CHAPTER XIV

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VERY PRIVATE THEATRICALS.

The river was gray and dim in the twilight by this time; for the first half of October was gone, and the dusky shadows gathered early on Mr. Hillary’s lawn. Francis Tredethlyn found the gardens deserted when he left the terrace, and walked slowly towards the house, where lights were gleaming in innumerable windows. The young man had only ridden down to Twickenham that morning, and had no special engagement to dine at the Cedars.

“I’ll go round to the stables at once,” he thought, “and I can call in Moorgate Street to-morrow, and tell Mr. Hillary that I think of going abroad. Why should I see _her_ again? The sight of her will only make me foolish, and keep me here in spite of myself.”

The lady thus vaguely alluded to was not Miss Desmond; but when Francis Tredethlyn entered Mr. Hillary’s house by the first open window that presented itself on the upper terrace, he found himself in a little study much affected by the ladies of the household, and came suddenly upon a female figure sitting alone in the dark.

Something like a guilty pang shot through him as he recognized that stately figure, even in the shadowy obscurity of the unlighted room. In the next moment there was a rustling of silk, and Miss Desmond had risen and was facing him in the twilight.

“Yes, it _is_ Mr. Tredethlyn,” she said, presently. “What have you been doing with yourself all the afternoon? There has been a grand discussion about some amateur theatricals, concerning which Maude Hillary is absolutely bewitched, and we want you to act.”

“I think you’ve got plenty of fellows who’ll act better than I can, Miss Desmond; though I did try my hand at the business once in Van Diemen’s Land; and I’d be glad to make myself useful in any way that would please Miss Hillary, if it was to dress myself as a footman and carry a tea-tray or a scuttle of coals; but I think I shall be leaving England before the theatricals come off; in point of fact, I think I shall be leaving England directly.”

“Leaving England!”

The expression of those two words could scarcely have been more tragical than it was; and yet for once in a way Miss Desmond was _not_ acting. All in a moment she saw the fair edifice which she had schemed to build for herself crumbling into ruin and chaos.

“Leaving England!” she repeated,--“you think of leaving England, Mr. Tredethlyn?”

She put her hands to her forehead with a little tragic gesture: and Francis Tredethlyn wished that he had entered the house by any other door or window than that which he had chosen.

Julia’s dismay was entirely real; for the disappointment was very bitter to this young lady; who had built up a fair future for herself on the foundation of Francis Tredethlyn’s wealth. The grim walls of Castle Desmond, the silver waters of the Shannon, the green hill sides and lonely valleys, made themselves into a picture that shut out the dusky room, and then melted into gray blankness. She had meant to do such great things with Francis Tredethlyn’s thirty thousand a year!

The young man stood looking at her in as much embarrassment as if he had been guilty of some wilful deception. He was so little of a coxcomb, that it was very difficult for him to imagine that his sudden departure could give pain to the brilliant Julia. He was so entirely simple and true-hearted, that no suspicion of Miss Desmond’s mercenary views had any place in his mind.

There was a very brief pause, and then Julia murmured, in low, half-broken accents--

“You are really going away?--but why?”

“Oh, Miss Desmond, I scarcely like to tell you why; and yet it’s not altogether on that account,” answered Francis, vaguely. “There are other reasons. I am not in my right place amongst such people as I meet here. I’m a rough, uneducated fellow, and idleness doesn’t suit me. I want to be of some use in the world. Why, I felt myself a better man out yonder, without sixpence in my pocket, than I am to-day, in spite of Oliver Tredethlyn’s money. So I mean to buy a commission and go out to India, where there’s some fighting to be done.”

“You are not telling me the truth, Mr. Tredethlyn. _This_ is not your real reason for running away from the Cedars, as if the house were infected.”

“My dear Miss Desmond, I--you have been so kind to me--you have made me feel so much at home here, where, but for you, I must have felt myself so miserably out of place.”

“Why should you be out of place amongst these people?” cried Julia, drawing up her head with a proud gesture, “unless,” she murmured, in a thoughtful undertone--“unless because these people are so much beneath you.”

