The Egoist

by George Meredith

  ‘My daughter has refused him, sir?’

  ‘Temporarily it would appear that she has declined the proposal.’

  ‘He was at liberty…? he could honourably…?’

  ‘His best friend and nearest relative is your guarantee.’

  ‘I know it; I hear so; I am informed of that: I have heard of the proposal, and that he could honourably make it. Still, I am helpless, I cannot move, until I am assured that my daughter’s reasons are such as a father need not underline.’

  ‘Does the lady, perchance, equivocate?’

  ‘I have not seen her this morning; I rise late. I hear an astounding account of the cause for her departure from Patterne, and I find her door locked to me – no answer.’

  ‘It is that she had no reasons to give, and she feared the demand for them.’

  ‘Ladies!’ dolorously exclaimed Mr Dale.

  ‘We guess the secret, we guess it!’ they exclaimed in reply; and they looked smilingly, as Dr Middleton looked.

  ‘She had no reasons to give?’ Mr Dale spelled these words to his understanding. ‘Then, sir, she knew you not adverse?’

  ‘Undoubtedly, by my high esteem for the gentleman, she must have known me not adverse. But she would not consider me a principal. She could hardly have conceived me an obstacle. I am simply the gentleman’s friend. A zealous friend, let me add.’

  Mr Dale put out an imploring hand; it was too much for him.

  ‘Pardon me; I have a poor head. And your daughter the same, sir?’

  ‘We will not measure it too closely, but I may say, my daughter the same, sir. And likewise – may I not add – these ladies.’

  Mr Dale made sign that he was overfilled. ‘Where am I! And Laetitia refused him?’

  ‘Temporarily, let us assume. Will it not partly depend on you, Mr Dale?’

  ‘But what strange things have been happening during my daughter’s absence from the cottage!’ cried Mr Dale, betraying an elixir in his veins. ‘I feel that I could laugh if I did not dread to be thought insane. She refused his hand, and he was at liberty to offer it? My girl! We are all on our heads. The fairy-tales were right and the lesson-books were wrong. But it is really, it is really very demoralizing. An invalid – and I am one, and no momentary exhilaration will be taken for the contrary – clings to the idea of stability, order. The slightest disturbance of the wonted course of things unsettles him. Why, for years I have been prophesying it! and for years I have had everything against me, and now when it is confirmed, I am wondering that I must not call myself a fool!’

  ‘And for years, dear Mr Dale, this union, in spite of counter-currents and human arrangements, has been our Willoughby’s constant preoccupation,’ said Miss Eleanor.

  ‘His most cherished aim,’ said Miss Isabel.

  ‘The name was not spoken by me,’ said Dr Middleton. ‘But it is out, and perhaps better out, if we would avoid the chance of mystifications. I do not suppose we are seriously committing a breach of confidence, though he might have wished to mention it to you first himself. I have it from Willoughby that last night he appealed to your daughter, Mr Dale – not for the first time, if I apprehend him correctly; and unsuccessfully. He despairs. I do not: supposing, that is, your assistance vouchsafed to us. And I do not despair, because the gentleman is a gentleman of worth, of acknowledged worth. You know him well enough to grant me that. I will bring you my daughter to help me in sounding his praises.’

  Dr Middleton stepped through the window to the lawn on an elastic foot, beaming with the happiness he felt charged to confer on his friend Mr Whitford.

  ‘Ladies! it passes all wonders,’ Mr Dale gasped.

  ‘Willoughby’s generosity does pass all wonders,’ they said in chorus.

  The door opened; Lady Busshe and Lady Culmer were announced.

  CHAPTER 45

  The Patterne Ladies: Mr Dale: Lady Busshe and Lady Culmer: with Mrs Mountstuart Jenkinson

  LADY BUSSHE and Lady Culmer entered spying to right and left. At the sight of Mr Dale in the room Lady Busshe murmured to her friend: ‘Confirmation!’

  Lady Culmer murmured: ‘Corney is quite reliable.’

  ‘The man is his own best tonic.’

  ‘He is in valuable for the country.’

  Miss Eleanor and Miss Isabel greeted them.

  The amiability of the Patterne ladies combined with their total eclipse behind their illustrious nephew invited enterprising women of the world to take liberties, and they were not backward.

