The Complete Works of Henry James

by Henry James

  Pansy’s white little face turned red. “To England! Not to come back?”

  “I don’t know when I shall come back.”

  “Ah, I’m sorry,” Pansy breathed with faintness. She spoke as if she had no right to criticise; but her tone expressed a depth of disappointment.

  “My cousin, Mr. Touchett, is very ill; he’ll probably die. I wish to see him,” Isabel said.

  “Ah yes; you told me he would die. Of course you must go. And will papa go?”

  “No; I shall go alone.”

  For a moment the girl said nothing. Isabel had often wondered what she thought of the apparent relations of her father with his wife; but never by a glance, by an intimation, had she let it be seen that she deemed them deficient in an air of intimacy. She made her reflexions, Isabel was sure; and she must have had a conviction that there were husbands and wives who were more intimate than that. But Pansy was not indiscreet even in thought; she would as little have ventured to judge her gentle stepmother as to criticise her magnificent father. Her heart may have stood almost as still as it would have done had she seen two of the saints in the great picture in the convent chapel turn their painted heads and shake them at each other. But as in this latter case she would (for very solemnity’s sake) never have mentioned the awful phenomenon, so she put away all knowledge of the secrets of larger lives than her own. “You’ll be very far away,” she presently went on.

  “Yes; I shall be far away. But it will scarcely matter,” Isabel explained; “since so long as you’re here I can’t be called near you.”

  “Yes, but you can come and see me; though you’ve not come very often.”

  “I’ve not come because your father forbade it. To-day I bring nothing with me. I can’t amuse you.”

  “I’m not to be amused. That’s not what papa wishes.”

  “Then it hardly matters whether I’m in Rome or in England.”

  “You’re not happy, Mrs. Osmond,” said Pansy.

  “Not very. But it doesn’t matter.”

  “That’s what I say to myself. What does it matter? But I should like to come out.”

  “I wish indeed you might.”

  “Don’t leave me here,” Pansy went on gently.

  Isabel said nothing for a minute; her heart beat fast. “Will you come away with me now?” she asked.

  Pansy looked at her pleadingly. “Did papa tell you to bring me?”

  “No; it’s my own proposal.”

  “I think I had better wait then. Did papa send me no message?”

  “I don’t think he knew I was coming.”

  “He thinks I’ve not had enough,” said Pansy. “But I have. The ladies are very kind to me and the little girls come to see me. There are some very little ones—such charming children. Then my room—you can see for yourself. All that’s very delightful. But I’ve had enough. Papa wished me to think a little—and I’ve thought a great deal.”

  “What have you thought?”

  “Well, that I must never displease papa.”

  “You knew that before.”

  “Yes; but I know it better. I’ll do anything—I’ll do anything,” said Pansy. Then, as she heard her own words, a deep, pure blush came into her face. Isabel read the meaning of it; she saw the poor girl had been vanquished. It was well that Mr. Edward Rosier had kept his enamels! Isabel looked into her eyes and saw there mainly a prayer to be treated easily. She laid her hand on Pansy’s as if to let her know that her look conveyed no diminution of esteem; for the collapse of the girl’s momentary resistance (mute and modest thought it had been) seemed only her tribute to the truth of things. She didn’t presume to judge others, but she had judged herself; she had seen the reality. She had no vocation for struggling with combinations; in the solemnity of sequestration there was something that overwhelmed her. She bowed her pretty head to authority and only asked of authority to be merciful. Yes; it was very well that Edward Rosier had reserved a few articles!

  Isabel got up; her time was rapidly shortening. “Good-bye then. I leave Rome to-night.”

  Pansy took hold of her dress; there was a sudden change in the child’s face. “You look strange, you frighten me.”

  “Oh, I’m very harmless,” said Isabel.

  “Perhaps you won’t come back?”

  “Perhaps not. I can’t tell.”

  “Ah, Mrs. Osmond, you won’t leave me!”

  Isabel now saw she had guessed everything. “My dear child, what can I do for you?” she asked.

  “I don’t know—but I’m happier when I think of you.”

  “You can always think of me.”

  “Not when you’re so far. I’m a little afraid,” said Pansy.

  “What are you afraid of?”

  “Of papa—a little. And of Madame Merle. She has just been to see me.”

  “You must not say that,” Isabel observed.

  “Oh, I’ll do everything they want. Only if you’re here I shall do it more easily.”

  Isabel considered. “I won’t desert you,” she said at last. “Good-bye, my child.”

  Then they held each other a moment in a silent embrace, like two sisters; and afterwards Pansy walked along the corridor with her visitor to the top of the staircase. “Madame Merle has been here,” she remarked as they went; and as Isabel answered nothing she added abruptly: “I don’t like Madame Merle!”

  Isabel hesitated, then stopped. “You must never say that—that you don’t like Madame Merle.”