Miss Desmond had entirely recovered herself by this time. All at once, after sitting a long time at the table, playing her cards with infinite tact and patience,--all at once she found herself losing the game, and saw that only the boldest play could help her. But Julia was equal to the situation. The second of December had come upon her very suddenly; but she did not despair of triumphing by a _coup d’état_.

“Tell me the truth, Mr. Tredethlyn,” she said, looking Francis full in the face, with her eyes and teeth gleaming in the twilight; “why are you going to leave this house? Why do you talk of hurrying away from England?”

“Because--because--I have done you a wrong in absorbing so much of your society, Miss Desmond, and the people here have begun to mix your name with mine. I cannot bear that you, who are so superior to me, should be humiliated by such an association; especially when there is no foundation for their talk,” Francis Tredethlyn added, in considerable embarrassment.

“Oh, I understand it all now,” answered Julia, with an unutterable bitterness in her tone; “you have been warned against me, Mr. Tredethlyn. I am only a fortune-huntress, and I have been spreading my toils about your innocent footsteps, and it is only by flight that you can save yourself. Oh, yes!” she cried, with an ironical laugh, which seemed to express a keener anguish than another woman’s wildest sob, “I know how these people talk!”

“Miss Desmond, on my honour----”

“Mr. Tredethlyn, on _my_ honour, I know the world better than you do. If you had devoted yourself to any other woman in this house, to any daughter of that mercantile aristocracy in which Mr. Hillary rules supreme, no sneering comments would have greeted your ear. But what am I--the daughter of the Desmonds of Desmond--amongst these people? What am I but Maude Hillary’s dependant and companion? I am poor, and I endure poverty in its most cruel bitterness; for I am poor amongst the vulgar rich. Who can give me credit for sincerity? who dare trust in my friendship? I am a well-bred pauper, a fortune-huntress, an adventuress, a creature whose smiles are to be dreaded, whose society is to be avoided. O Francis Tredethlyn,” cried Julia, with a sudden shiver of agony, which would have done credit to a Rachel, “_I know so well_ what has been said to you. Go--go at once. You are wise to accept the warning conveyed in these people’s insolent insinuations. Go--there is a gulf between you and me, for you are rich and I am poor. Beware of me even when I seem most sincere. Remember that I am a pauper, and the descendant of paupers--paupers who shed their blood and squandered their fortunes in a losing cause; paupers who died for the love of honour and loyalty, two words that would seem the emptiest sounds to merchants and tradesmen. Oh, Mr. Tredethlyn, have pity upon me, and go.”

And then Miss Desmond broke down all at once into a burst of hysterical sobbing, and stretching out her hand towards the back of a _prie-dieu_ chair standing near her, tottered as if she would have fallen. She did not fall, however; for before her hand could reach the _prie-dieu_, Francis Tredethlyn’s strong arm was round her.

“Miss Desmond,” he cried, “Julia! why do you talk like this? Do you think that any base thought about you ever entered _my_ brain? Fortune-huntress, adventuress--did I ever wrong you in my inmost thoughts by such a name as that?”

“No,” answered Julia, softly. “_You_ are too noble; and yet you may have been influenced by others. Why should you think better of me than others think? Why should not you too despise me?”

Her voice was broken by sobs, and she was still supported by Mr. Tredethlyn’s arm. He felt that she was trembling violently. He could just distinguish her handsome profile in the dusk, and the tears glittering upon her dark lashes.

“Despise you, Julia! you who are so superior to me! Do you forget what I am? Have I not much greater reason to fear your contempt? And you talk of poverty, as if that were so deep a suffering, while I am so rich, and care so little for my money. Share it with me, Julia. I’m only a poor waif and stray as it is; but with such a woman as you for my wife I might be of some good in the world. Heaven knows you are welcome to my fortune, Miss Desmond. If you were a man, and my comrade, I would say, Share it with me as my brother and my friend. But you are a woman, and I can only say, Be my wife.”

Julia withdrew herself from the supporting arm.

“Ah, Mr. Tredethlyn,” she said, in an icy kind of voice, “this is the bitterest insult of all. The Desmonds do not marry for money; they only marry where they are beloved, and can love again.”

“How can I expect that you can love me?” asked Francis. “Do you think I can forget that I am an ignorant boor, suddenly thrown amongst people whose habits of life, whose very thoughts, are strange to me?”