  Lady Busshe said: ‘Well? the news! we have the outlines. Don’t be astonished: we know the points: we have heard the gun. I could have told you as much yesterday. I saw it. And I guessed it the day before. Oh, I do believe in fatalities now. Lady Culmer and I agree to take that view: it is the simplest. Well, and are you satisfied, my dears?’

  The ladies grimaced interrogatively: ‘With what?’

  ‘With it? with all! with her! with him!’

  ‘Our Willoughby?’

  ‘Can it be possible that they require a dose of Corney?’ Lady Busshe remarked to Lady Culmer.

  ‘They play discretion to perfection,’ said Lady Culmer. ‘But, my dears, we are in the secret.’

  ‘How did she behave?’ whispered Lady Busshe. ‘No high flights and flutters, I do hope. She was well-connected, they say; though I don’t comprehend what they mean by a line of scholars – one thinks of a row of pinafores: and she was pretty. That is well enough at the start. It never will stand against brains. He had the two in the house to contrast them, and… the result! A young woman with brains – in a house – beats all your beauties. Lady Culmer and I have determined on that view. He thought her a delightful partner for a dance, and found her rather tiresome at the end of the gallopade. I saw it yesterday, clear as daylight. She did not understand him, and he did understand her. That will be our report.’

  ‘She is young: she will learn,’ said the ladies uneasily, but in total ignorance of her meaning.

  ‘And you are charitable, and always were. I remember you had a good word for that girl Durham.’

  Lady Busshe crossed the room to Mr Dale, who was turning over leaves of a grand book of the heraldic devices of our great Families.

  ‘Study it,’ she said, ‘study it, my dear Mr Dale; you are in it, by right of possessing a clever and accomplished daughter. At page 300 you will find the Patterne crest. And mark me, she will drag you into the peerage before she has done – relatively, you know. Sir Willoughby and wife will not be contented to sit down and manage the estates. Has not Laetitia immense ambition? And very creditable, I say.’

  Mr Dale tried to protest something. He shut the book, examining the binding, flapped the cover with a finger, hoped her ladyship was in good health, alluded to his own and the strangeness of the bird out of the cage.

  ‘You will probably take up your residence here, in a larger and handsomer cage, Mr Dale.’

  He shook his head. ‘Do I apprehend…’ he said.

  ‘I know,’ said she.

  ‘Dear me, can it be?’

  Mr Dale gazed upward, with the feelings of one awakened late to see a world alive in broad daylight.

  Lady Busshe dropped her voice. She took the liberty permitted to her with an inferior in station, while treating him to a tone of familiarity in acknowledgment of his expected rise; which is high breeding, or the exact measurement of social dues.

  ‘Laetitia will be happy, you may be sure. I love to see a long and faithful attachment rewarded – love it! Her tale is the triumph of patience. Far above Grizzel! No woman will be ashamed of pointing to Lady Patterne. You are uncertain? You are in doubt? Let me hear – as low as you like. But there is no doubt of the new shifting of the scene? – no doubt of the proposal? Dear Mr Dale! a very little louder. You are here because –? of course you wish to see Sir Willoughby. She? I did not catch you quite. She?… it seems, you say…?

  Lady Culmer said to the Patterne ladies:

  ‘You must have had a distressing
time. These affairs always mount up to a climax, unless people are very wellbred. We saw it coming. Naturally we did not expect such a transformation of brides: who could? If I had laid myself down on my back to think, I should have had it. I am unerring when I set to speculating on my back. One is cooler: ideas come; they have not to be forced. That is why I am brighter on a dull winter afternoon, on the sofa, beside my tea-service, than at any other season. However, your trouble is over. When did the Middletons leave?’

  ‘The Middletons leave?’ said the ladies.

  ‘Dr Middleton and his daughter.’

  ‘They have not left us.’

  ‘The Middletons are here?’

  ‘They are here, yes. Why should they have left Patterne?’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘Yes. They are likely to stay some days longer.’

  ‘Goodness!’

  ‘There is no ground for any report to the contrary, Lady Culmer.’

  ‘No ground!’

  Lady Culmer called out to Lady Busshe.

  A cry came back from that startled dame.

  ‘She has refused him!’

  ‘Who?’

  ‘She has.’

