by Thomas Hardy
XXIX
The effect upon Swithin of the interview with the Bishop had been a verymarked one. He felt that he had good ground for resenting thatdignitary's tone in haughtily assuming that all must be sinful which atthe first blush appeared to be so, and in narrowly refusing a young manthe benefit of a single doubt. Swithin's assurance that he would be ableto explain all some day had been taken in contemptuous incredulity.
'He may be as virtuous as his prototype Timothy; but he's an opinionatedold fogey all the same,' said St. Cleeve petulantly.
Yet, on the other hand, Swithin's nature was so fresh and ingenuous,notwithstanding that recent affairs had somewhat denaturalized him, thatfor a man in the Bishop's position to think him immoral was almost asoverwhelming as if he had actually been so, and at moments he couldscarcely bear existence under so gross a suspicion. What was his unionwith Lady Constantine worth to him when, by reason of it, he was thoughta reprobate by almost the only man who had professed to take an interestin him?
Certainly, by contrast with his air-built image of himself as a worthyastronomer, received by all the world, and the envied husband ofViviette, the present imputation was humiliating. The glorious light ofthis tender and refined passion seemed to have become debased toburlesque hues by pure accident, and his aesthetic no less than his ethictaste was offended by such an anti-climax. He who had soared amid theremotest grandeurs of nature had been taken to task on a rudimentaryquestion of morals, which had never been a question with him at all. Thiswas what the exigencies of an awkward attachment had brought him to; buthe blamed the circumstances, and not for one moment Lady Constantine.
Having now set his heart against a longer concealment he was disposed tothink that an excellent way of beginning a revelation of their marriagewould be by writing a confidential letter to the Bishop, detailing thewhole case. But it was impossible to do this on his own responsibility.He still recognized the understanding entered into with Viviette, beforethe marriage, to be as binding as ever,--that the initiative indisclosing their union should come from her. Yet he hardly doubted thatshe would take that initiative when he told her of his extraordinaryreprimand in the churchyard.
This was what he had come to do when Louis saw him standing at thewindow. But before he had said half-a-dozen words to Viviette shemotioned him to go on, which he mechanically did, ere he couldsufficiently collect his thoughts on its advisability or otherwise. Hedid not, however, go far. While Louis and his sister were discussing himin the drawing-room he lingered musing in the churchyard, hoping that shemight be able to escape and join him in the consultation he so earnestlydesired.
She at last found opportunity to do this. As soon as Louis had left theroom and shut himself in upstairs she ran out by the window in thedirection Swithin had taken. When her footsteps began crunching on thegravel he came forward from the churchyard door.
They embraced each other in haste, and then, in a few short pantingwords, she explained to him that her brother had heard and witnessed theinterview on that spot between himself and the Bishop, and had told herthe substance of the Bishop's accusation, not knowing she was the womanin the cabin.
'And what I cannot understand is this,' she added; 'how did the Bishopdiscover that the person behind the bed-curtains was a woman and not aman?'
Swithin explained that the Bishop had found the bracelet on the bed, andhad brought it to him in the churchyard.
'O Swithin, what do you say? Found the coral bracelet? What did you dowith it?'
Swithin clapped his hand to his pocket.
'Dear me! I recollect--I left it where it lay on Reuben Heath'stombstone.'
'Oh, my dear, dear Swithin!' she cried miserably. 'You have compromisedme by your forgetfulness. I have claimed the article as mine. Mybrother did not tell me that the Bishop brought it from the cabin. Whatcan I, can I do, that neither the Bishop nor my brother may conclude _I_was the woman there?'
'But if we announce our marriage--'
'Even as your wife, the position was too undignified--too I don't knowwhat--for me ever to admit that I was there! Right or wrong, I mustdeclare the bracelet was not mine. Such an escapade--why, it would makeme ridiculous in the county; and anything rather than that!'
'I was in hope that you would agree to let our marriage be known,' saidSwithin, with some disappointment. 'I thought that these circumstanceswould make the reason for doing so doubly strong.'
'Yes. But there are, alas, reasons against it still stronger! Let mehave my way.'
'Certainly, dearest. I promised that before you agreed to be mine. Myreputation--what is it! Perhaps I shall be dead and forgotten before thenext transit of Venus!'