“And you would marry a woman without so much as asking for her love?”

“I would ask for her friendship and her fidelity. I shouldn’t care to exact an uneven bargain, Miss Desmond; and I doubt if I could give much more myself,” the young man answered, rather coldly. But at the sound of a stifled sob from Julia he changed his tone all at once; a thousand generous impulses were stirred in him by the aspect of her distress. He was nothing more than a child in the hands of this brilliant young Irishwoman.

“Dear Miss Desmond,” he cried, “I seem destined to offend and grieve you. If you will share my fortune, if you will accept any best friendship and fidelity, my whole life shall prove to you how much I admire and respect you. If you reject my offer, I can only say----”

But Julia did not allow him to finish the sentence, which she foresaw would be expressive of complete resignation to her adverse decision.

“Oh, Francis,” she exclaimed, “you offer me your _fortune_!” There was something sublime in her contemptuous enunciation of this last word. “You ask me to accept your friendship, when I have been weak and mad enough to LOVE YOU.” She was not Rachel any longer; she was Madame Dorval, all melting tenderness and womanly pathos. She covered her face with her hands, and then, with something between a sob and a shudder, rushed suddenly from the room, and hurried along the dusky staircase and passages to her own apartment.

The candles were lighted on the dressing-table; but there was no intrusive handmaiden to annoy Miss Desmond by her watchful glances, her mute interrogation. Julia looked at her reflection in the glass, and saw herself flushed and triumphant, with traces of tears upon her cheeks.

“And my eyes are really wet,” she thought; “but then the chance was such a good one, and so nearly lost. What a good, simple-hearted fellow he is! and how happy any reasonable woman might be with him--and thirty thousand a year! Ah, Maude Hillary! it was very pretty and childish and nice of you, coming to wake me out of my sleep on your last birthday, to show me the set of diamonds and opals papa had bribed your maid to slip under your pillow before you awoke; but _I_ will show you diamonds before long that shall make you ashamed of that birthday trumpery.”

Miss Desmond rolled her black hair into a great smooth knot at the back of her head; and she put on a dress of that fugitive golden yellow, in which there is an artful intermingling of silvery sheen, and which milliners call maize--a bewilderingly beautiful colour when seen in conjunction with a handsome brunette. The loungers who dined at the Cedars that evening declared that Julia Desmond had never looked so splendid. Francis Tredethlyn sat by her at dinner, and was near her all the evening: and at night, when he found himself alone in the pretty chintz-curtain chamber that he had so often occupied of late, the young man seated himself by one of the windows, and, pushing open the sash, looked out at the quiet river rippling softly under the stars.

“And she is to be my wife,” he thought; “she is very handsome, and I ought to be proud to think that she can care for such a fellow as I. And yet----” His head sank forward on his folded arms, and the image of a beautiful creature smiled before him in all the dazzling brightness of an opium-eater’s dream. Francis Tredethlyn gave one long regretful sigh as he raised his head, and looked moodily out at the distant woodland on the other side of the river.

“What can it matter whom I marry?” he asked himself, bitterly; “would _she_ ever think of me, if I were to come to this house every day for ten years at a stretch? Why, her dogs are more to her and dearer to her twenty times than I am. And Julia Desmond loves me, and thinks me better than those fellows with the yellow whiskers, who are always talking of new books and new music. They please _her_; but Julia despises them. Am I such a wretch that I cannot be grateful for a sensible woman’s affection? I _am_ grateful to her. I am proud to think that she will be my wife. But I wish I was back in Van Diemen’s Land, blacking the captain’s boots, and smoking shag tobacco with Surly Bill the burglar.”

After that dramatic little scene in the twilight study at the Cedars, everything went on velvet. Julia was triumphant; Maude was delighted and sympathetic. What could be more charming or more proper than that Julia should marry a man with thirty thousand a year for his fortune? The only hindrance to universal happiness in a very delightful world was the fact that so many people had to do _without_ thirty thousand a year, Miss Hillary thought, whenever she gave her mind to the study of political economy.