  ‘She? – Sir Willoughby?’

  ‘Refused! – declines the honour.’

  ‘Oh, never! No, that carries the incredible beyond romance. But is he perfectly at…’

  ‘Quite, it seems. And she was asked in due form and refused.’

  ‘No, and no again!’

  ‘My dear, I have it from Mr Dale.’

  ‘Mr Dale, what can be the signification of her conduct?’

  ‘Indeed, Lady Culmer,’ said Mr Dale, not unpleasantly agitated by the interest he excited, in spite of his astonishment at a public discussion of the matter in this house, ‘I am in the dark. Her father should know, but I do not. Her door is locked to me; I have not seen her. I am absolutely in the dark. I am a recluse. I have forgotten the ways of the world. I should have supposed her father would first have been addressed.’

  ‘Tut-tut. Modern gentlemen are not so formal; they are creatures of impulse and take a pride in it. He spoke. We settle that. But where did you get this tale of a refusal?’

  ‘I have it from Dr Middleton.’

  ‘From Dr Middleton?’ shouted Lady Busshe.

  ‘The Middletons are here,’ said Lady Culmer.

  ‘What whirl are we in?’ Lady Busshe got up, ran two or three steps and seated herself in another chair. ‘Oh! do let us proceed upon system. If not we shall presently be rageing; we shall be dangerous. The Middletons are here, and Dr Middleton himself communicates to Mr Dale that Laetitia Dale has refused the hand of Sir Willoughby, who is ostensibly engaged to his own daughter! And pray, Mr Dale, how did Dr Middleton speak of it? Compose yourself; there is no violent hurry, though our sympathy with you and our interest in all the parties does perhaps agitate us a little. Quite at your leisure – speak!’

  ‘Madam… Lady Busshe.’ Mr Dale gulped a ball in his

  throat. ‘I see no reason why I should not speak. I do not see how I can have been deluded. The Miss Patternes heard him. Dr Middleton began upon it, not I. I was unaware, when I came, that it was a refusal. I had been informed that there was a proposal. My authority for the tale was positive. The object of my visit was to assure myself of the integrity of my daughter’s conduct. She had always the highest sense of honour. But passion is known to mislead, and there was this most strange report. I feared that our humblest apologies were due to Dr Middleton and his daughter. I know the charm Laetitia can exercise. Madam, in the plainest language, without a possibility of my misapprehending him, Dr Middleton spoke of himself as the advocate of the suitor for my daughter’s hand.

  I have a poor head. I supposed at once an amicable rupture between Sir Willoughby and Miss Middleton, or that the version which had reached me of their engagement was not strictly accurate. My head is weak. Dr. Middleton’s language is trying to a head like mine; but I can speak positively on the essential points: he spoke of himself as ready to be the impassioned advocate of the suitor for my daughter’s hand. Those were his words. I understood him to entreat me to intercede with her. Nay, the name was mentioned. There was no concealment. I am certain there could not be a misapprehension. And my feelings were touched by his anxiety for Sir Willoughby’s happiness. I attributed it to a sentiment upon which I need not dwell. Impassioned advocate, he said.’

  ‘We are in a perfect maelstrom!’ cried Lady Busshe, turning to everybody.

  ‘It is a complete hurricane!’ cried Lady Culmer.

  A light broke over the faces of the Patterne ladies. They exchanged it with one another.

  They had been so shocked as to be almost offended by Lady Busshe, but their natural gentleness and habitual submission rendered them unequal to the task of checking her.

  ‘Is it not,’ said Miss Eleanor, ‘a misunderstanding that a change of names will rectify?’

  ‘This is by no means the first occasion,’ said Miss Isabel, ‘that Willoughby has pleaded for his cousin Vernon.’

  ‘We deplore extremely the painful error into which Mr Dale has fallen.’

  ‘It springs, we now perceive, from an entire misapprehension of Dr Middleton.’

  ‘Vernon was in his mind. It was clear to us.’

  ‘Impossible that it could have been Willoughby!’

  ‘You see the impossibility, the error!’

  ‘And the Middletons here!’ said Lady Busshe. ‘Oh, if we leave unilluminated we shall be the laughing-stock of the county. Mr Dale, please, wake up. Do you see? You may have been mistaken.’

