Part 18 (1/2)
”You ought to take a walk every day,” said Miss Marjoribanks, ”that is what is the matter with you; but, in the meantime, there is something else I want you to do. This is Thursday, you know, and I have always some people on Thursday. It is not a party--it is only an Evening--and no dress to speak of. Your black silk will look quite nice, and be all that is necessary. Black is very becoming to some people,” said Lucilla reflectively. She looked at Mrs Mortimer with her head a little on one side, and saw in a moment, with the rapid glance of genius, just what she wanted. ”And some lace for your head,” Miss Marjoribanks added. ”I don't think you have gone off at all, and I am sure you will look very nice. It is at nine o'clock.”
”This evening, Lucilla!” said Mrs Mortimer, faintly: ”but you know I never go out--I am not fit for society. Oh, don't ask me, please! Since poor Edward died----'
”Yes,” said Lucilla, ”it must have been a great loss, I am sure; though I can't say I mind going into a room alone, as some people do; but you know you can avoid that, if you like, by coming early. Come at eight, and there will be n.o.body in the drawing-room, and you can choose your own corner. Put it quite back--at the back of your head,” said Miss Marjoribanks, with a little anxiety. ”I could show you how if I had the lace. I do so want you to look nice. Oh, never mind the fas.h.i.+on. When one has a style of one's own, it is always twenty times better. Put it as you used to wear it before you were married; and then, with that nice black silk----”
”Oh, Lucilla, don't ask me,” said the widow. ”I shall not know how to talk, nor look, nor anything; and then I know n.o.body; and then----”
”My dear, you have always _me_,” said Lucilla, with tender reproach. ”I am so sorry I can't stop any longer. I leave it quite to your own taste about the lace. And you will find people you know, you may be quite sure of that. Remember, not later than nine o'clock; and come at eight if you don't like to come into the room by yourself. Good-bye now. I want you to look very nice to-night,” Miss Marjoribanks added, giving her friend an affectionate kiss; ”you must, for my sake.”
”But, Lucilla----” cried Mrs Mortimer.
It was vain to make any further protest, however, for Lucilla was gone, having, in the first place, communicated her requirements to Mary Jane, who was not likely to forget, nor to let her mistress be late. ”And mind she is _nice_,” said Miss Marjoribanks emphatically, as she went out at the door. It was necessary she should be nice; without that the intended _situation_ which Lucilla was preparing--the grand finale of her exertions--would fall flat, and probably fail of its effect. For this it was necessary that the widow should look not only pretty, but interesting, and a little pathetic, and all that a widow should look when first dragged back into society. Miss Marjoribanks gave a momentary sigh as she emerged from the garden door, and could not but feel conscious that in all this she might be preparing the most dread discomfiture and downfall for herself. Even if it pa.s.sed over as it ought to do, and n.o.body was charmed but the Archdeacon, who was the right person to be charmed, Lucilla felt that after this she never could have that entire confidence in her father which she had had up to this moment. The incipient sentiment Dr Marjoribanks had exhibited was one that struck at the roots of all faith in him as a father; and every person of sensibility will at once perceive how painful such a suggestion must have been to the mind of a young woman so entirely devoted as was Miss Marjoribanks to the consolation and comfort of her dear papa.
Lucilla was not allowed to spend the rest of this momentous afternoon in maturing her plans, as might have been necessary to a lesser intelligence; and when the refres.h.i.+ng moment came at which she could have her cup of tea before preparing for the fatigues of the evening, it was Mrs Chiley who came to a.s.sist at that ceremony. The old lady came in with an important air, and gave Lucilla a long, lingering kiss, as old ladies sometimes do when they particularly mean it. ”My dear, I am not going to stay a moment, but I thought you might have something to tell me,” the kind old woman said, arranging herself in her chair with the satisfaction of a listener who expects to be confided in. As for Lucilla, who had no clue to Mrs Chiley's special curiosity, and who had a good many things on her mind just at that moment which she rather preferred not to talk about, she was for once struck with veritable astonishment, and did not know what to say.
”Dear Mrs Chiley, what should I have to tell you?” said Miss Marjoribanks. ”You know very well where I should go the very first moment if anything happened;” and by way of staving off more particular questions, she took her old friend a cup of tea.
”Yes, my dear, I hope so,” said Mrs Chiley, but at the same time her disappointment was evident. ”It is very nice, thank you--your tea is always nice, Lucilla--but it was not that I was thinking of. I can't understand how it is, I am sure. I saw him to-day with my own eyes, and could not help seeing how anxious he was looking! I hope, I do hope, you have not been so cruel as to refuse him, Lucilla--and all for something that is not his fault, poor fellow, or that could be explained, you may be sure.”
Miss Marjoribanks grew more and more surprised as she listened. She put away the kettle without filling the teapot, and left her own cup standing untasted, and went and sat down on the stool by Mrs Chiley's feet. ”Tell me whom I have refused this time, for I don't know anything about it,” said Lucilla; and then her visitor burst forth.
”It must be all that creature's fault! He told me he was coming here; and to tell the truth, I stood and watched him, for you know how interested I am, my dear; and then a little while after he met _that_ Barbara. Oh, Lucilla, why were you ever so foolish as to have her here?
I told you how it would end when you brought those artist people about your house. They are all a set of adventurers!” cried Mrs Chiley. ”I saw them meet, and I was so disgusted that I did not know what I was doing; but he pa.s.sed her as nicely as possible. Just a civil word, you know, and then he was past. Just as I would have done myself; for it is always best not to be uncivil to anybody. I could see her standing as if she had been struck with lightning; and naturally, Lucilla, I never thought anything else than that he had come here, and that all was right between you. Oh, my dear, I hope you are sure you have not refused him,” Mrs Chiley said, piteously; ”anyhow, Lucilla, you need not mind telling _me_. I may be sorry, but I will not blame you, my dear.”
