of such trifling importance while he believed her ignorant of it, suddenly assumed, even in his eyes, the character of a sin of the first magnitude when he felt it known to a being so innocent, so conscientious as the young wife whom he had now learned to respect, as well as to love. He half persuaded himself it was impossible she could have read, or at least have comprehended the purport of the letter, or she could never have nursed him with such unremitting attention, without ever speaking, implying, or looking a reproach.

He also had awaited the evening meeting with dread and agitation, half expecting that he must go through a scene of tears and explanation. As she alluded not to the subject, he half hoped at first that she had not read the letter. He had instinctively availed himself of the weather to attempt a conversation on indifferent subjects; but, adept as he was at giving what turn he pleased to conversation in society, he was unequal to the task now. She did not assist him, and he became nearly convinced by her taciturnity that she knew all, and then his spirit felt abashed before her’s.

He mentally resolved to break off entirely with Alicia, and for the future to be the most exemplary of husbands; but he had not the nobleness of character to be able willingly to own his fault, and to throw himself on her mercy for forgiveness. Indeed, though he could not choose but admire her conduct, supposing she was acquainted with his errors, still the admiration he felt did not attract him. On the contrary, the consciousness of inferiority, from which he could not defend himself, _vis-à-vis_ of a woman, and of one whom he had raised from comparative obscurity, chilled the love which had been gradually increasing in his heart, with the growth of his newly-awakened parental affection. This evening, and many succeeding evenings and mornings, passed off in _gêne_ and coldness.

Lucy’s generous impulse of forgiveness had changed to a feeling of disgust for his unblushing immorality, contempt for what she thought was hypocrisy in his tender expressions towards herself, and indignation at the insult offered to her as a wife, a mother, and a young and lovely woman. She wrapt herself up in cool reserve.

If at first Lord Montreville could not work himself up to a full confession in all contrition and humility, still less could he do so, when the soft, the mild, the timid Lucy, had assumed a certain calm, composed, and self-possessed manner, which repelled, rather than invited confidence.