  Pansy looked at her in wonder; but wonder with Pansy had never been a reason for non-compliance. “I never will again,” she said with exquisite gentleness. At the top of the staircase they had to separate, as it appeared to be part of the mild but very definite discipline under which Pansy lived that she should not go down. Isabel descended, and when she reached the bottom the girl was standing above. “You’ll come back?” she called out in a voice that Isabel remembered afterwards.

  “Yes—I’ll come back.”

  Madame Catherine met Mrs. Osmond below and conducted her to the door of the parlour, outside of which the two stood talking a minute. “I won’t go in,” said the good sister. “Madame Merle’s waiting for you.”

  At this announcement Isabel stiffened; she was on the point of asking if there were no other egress from the convent. But a moment’s reflexion assured her that she would do well not to betray to the worthy nun her desire to avoid Pansy’s other friend. Her companion grasped her arm very gently and, fixing her a moment with wise, benevolent eyes, said in French and almost familiarly: “Eh bien, chere Madame, qu’en pensez-vous?”

  “About my step-daughter? Oh, it would take long to tell you.”

  “We think it’s enough,” Madame Catherine distinctly observed. And she pushed open the door of the parlour.

  Madame Merle was sitting just as Isabel had left her, like a woman so absorbed in thought that she had not moved a little finger. As Madame Catherine closed the door she got up, and Isabel saw that she had been thinking to some purpose. She had recovered her balance; she was in full possession of her resources. “I found I wished to wait for you,” she said urbanely. “But it’s not to talk about Pansy.”

  Isabel wondered what it could be to talk about, and in spite of Madame Merle’s declaration she answered after a moment: “Madame Catherine says it’s enough.”

  “Yes; it also seems to me enough. I wanted to ask you another word about poor Mr. Touchett,” Madame Merle added. “Have you reason to believe that he’s really at his last?”

  “I’ve no information but a telegram. Unfortunately it only confirms a probability.”

  “I’m going to ask you a strange question,” said Madame Merle. “Are you very fond of your cousin?” And she gave a smile as strange as her utterance.

  “Yes, I’m very fond of him. But I don’t understand you.”

  She just hung fire. “It’s rather hard to explain. Something has occurred to me which may not have occurred to you, and I give you the benefit of my i
dea. Your cousin did you once a great service. Have you never guessed it?”

  “He has done me many services.”

  “Yes; but one was much above the rest. He made you a rich woman.”

  “HE made me—?”

  Madame Merle appearing to see herself successful, she went on more triumphantly: “He imparted to you that extra lustre which was required to make you a brilliant match. At bottom it’s him you’ve to thank.” She stopped; there was something in Isabel’s eyes.

  “I don’t understand you. It was my uncle’s money.”

  “Yes; it was your uncle’s money, but it was your cousin’s idea. He brought his father over to it. Ah, my dear, the sum was large!”

  Isabel stood staring; she seemed to-day to live in a world illumined by lurid flashes. “I don’t know why you say such things. I don’t know what you know.”

  “I know nothing but what I’ve guessed. But I’ve guessed that.”

  Isabel went to the door and, when she had opened it, stood a moment with her hand on the latch. Then she said—it was her only revenge: “I believed it was you I had to thank!”

  Madame Merle dropped her eyes; she stood there in a kind of proud penance. “You’re very unhappy, I know. But I’m more so.”

  “Yes; I can believe that. I think I should like never to see you again.”

  Madame Merle raised her eyes. “I shall go to America,” she quietly remarked while Isabel passed out.

  CHAPTER 53

  It was not with surprise, it was with a feeling which in other circumstances would have had much of the effect of joy, that as Isabel descended from the Paris Mail at Charing Cross she stepped into the arms, as it were—or at any rate into the hands—of Henrietta Stackpole. She had telegraphed to her friend from Turin, and though she had not definitely said to herself that Henrietta would meet her, she had felt her telegram would produce some helpful result. On her long journey from Rome her mind had been given up to vagueness; she was unable to question the future. She performed this journey with sightless eyes and took little pleasure in the countries she traversed, decked out though they were in the richest freshness of spring. Her thoughts followed their course through other countries—strange-looking, dimly-lighted, pathless lands, in which there was no change of seasons, but only, as it seemed, a perpetual dreariness of winter. She had plenty to think about; but it was neither reflexion nor conscious purpose that filled her mind. Disconnected visions passed through it, and sudden dull gleams of memory, of expectation. The past and the future came and went at their will, but she saw them only in fitful images, which rose and fell by a logic of their own. It was extraordinary the things she remembered. Now that she was in the secret, now that she knew something that so much concerned her and the eclipse of which had made life resemble an attempt to play whist with an imperfect pack of cards, the truth of things, their mutual relations, their meaning, and for the most part their horror, rose before her with a kind of architectural vastness. She remembered a thousand trifles; they started to life with the spontaneity of a shiver. She had thought them trifles at the time; now she saw that they had been weighted with lead. Yet even now they were trifles after all, for of what use was it to her to understand them? Nothing seemed of use to her to-day. All purpose, all intention, was suspended; all desire too save the single desire to reach her much-embracing refuge. Gardencourt had been her starting-point, and to those muffled chambers it was at least a temporary solution to return. She had gone forth in her strength; she would come back in her weakness, and if the place had been a rest to her before, it would be a sanctuary now. She envied Ralph his dying, for if one were thinking of rest that was the most perfect of all. To cease utterly, to give it all up and not know anything more—this idea was as sweet as the vision of a cool bath in a marble tank, in a darkened chamber, in a hot land.

