“I imagine we have, mamma,” replied Mary, who was in every way delighted by the discovery of this unknown talent in her favourite. “But Agnes is right; she must really sing no more now.... You have had no walk to-day, Agnes, have you?” kindly adding, “if you like it, I will put on my bonnet again and take a stroll with you.”
Agnes blushed when she replied,— “No, I have not time to walk to-day.... I must go home now;” much as she might have done if, instead of intending to take a ramble with her thoughts, she had been about to enjoy a tête-à-tête promenade with the object of them.
“At least we will walk home with you,” replied her friend; and accordingly the two eldest girls and Mr. Stephenson accompanied her to Sion Row.
Ungrateful Agnes!... It was with a feeling of joy that made her heart leap that she watched the departure of her kind friends, and of him too who would have shed his blood for her with gladness ... in order that in silence and solitude she might live over again the moments she had passed with Hubert — moments which, in her estimation, outweighed in value whole years of life without him.
Dear and precious was her little closet now. There was nothing within it that ever tempted her aunt to enter; her retreat, therefore, was secure, and deeply did she enjoy the conviction that it was so. It was not Petrarch, it was not Shakspeare, no, nor Spencer’s fairy-land, in which, when fancy-free, she used to roam for hours of most sweet forgetfulness, that now chained her to her solitary chair, and kept her wholly unconscious of the narrow walls that hemmed her in. But what a world of new and strange thoughts it was amidst which she soon lost herself!... Possibilities, conjectures, hopes, such as had never before entered her head, arose within her as, with a singular mixture of distinctness of memory and confusion of feeling, she lived again through every instant of the period during which Colonel Hubert had been in her presence, and of that, more thrilling still as she meditated upon it, when she unconsciously had been in his. How anxiously she recalled her attitude, the careless disorder of her hair, and the unmeasured burst of enjoyment to which she had yielded herself!... How every song she had sung passed in review before her!... Her graces, her roulades, her childish trials of what she could effect, all seemed to rise in judgment against her, and her cheeks tingled with the blushes they brought. Yet in the midst of this, perhaps,
... a sense of self-approving power Mixed with her busy thought ...
and she felt that she was not sorry he had heard her sing.
Then came the glowing picture of the few short moments that followed the discovery ... the look that she had seen fixed upon her ... the voice that trembled as he asked to be forgiven ... his flushed cheek ... the agitation — yes, the agitation of his manner, of the stately Hubert’s manner, as he approached, as he stood near, as he looked at, as he spoke to her! It was so; she knew it, she had seen it, she had felt it.... How strange is the constitution of the human mind!... and how mutually dependent are its faculties and feelings on each other!.... The same girl who was so “earthly dull” as to be unable to perceive the undisguised adoration of Frederick Stephenson, was now rapt in a delirium of happiness from having read, what probably no other mortal eye could see, in the involuntary workings of Colonel Hubert’s features for a few short instants, while offering an apology which he could hardly avoid making.
CHAPTER VIII.
SOME FARTHER PARTICULARS RESPECTING THE STATE OF MRS. BARNABY’S HEART. — TENDER DOUBTS AND FEARS, ON THE PART OF THE MAJOR, ALL SET TO REST BY THE GENTLE KINDNESS OF THE WIDOW. — SOME ACCOUNT OF MRS. PETERS’S CONCERT, AND OF THE TERRIBLE EVENTS WHICH FOLLOWED IT.
We have left the Widow Barnaby too long, and must hasten back to her. There was altogether a strange mixture of worldly wisdom and of female folly in her character, for first one and then the other preponderated, as circumstances occurred. Had a man, richer than she believed the fascinating Major to be, proposed to her even at the very tenderest climax of his courtship, there is no doubt in the world but she would have accepted him, but when all her pecuniary anxieties were lulled into a happy doze by the pleasing statements of Messrs. William and Maintry, her love-making propensities awoke; she was again the Martha Compton of Silverton; and became so exceedingly attached to the Major’s society, that neither Mrs. Peters’s concert, nor any other engagement in which he did not share, could have compensated for one of those delightful tête-à-tête evenings during which Agnes enjoyed the society of her friends.