”I have not refused anybody,” said Lucilla, with a modest innocence that it was a pleasure to see; ”but, dear Mrs Chiley,” she continued, raising her drooping eyelids, ”I think you make a mistake about Mr Cavendish. My own opinion is that Barbara would make him a very nice wife. Oh, please, don't be angry! I don't mean to say, you know, that I think her quite what one would call _nice_--for oneself. But then the gentlemen have such strange ways of thinking. Many a girl whom we could not put up with is quite popular with Them,” said Miss Marjoribanks, with a certain mild wonder at the inexplicable creatures whom she thus condescended to discuss. ”I suppose they have a different standard, you know; and for my part, I would advise Mr Cavendish to marry Barbara. I think it is the best thing he could do.”
”Lucilla!” cried Mrs Chiley, almost with a shriek of horror. She thought, as was perhaps natural, that there was some pique in what her young companion said; not doing Miss Marjoribanks justice--as indeed few people did--for that perfect truthfulness which it was Lucilla's luck always to be able to maintain. Mrs Chiley thought it was her young friend's maidenly pride and determination not to take up the part of a woman slighted or jilted. ”You may refuse him, my dear, if your heart is not with him,” said the old lady; ”but I would not be so hard upon him as that, poor fellow. You may say what you please, but I always will think him nice, Lucilla. I know I ought to be on the Archdeacon's side,”
said Mrs Chiley, putting her handkerchief to her eyes; ”but I am an old woman, and I like my old friends best. Oh, Lucilla, it is not kind of you to keep up appearances with me. I wish you would give way a little.
It would do you good, my darling; and you know I might be both your grandmothers, Lucilla,” she cried, putting her arm round her favourite.
As for Miss Marjoribanks, she gave her old friend a close embrace, which was the only thing that even her genius could suggest to do.
”I have always _you_,” said Lucilla, with touching eloquence; and then she freed herself a little from Mrs Chiley's arms. ”I don't say, perhaps, that everybody will receive her; but I mean to make an effort, for my part; and I shall certainly tell Mr Cavendish so if he ever speaks of it to me. As for Mr Beverley, he is going to be married too.
Did not you hear? He told me all about it himself one day,” said Miss Marjoribanks; ”and I will ask him to-night if I may not tell you who the lady is. It is quite a little romance, and I hope we shall have two marriages, and it will make it quite gay for the winter. When you know all about it,” Lucilla added tenderly, by way of breaking the shock, ”I am sure you will be pleased.”
But instead of being pleased, Mrs Chiley was speechless for the moment.
Her fresh old cheeks grew ashy with dismay and horror. ”The Archdeacon too!” she cried, gasping for breath. ”Oh, Lucilla, my dear?--and you?”
Then the kind old lady held Miss Marjoribanks fast, and sobbed over her in the despair of the moment. To think, after all the pains that had been taken, and all the hopes and all the speculations, that neither the one nor the other was coming to anything! ”If it should be that General, after all--and I cannot abide him,” sobbed Lucilla's anxious friend. But Miss Marjoribanks's genius carried her through this trial, as well as through all the others which she had yet encountered on her way.
”Dear Mrs Chiley!” said Lucilla, ”it is so good of you to care; but if it had been _that_ I was thinking of, I need never have come home at all, you know; and my object in life is just what it has always been, to be a comfort to papa.”
Upon which Mrs Chiley kissed her young friend once more with lingering meaning. ”My dear, I don't know what They mean,” she said, with indignation; ”everybody knows men are great fools where women are concerned--but I never knew what idiots they were till now; and you are too good for them, my darling!” said Mrs Chiley, with indignant tenderness. Perhaps Miss Marjoribanks was in some respects of the same way of thinking. She conducted her sympathetic friend to the garden door, when it came to be time for everybody to go and dress, with a certain pathetic elevation in her own person, which was not out of accord with Mrs Chiley's virtuous wrath. To have Mrs Mortimer and Barbara Lake preferred to her did not wound Lucilla's pride--one can be wounded in that way only by one's equals. She thought of it with a certain mild pity and charitable contempt. Both these two men had had the chance of having _her_, and this was how they had chosen! And there can be little wonder if Miss Marjoribanks's compa.s.sion for them was mingled with a little friendly and condescending disdain.
It was, however, an ease to Lucilla's mind that she had let Mrs Chiley know, and was so far free to work out her plans without any fear of misconception. And on the whole, her old friend's tender indignation was not disagreeable to her. Thus it was, without any interval of repose to speak of, that her lofty energies went on unwearied to overrule and guide the crisis which was to decide so many people's fate.
_Chapter x.x.xII_
Dr Marjoribanks was not a man to take very much notice of trivial external changes; and he knew Lucilla and her const.i.tution, and, being a medical man, was not perhaps so liable to parental anxieties as an unprofessional father might have been; but even he was a little struck by Miss Marjoribanks's appearance when he came into the drawing-room. He said, ”You are flushed, Lucilla? is anything going to happen?” with the calmness of a man who knew there was not much the matter--but yet he did observe that her colour was not exactly what it always was. ”I am quite well, papa, thank you,” said Lucilla, which, to be sure, was a fact the Doctor had never doubted; and then the people began to come in, and there was no more to be said.