CHAPTER XXXIII.
Monkshade.
When the first of the new year came round Lady Glencora was notkeeping her appointment at Lady Monk's house. She went to GatherumCastle, and let us hope that she enjoyed the magnificent Christmashospitality of the Duke; but when the time came for moving on toMonkshade, she was indisposed, and Mr. Palliser went thither alone.Lady Glencora returned to Matching and remained at home, while herhusband was away, in company with the two Miss Pallisers.
When the tidings reached Monkshade that Lady Glencora was not tobe expected, Burgo Fitzgerald was already there, armed with suchpecuniary assistance as George Vavasor had been able to wrench outof the hands of Mr. Magruin. "Burgo," said his aunt, catching him onemorning near his bedroom door as he was about to go down-stairs inhunting trim, "Burgo, your old flame, Lady Glencora, is not cominghere."
"Lady Glencora not coming!" said Burgo, betraying by his look and thetone of his voice too clearly that this change in the purpose of amarried lady was to him of more importance than it should have been.Such betrayal, however, to Lady Monk was not perhaps matter of muchmoment.
"No; she is not coming. It can't be matter of any moment to you now."
"But, by heavens, it is," said he, putting his hand up to hisforehead, and leaning back against the wall of the passage as thoughin despair. "It is matter of moment to me. I am the most unfortunatedevil that ever lived."
"Fie, Burgo, fie! You must not speak in that way of a married woman.I begin to think it is better that she should not come." At thismoment another man booted and spurred came down the passage, uponwhom Lady Monk smiled sweetly, speaking some pretty little word ashe passed. Burgo spoke never a word, but still stood leaning againstthe wall, with his hand to his forehead, showing that he had heardsomething which had moved him greatly. "Come back into your room,Burgo," said his aunt; and they both went in at the door that wasnearest to them, for Lady Monk had been on the look-out for him, andhad caught him as soon as he appeared in the passage. "If this doesannoy you, you should keep it to yourself! What will people say?"
"How can I help what they say?"
"But you would not wish to injure her, I suppose? I thought it bestto tell you, for fear you should show any special sign of surpriseif you heard of it first in public. It is very weak in you to allowyourself to feel that sort of regard for a married woman. If youcannot constrain yourself I shall be afraid to let you meet her inBrook Street."
Burgo looked for a moment into his aunt's face without answering her,and then turned away towards the door. "You can do as you pleaseabout that," said he; "but you know as well as I do what I have madeup my mind to do."
"Nonsense, Burgo; I know nothing of the kind. But do you godown-stairs to breakfast, and don't look like that when you go amongthe people there."
Lady Monk was a woman now about fifty years of age, who had been agreat beauty, and who was still handsome in her advanced age. Herfigure was very good. She was tall and of fine proportion, though byno means verging to that state of body which our excellent Americanfriend and critic Mr. Hawthorne has described as beefy and hasdeclared to be the general condition of English ladies of Lady Monk'sage. Lady Monk was not beefy. She was a comely, handsome, upright,dame,--one of whom, as regards her outward appearance, England mightbe proud,--and of whom Sir Cosmo Monk was very proud. She had come ofthe family of the Worcestershire Fitzgeralds, of whom it used to besaid that there never was one who was not beautiful and worthless.Looking at Lady Monk you would hardly think that she could be aworthless woman; but there were one or two who professed to know her,and who declared that she was a true scion of the family to which shebelonged;--that even her husband's ample fortune had suffered fromher extravagance, that she had quarrelled with her only son, andhad succeeded in marrying her daughter to the greatest fool in thepeerage. She had striven very hard to bring about a marriage betweenher nephew and the great heiress, and was a woman not likely topardon those who had foiled her.
At this moment Burgo felt very certain that his aunt was aware of hispurpose, and could not forgive her for pretending to be innocent ofit. In this he was most ungrateful, as well as unreasonable,--andvery indiscreet also. Had he been a man who ever reflected he musthave known that such a woman as his aunt could only assist him aslong as she might be presumed to be ignorant of his intention. ButBurgo never reflected. The Fitzgeralds never reflected till they werenearer forty than thirty, and then people began to think worse ofthem than they had thought before.