  She had moments indeed in her journey from Rome which were almost as good as being dead. She sat in her corner, so motionless, so passive, simply with the sense of being carried, so detached from hope and regret, that she recalled to herself one of those Etruscan figures couched upon the receptacle of their ashes. There was nothing to regret now—that was all over. Not only the time of her folly, but the time of her repentance was far. The only thing to regret was that Madame Merle had been so—well, so unimaginable. Just here her intelligence dropped, from literal inability to say what it was that Madame Merle had been. Whatever it was it was for Madame Merle herself to regret it; and doubtless she would do so in America, where she had announced she was going. It concerned Isabel no more; she only had an impression that she should never again see Madame Merle. This impression carried her into the future, of which from time to time she had a mutilated glimpse. She saw herself, in the distant years, still in the attitude of a woman who had her life to live, and these intimations contradicted the spirit of the present hour. It might be desirable to get quite away, really away, further away than little grey-green England, but this privilege was evidently to be denied her. Deep in her soul—deeper than any appetite for renunciation—was the sense that life would be her business for a long time to come. And at moments there was something inspiring, almost enlivening, in the conviction. It was a proof of strength—it was a proof she should some day be happy again. It couldn’t be she was to live only to suffer; she was still young, after all, and a great many things might happen to her yet. To live only to suffer—only to feel the injury of life repeated and enlarged—it seemed to her she was too valuable, too capable, for that. Then she wondered if it were vain and stupid to think so well of herself. When had it even been a guarantee to be valuable? Wasn’t all history full of the destruction of precious things? Wasn’t it much more probable that if one were fine one would suffer? It involved then perhaps an admission that one had a certain grossness; but Isabel recognised, as it passed before her eyes, the quick vague shadow of a long future. She should never escape; she should last to the end. Then the middle years wrapped her about again and the grey curtain of her indifference closed her in.

  Henrietta kissed her, as Henrietta usually kissed, as if she were afraid she should be caught doing it; and then Isabel stood there in the crowd, looking about her, looking for her servant. She asked nothing; she wished to wait. She had a sudden perception that she should be helped. She rejoiced Henrietta had come; there was something terrible in an arrival in London. The dusky, smoky, far-arching vault of the station, the strange, livid light, the dense, dark, pushing crowd, filled her with a nervous fear and made her put her arm into her friend’s. She remembered she had once liked these things; they seemed part of a mighty spectacle in which there was something that touched her. She remembered how she walked away from Euston, in the winter dusk, in the crowded streets, five years before. She could not have done that to-day, and the incident came before her as the deed of another person.

  “It’s too beautiful that you should have come,” said Henrietta, looking at her as if she thought Isabel might be prepared to challenge the proposition. “If you hadn’t—if you hadn’t; well, I don’t know,” remarked Miss Stackpole, hinting ominously at her powers of disapproval.

  Isabel looked about without seeing her maid. Her eyes rested on another figure, however, which she felt she had seen before; and in a moment she recognised the genial countenance of Mr. Bantling. He stood a little apart, and it was not in the power of the multitude that pressed about him to make him yield an inch of the ground he had taken—that of abstracting himself discreetly while the two ladies performed their embraces.

  “There’s Mr. Bantling,” said Isabel, gently, irrelevantly, scarcely caring much now whether she should find her maid or not.

  “Oh yes, he goes everywhere with me. Come here, Mr. Bantling!” Henrietta exclaimed. Whereupon the gallant bachelor advanced with a smile—a smile tempered, however, by the gravity of the occasion. “Isn’t it lovely she has come?” Henrietta asked. “He knows all about it,” she added; “we had quite a discussion. He said you wouldn’t, I said you would.
”

  “I thought you always agreed,” Isabel smiled in return. She felt she could smile now; she had seen in an instant, in Mr. Bantling’s brave eyes, that he had good news for her. They seemed to say he wished her to remember he was an old friend of her cousin—that he understood, that it was all right. Isabel gave him her hand; she thought of him, extravagantly, as a beautiful blameless knight.

  “Oh, I always agree,” said Mr. Bantling. “But she doesn’t, you know.”

  “Didn’t I tell you that a maid was a nuisance?” Henrietta enquired. “Your young lady has probably remained at Calais.”

  “I don’t care,” said Isabel, looking at Mr. Bantling, whom she had never found so interesting.