She soothed him tenderly, but could not tell him why she felt the reasonsagainst any announcement as yet to be stronger than those in favour ofit. How could she, when her feeling had been cautiously fed anddeveloped by her brother Louis's unvarnished exhibition of Swithin'smaterial position in the eyes of the world?--that of a young man, thescion of a family of farmers recently her tenants, living at thehomestead with his grandmother, Mrs. Martin.
To soften her refusal she said in declaring it, 'One concession, Swithin,I certainly will make. I will see you oftener. I will come to the cabinand tower frequently; and will contrive, too, that you come to the houseoccasionally. During the last winter we passed whole weeks withoutmeeting; don't let us allow that to happen again.'
'Very well, dearest,' said Swithin good-humouredly. 'I don't care soterribly much for the old man's opinion of me, after all. For thepresent, then, let things be as they are.'
Nevertheless, the youth felt her refusal more than he owned; but theunequal temperament of Swithin's age, so soon depressed on his ownaccount, was also soon to recover on hers, and it was with almost achild's forgetfulness of the past that he took her view of the case.
When he was gone she hastily re-entered the house. Her brother had notreappeared from upstairs; but she was informed that Tabitha Lark waswaiting to see her, if her ladyship would pardon the said Tabitha forcoming so late. Lady Constantine made no objection, and saw the younggirl at once.
When Lady Constantine entered the waiting-room behold, in Tabitha'soutstretched hand lay the coral ornament which had been causing Vivietteso much anxiety.
'I guessed, on second thoughts, that it was yours, my lady,' saidTabitha, with rather a frightened face; 'and so I have brought it back.'
'But how did you come by it, Tabitha?'
'Mr. Glanville gave it to me; he must have thought it was mine. I tookit, fancying at the moment that he handed it to me because I happened tocome by first after he had found it.'
Lady Constantine saw how the situation might be improved so as to effecther deliverance from this troublesome little web of evidence.
'Oh, you can keep it,' she said brightly. 'It was very good of you tobring it back. But keep it for your very own. Take Mr. Glanville at hisword, and don't explain. And, Tabitha, divide the strands into twobracelets; there are enough of them to make a pair.'
The next morning, in pursuance of his resolution, Louis wandered roundthe grounds till he saw the girl for whom he was waiting enter thechurch. He accosted her over the wall. But, puzzling to view, a coralbracelet blushed on each of her young arms, for she had promptly carriedout the suggestion of Lady Constantine.
'You are wearing it, I see, Tabitha, with the other,' he murmured. 'Thenyou mean to keep it?'
'Yes, I mean to keep it.'
'You are sure it is not Lady Constantine's? I find she has one like it.'
'Quite sure. But you had better take it to her, sir, and ask her,' saidthe saucy girl.
'Oh, no; that's not necessary,' replied Louis, considerably shaken in hisconvictions.
When Louis met his sister, a short time after, he did not catch her, ashe had intended to do, by saying suddenly, 'I have found your bracelet. Iknow who has got it.'
'You cannot have found it,' she replied quietly, 'for I have discoveredt
hat it was never lost,' and stretching out both her hands she revealedone on each, Viviette having performed the same operation with herremaining bracelet that she had advised Tabitha to do with the other.
Louis was mystified, but by no means convinced. In spite of this attemptto hoodwink him his mind returned to the subject every hour of the day.There was no doubt that either Tabitha or Viviette had been with Swithinin the cabin. He recapitulated every case that had occurred during hisvisit to Welland in which his sister's manner had been of a colour tojustify the suspicion that it was she. There was that strange incidentin the corridor, when she had screamed at what she described to be ashadowy resemblance to her late husband; how very improbable that thisfancy should have been the only cause of her agitation! Then he hadnoticed, during Swithin's confirmation, a blush upon her cheek when hepassed her on his way to the Bishop, and the fervour in her glance duringthe few moments of the imposition of hands. Then he suddenly recalledthe night at the railway station, when the accident with the whip tookplace, and how, when he reached Welland House an hour later, he had foundno Viviette there. Running thus from incident to incident he increasedhis suspicions without being able to cull from the circumstances anythingamounting to evidence; but evidence he now determined to acquire withoutsaying a word to any one.
His plan was of a cruel kind: to set a trap into which the pair wouldblindly walk if any secret understanding existed between them of thenature he suspected.