When Burgo reached the dining-room there were many men there, but noladies. Sir Cosmo Monk, a fine bald-headed hale man of about sixty,was standing up at the sideboard, cutting a huge game pie. He was aman also who did not reflect much, but who contrived to keep straightin his course through the world without much reflection. "Palliseris coming without her," he said in his loud clear voice, thinkingnothing of his wife's nephew. "She's ill, she says."
"I'm sorry for it," said one man. "She's a deal the better fellow ofthe two."
"She has twice more go in her than Planty Pall," said another.
"Planty is no fool, I can tell you," said Sir Cosmo, coming to thetable with his plate full of pie. "We think he's about the mostrising man we have." Sir Cosmo was the member for his county, andwas a Liberal. He had once, when a much younger man, been at theTreasury, and had since always spoken of the Whig Government asthough he himself were in some sort a part of it.
"Burgo, do you hear that Palliser is coming without his wife?"said one man,--a very young man, who hardly knew what had been thecircumstances of the case. The others, when they saw Burgo enter, hadbeen silent on the subject of Lady Glencora.
"I have heard,--and be d----d to him," said Burgo. Then there wassuddenly a silence in the room, and everyone seemed to attendassiduously to his breakfast. It was very terrible, this clearexpression of a guilty meaning with reference to the wife of anotherman! Burgo regarded neither his plate nor his cup, but thrustinghis hands into his breeches pockets, sat back in his chair with theblackness as of a thunder cloud upon his brow.
"I have heard," said Burgo.]
"Burgo, you had better eat your breakfast," said Sir Cosmo.
"I don't want any breakfast." He took, however, a bit of toast,and crumbling it up in his hand as he put a morsel into his mouth,went away to the sideboard and filled for himself a glass of cherrybrandy.
"If you don't eat any breakfast the less of that you take thebetter," said Sir Cosmo.
"I'm all right now," said he, and coming back to the table, wentthrough some form of making a meal with a roll and a cup of tea.
They who were then present used afterwards to say that they shouldnever forget that breakfast. There had been something, they declared,in the tone of Burgo's voice when he uttered his curse against Mr.Palliser, which had struck them all with dread. There had, too, theysaid, been a blackness in his face, so terrible to be seen, that ithad taken from them all the power of conversation. Sir Cosmo, when hehad broken the ominous silence, had done so with a manifest struggle.The loud clatter of glasses with which Burgo had swallowed his dram,as though resolved to show that he was regardless who might know thathe was drinking, added to the feeling. It may easily be understoodthat there was no further word spoken at that breakfast-table aboutPlanty Pall or his wife.
On that day Burgo Fitzgerald startled all those who saw him by themad way in which he rode. Early in the day there was no excuse forany such rashness. The hounds went from wood to wood, and men went introops along the forest sides as they do on such occasions. But Burgowas seen to cram his horse at impracticable places, and to ride atgates and rails as though resolved to do himself and his uncle'ssteed a mischief. This was so apparent that some friend spoke to SirCosmo Monk about it. "I can do nothing," said Sir Cosmo. "He is aman whom no one's words will control. Something has ruffled him thismorning, and he must run his chance till he becomes quiet." In theafternoon there was a good run, and Burgo again rode as hard as hecould make his horse carry him;--but then there was
the usual excusefor hard riding; and such riding in a straight run is not dangerous,as it is when the circumstances of the occasion do not warrant it,But, be that as it may, Burgo went on to the end of the day withoutaccident, and as he went home, assured Sir Cosmo, in a voice whichwas almost cheery, that his mare Spinster was by far the best thingin the Monkshade stables. Indeed Spinster made quite a character thatday, and was sold at the end of the season for three hundred guineason the strength of it. I am, however, inclined to believe that therewas nothing particular about the mare. Horses always catch thetemperament of their riders, and when a man wishes to break his neck,he will generally find a horse willing to assist him in appearance,but able to save him in the performance. Burgo, at any rate, did notbreak his neck, and appeared at the dinner-table in a better humourthan that which he had displayed in the morning.