“And you will be so rich, dear Julia,” Maude said, as she kissed her friend; “and if Harcourt and I are very poor--as we must be, unless papa gives his consent by-and-by--you’ll take us for a drive in the Park sometimes, won’t you? And if you give many parties in the season, I shan’t be able to come to them; for you wouldn’t like to see me always in the same dress--like those poor people at the Union--and I shall be obliged to get a set of black-lace flounces, like Reder--you never saw Reder, my last German governess but one--and put them on pink silk one day, and blue the next, and so on; it’s very troublesome, and the flounces don’t generally come straight; but then it looks as if one had so many dresses. Of course you’ll have boxes at _both_ houses, Julia, and on the grand tier? and you’ll buy a place in the country--and Oh, where do you mean to live in town?”

Miss Desmond answered all these eager queries very demurely. Francis would make all arrangements for their future life, she said; he _had_ certainly promised her the two opera-boxes; he had made inquiries about the one house that was to be let in Park Lane; and he was anxious to discover her favourite county before taking any steps towards the purchase of an estate.

“But you know he is such a dear good fellow, and has such a knack of guessing all my fancies, that really I never like to suggest anything,” Miss Desmond concluded, modestly. But, somehow or other, without making any very direct suggestions, Julia had so contrived matters, that in a few weeks her affianced husband had gratified many of the desires that had been smouldering in her breast ever since the earliest dawn of girlhood.

Already the “family jools” of the Desmonds had been consigned to the oblivion of one of Julia’s shabbiest trunks, and diamonds now twinkled on Miss Desmond’s neck and arms, and gleamed here and there in her black hair, when she came down to dinner in her maize silk dress. Her toilette-table was all of a glitter with the rings she drew off her slim fingers when she disrobed at night, before the looking-glass which had so often reflected a gloomy, discontented face, but which now only gave back triumphant smiles.

She was an adventuress perhaps, and her triumph was an ignoble one; but she was not altogether base. She was prepared to be a good wife to the man whom she had brought to her feet by force of feminine strategy. She did not love Francis Tredethlyn; and indeed she seemed to be made of a sterner stuff than that out of which the women who can love are fashioned. She did not love her affianced husband; but she meant to be as faithful and devoted as the most loving wife in Christendom. If she intended to raise herself upon the platform of her husband’s wealth, she meant that he should mount with her. Already she had lifted him several stages on the social ladder. From the very first her watchful care had saved him from a hundred small solecisms, and in the more intimate relationship of the last few weeks her refining influence had been almost magical in its effects. The good old blood of the Tredethlyns asserted itself, and Julia found her task an easy one.

“I don’t want you to be like those Government clerks, and magazine writers, and embryo Q.C.’s,” she said to him sometimes. “I like you to be big and deep-voiced and--just a little clumsy. The Knights-Templars, and Crusaders, and that sort of people, must have been clumsy on account of their armour. I always fancy I hear the clank of spurs when you come into a room: and when you sit in Parliament you must be the soldier’s friend, you know, and make great speeches about rations, and court-martial verdicts, and discipline, and all that sort of thing; and I shall come into the ladies’ gallery, and strain my eyes by peering at you through that horrible grating. You will look so handsome with your head thrown a little back, and your hand in your waistcoat.”

Now this kind of talk from a handsome woman, whom he knows to be infinitely his intellectual superior, can scarcely be displeasing to the most strong-minded of men; and, unluckily, Francis Tredethlyn was not very strong-minded. He looked down at his Julia with a sheepish smile, and acknowledged her pretty flatteries in the lamest possible manner; but when he came to the Cedars next morning, he brought with him the biggest emerald-headed serpent that he had been able to find among the jewellers of the West End, and coiled it about his Julia’s wrist. He was grateful to her for all her tender smiles and pleasant speeches--all the more grateful, perhaps, because of that uncomfortable knowledge of the cold void in his own heart, where love for his promised wife should have been. So he brought her all manner of costly tribute in the way of rings and bracelets, and necklaces and head-gear; and he bought her a three-hundred-guinea hunter at Tattersall’s, so that she should no longer ride Maude Hillary’s horses in the Twickenham lanes. Sometimes, in spite of himself, even when Julia was most agreeable, the thought came upon him that he would only too gladly have given her the whole of his fortune if by such a gift he might have freed himself from the promise that bound him to her.

“But if I were free to-morrow, _she_ would not care for me,” he thought, “and what would be the use of my liberty?”

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