  ‘Lady Busshe,’ he woke up; ‘I may have mistaken Dr Middleton; he has a language that I can compare only to a review-day of the field forces. But I have the story on authority that I cannot question: it is confirmed by my daughter’s unexampled behaviour. And if I live through this day I shall look about me as a ghost to-morrow.’

  ‘Dear Mr Dale!’ said the Patterne ladies, compassionately.

  Lady Busshe murmured to them: ‘You know the two did not agree; they did not get on: I saw it; I predicted it.’

  ‘She will understand him in time,’ said they.

  ‘Never. And my belief is, they have parted by consent, and Letty Dale wins the day at last. Yes, now I do believe it.’

  The ladies maintained a decided negative, but they knew too much not to feel perplexed, and they betrayed it, though they said: ‘Dear Lady Busshe! is it credible, in decency?’

  ‘Dear Mrs Mountstuart!’ Lady Busshe invoked her great rival appearing among them: ‘You come most opportunely; we are in a state of inextricable confusion: we are bordering on frenzy. You, and none but you, can help us. You know, you always know; we hang on you. Is there any truth in it? a particle?’

  Mrs Mountstuart seated herself regally. ‘Ah, Mr Dale!’ she said, inclining to him. ‘Yes, dear Lady Busshe, there is a particle.’

  ‘Now, do not roast us. You can; you have the art. I have the whole story. That is, I have a part. I mean, I have the outlines, I cannot be deceived, but you can fill them in, I know you can. I saw it yesterday. Now, tell us, tell us. It must be quite true or utterly false. Which is it?’

  ‘Be precise.’

  ‘His fatality! you called her. Yes, I was sceptical. But here we have it all come round again, and if the tale is true, I shall own you infallible. Has he? – and she?’

  ‘Both.’

  ‘And the Middletons here? They have not gone; they keep the field. And more astounding, she refuses him. And to add to it, Dr Middleton intercedes with Mr Dale for Sir Willoughby.’

  ‘Dr. Middleton intercedes!’ This was rather astonishing to Mrs Mountstuart.

  ‘For Vernon,’ Miss Eleanor emphasized.

  ‘For Vernon Whitford, his cousin,’ said Miss Isabel, still more emphatically.

  ‘Who,’ said Mrs Mountstuart, with a sovereign lift and turn of her head, ‘speaks of a refusal?’

  ‘I have it from Mr Dale,’ said Lady Busshe.
r />   ‘I had it, I thought, distinctly from Dr Middleton,’ said Mr Dale.

  ‘That Willoughby proposed to Laetitia for his cousin Vernon, Doctor Middleton meant,’ said Miss Eleanor.

  Her sister followed: ‘Hence this really ridiculous misconception! – sad, indeed,’ she added, for balm to Mr Dale. ‘Willoughby was Vernon’s proxy. His cousin, if not his first, is ever the second thought with him.’

  ‘But can we continue…?

  ‘Such a discussion!’

  Mrs Mountstuart gave them a judicial hearing. They were regarded in the county as the most indulgent of nonentities, and she as little as Lady Busshe was restrained from the burning topic in their presence. She pronounced:

  ‘Each party is right, and each is wrong.’

  A dry: ‘I shall shriek!’ came from Lady Busshe.

  ‘Cruel!’ groaned Lady Culmer.

  ‘Mixed, you are all wrong. Disentangled, you are each of you right. Sir Willoughby does think of his cousin Vernon; he is anxious to establish him; he is the author of a proposal to that effect.’

  ‘We know it!’ the Patterne ladies exclaimed. ‘And Laetitia rejected poor Vernon once more!’

  ‘Who spoke of Miss Dale’s rejection of Mr Whitford?’

  ‘Is he not rejected?’ Lady Culmer inquired.

  ‘It is in debate, and at this moment being decided.’

  ‘Oh, do be seated, Mr Dale,’ Lady Busshe implored him, rising to thrust him back to his chair if necessary. ‘Any dislocation, and we are thrown out again! We must hold together if this riddle is ever to be read. Then, dear Mrs Mountstuart, we are to say that there is no truth in the other story?’

  ‘You are to say nothing of the sort, dear Lady Busshe.’

  ‘Be merciful! And what of the fatality?’

  ‘As positive as the Pole to the needle.’