On the day appointed Mr. Palliser reached Monkshade. He was, in amanner, canvassing for the support of the Liberal party, and it wouldnot have suited him to show any indifference to the invitation ofso influential a man as Sir Cosmo. Sir Cosmo had a little party ofhis own in the House, consisting of four or five other respectablecountry gentlemen, who troubled themselves little with thinking, andwho mostly had bald heads. Sir Cosmo was a man with whom it was quitenecessary that such an aspirant as Mr. Palliser should stand well, andtherefore Mr. Palliser came to Monkshade, although Lady Glencora wasunable to accompany him.
"We are so sorry," said Lady Monk. "We have been looking forward tohaving Lady Glencora with us beyond everything."
Mr. Palliser declared that Lady Glencora herself was overwhelmed withgrief in that she should have been debarred from making this specialvisit. She had, however, been so unwell at Gatherum, the anxioushusband declared, as to make it unsafe for her to go again away fromhome.
"I hope it is nothing serious," said Lady Monk, with a look of griefso well arranged that any stranger would have thought that all thePallisers must have been very dear to her heart. Then Mr. Palliserwent on to explain that Lady Glencora had unfortunately been foolish.During one of those nights of hard frost she had gone out among theruins at Matching, to show them by moonlight to a friend. The friendhad thoughtlessly, foolishly, and in a manner which Mr. Palliserdeclared to be very reprehensible, allowed Lady Glencora to remainamong the ruins till she had caught cold.
"How very wrong!" said Lady Monk with considerable emphasis.
"It was very wrong," said Mr. Palliser, speaking of poor Alice almostmaliciously. "However, she caught a cold which, unfortunately, hasbecome worse at my uncle's, and so I was obliged to take her home."
Lady Monk perceived that Mr. Palliser had in truth left his wifebehind because he believed her to be ill, and not because he wasafraid of Burgo Fitzgerald. So accomplished a woman as Lady Monk feltno doubt that the wife's absence was caused by fear of the lover, andnot by any cold caught in viewing ruins by moonlight. She was not tobe deceived in such a matter. But she became aware that Mr. Palliserhad been deceived. As she was right in this we must go back for amoment, and say a word of things as they went on at Matching afterAlice Vavasor had left that place.
Alice had told Miss Palliser that steps ought to be taken, whatevermight be their cost, to save Lady Glencora from the peril of a visitto Monkshade. To this Miss Palliser had assented, and, when she leftAlice, was determined to tell Mr. Palliser the whole story. But whenthe time for doing so had come, her courage failed her. She could notfind words in which to warn the husband that his wife would not besafe in the company of her old lover. The task with Lady Glencoraherself, bad as that would be, might be easier, and this task she atlast undertook,--not without success.
"Glencora," she said, when she found a fitting opportunity, "youwon't be angry, I hope, if I say a word to you?"
"That depends very much upon what the word is," said Lady Glencora.And here it must be acknowledged that Mr. Palliser's wife had not donemuch to ingratiate herself with Mr. Palliser's cousins;--not perhapsso much as she should have done, seeing that she found them in herhusband's house. She had taught herself to think that they were hard,stiff, and too proud of bearing the name of Palliser. Perhaps somelittle attempt may have been made by one or both of them to teach hersomething, and it need hardly be said that such an attempt on thepart of a husband's unmarried female relations would not be forgivenby a young bride. She had undoubtedly been ungracious, and of thisMiss Palliser was well aware.
"Well,--the word shall be as little unpleasant as I can make it,"said Miss Palliser, already appreciating fully the difficulty of hertask.
"But why say anything that is unpleasant? However, if it is to besaid, let us have it over at once."
"You are going to Monkshade, I believe, with Plantagenet."
"Well;--and what of that?"
"Dear Glencora, I think you had better not go. Do you not think soyourself?"
"Who has been talking to you?" said Lady Glencora, turning upon hervery sharply.
"Nobody has been talking to me;--not in the sense you mean."
"Plantagenet has spoken to you?"
"Not a word," said Miss Palliser. "You may be sure that he would notutter a word on such a subject to anyone unless it were to yourself.But, dear Glencora, you should not go there;--I mean it in allkindness and love,--I do indeed." Saying this she offered her hand toGlencora, and Glencora took it.
"Perhaps you do," said she in a low voice.
"Indeed I do. The world is so hard and cruel in what it says."
"I do not care two straws for what the world says."
"But he might care."
"It is not my fault. I do not want to go to Monkshade. Lady Monk wasmy friend once, but I do not care if I never see her again. I did notarrange this visit. It was Plantagenet who did it."
"But he will not take you there if you say you do not wish it."
"I have said so, and he told me that I must go. You will hardlybelieve me,--but I condescended even to tell him why I thought itbetter to remain away. He told me, in answer, that it was a sillyfolly which I must live down, and that it did not become me to beafraid of any man."
"Of course you are not afraid, but--"
"I am afraid. That is just the truth. I am afraid;--but what can I domore than I have done?"
This was very terrible to Miss Palliser. She had not thought thatLady Glencora would say so much, and she felt a true regret in havingbeen made to hear words which so nearly amounted to a confession.But for this there was no help now. There were not many more wordsbetween them, and we already know the result of the conversation.Lady Glencora became so ill from the effects of her imprudentlingering among the ruins that she was unable to go to Monkshade.
Mr. Palliser remained three days at Monkshade, and cemented hispolitical alliance with Sir Cosmo much in the same way as he hadbefore done with the Duke of St. Bungay. There was little or nothingsaid about politics, and certainly not a word that could be taken asany definite party understanding between the men; but they sat atdinner together at the same table, drank a glass of wine or two outof the same decanters, and dropped a chance word now and again aboutthe next session of Parliament. I do not know that anything more hadbeen expected either by Mr. Palliser or by Sir Cosmo; but it seemedto be understood when Mr. Palliser went away that Sir Cosmo was ofopinion that that young scion of a ducal house ought to become thefuture Chancellor of the Exchequer in the Whig Government.
"I can't see that there's so much in him," said one young member ofParliament to Sir Cosmo.
"I rather think that there is, all the same," said the baronet."There's a good deal in him, I believe! I dare say he's not verybright, but I don't know that we want brightness. A bright financieris the most dangerous man in the world. We've had enough of thatalready. Give me sound common sense, with just enough of the gab ina man to enable him to say what he's got to say! We don't want morethan that nowadays." From which it became evident that Sir Cosmo wassatisfied with the new political candidate for high place.
Lady Monk took an occasion to introd
uce Mr. Palliser to BurgoFitzgerald; with what object it is difficult to say, unless she wasanxious to make mischief between the men. Burgo scowled at him; butMr. Palliser did not notice the scowl, and put out his hand to hislate rival most affably. Burgo was forced to take it, and as he didso made a little speech. "I'm sorry that we have not the pleasure ofseeing Lady Glencora with you," said he.
"She is unfortunately indisposed," said Mr. Palliser.
"I am sorry for it," said Burgo--"very sorry indeed." Then he turnedhis back and walked away. The few words he had spoken, and the mannerin which he had carried himself, had been such as to make all thosearound them notice it. Each of them knew that Lady Glencora's nameshould not have been in Burgo's mouth, and all felt a fear noteasily to be defined that something terrible would come of it. ButMr. Palliser himself did not seem to notice anything, or to fearanything; and nothing terrible did come of it during that visit ofhis to Monkshade.
Can You Forgive Her? Page 35