When Major Allen saw the invitation card from Rodney Place lying on the table, he said, —
“Do you intend to go, dearest?”
“Have you a card, Major?” was the reply; and when the rejoinder produced a negative, she added,— “Then most assuredly I shall not go;” a degree of fidelity that was very satisfactory to the Major, who began to discover that his newness in the society of Clifton was wearing off, and that he was eyed askance whenever he ventured to appear where gentlemen assembled.
A thousand fond follies, of course, diversified these frequent tête-à-têtes; and upon one occasion the Major in a sudden burst of jealous tenderness declared, that, notwithstanding the many proofs of affection she had granted him, there was one without which he could not be satisfied, as his dreams perpetually tormented him with visions of rivals who succeeded in snatching her from him.
“Oh! Major, what folly!” exclaimed the lady. “Have you not yet learned to read my heart?... But what is there ... foolish as you are ... what is there that I could refuse to you ... that it was not inconsistent with my honour to grant?...”
“Your honour!... Beautiful Juno! know you not that your honour is dearer to me than my own?... What I would ask, my beloved Martha, can attach no disgrace to you, ... but, in fact, I shall not know a moment’s ease till you have given me a promise of marriage. I know, my love, that you have relations here who will leave no stone unturned to prevent our union, ... and the idea that they may succeed distracts me!... Will you forgive this weakness, and grant what I implore?”
“You know I will, foolish man!... but I will have your promise in return, or you will think my love less fervent than your own,” returned the widow playfully.
To this the Major made no objection; and so, “in merry sport,” these promises were signed and exchanged amidst many lover-like jestings on their own folly.
This happened just three days before the eventful concert; and in the interval Major Allen received a letter from his friend Maintry, who was still at Bath, requesting him to join him there in order to give him the advantage of his valuable advice on a matter of great importance. It was, of course, with extreme reluctance that he tore himself away; but it was a sacrifice demanded by friendship, and he would make it, as he told the widow, on condition that she would rescind her refusal to Mrs. Peters, and pass the evening of his absence at her house. She agreed to this, and he left her only in time to enable her to dress for the party.
The being accompanied by her aunt was a considerable drawback to any pleasure Agnes had anticipated from the evening, and the stroke came upon her by surprise, for Mrs. Barnaby did not deem it necessary to stand on such ceremony with her sister as to ask leave to come after having been once invited.
Mrs. Peters looked vexed and disconcerted when she entered; but, perceiving the anxiety with which Agnes was watching to see how she bore it, she recalled her smiles, placed her prodigiously fine sister-in-law on a sofa with two other dowagers, desired Mr. Peters to go and talk to her, and then seizing upon Agnes, led her among the party of amateurs who were indulging in gossip and tea at a snug table in the second drawing-room. She was immediately introduced as a young friend who would prove a great acquisition, and two or three songs in her own old-fashioned style were assigned, pretty nearly without waiting for her consent, to her performance; but with an observation from Mrs. Peters that she could not refuse, because they were the very songs she had sung when Mr. Stephenson was there in the morning.
All this was said and done in a bustle and a hurry, and Agnes carr
ied off captive to the region where the business of the evening was already beginning with the tuning of instruments and the arrangement of desks, before she well knew what she intended to do or say. She would have felt the embarrassment more had her mind been fully present to the scene; but it was not. She knew that Mr. Stephenson and his friend were expected, and no spot of earth had much interest for her at that moment except the doorway.
Her suspense lasted not long, however, for they soon entered together, and then her heart bounded, the colour varied on her cheek, and her whole frame trembled. Mr. Stephenson was by her side in a moment; but she was conscious of this only sufficiently to make her feel a pang because Colonel Hubert had not followed him. Far from approaching her, indeed, he seemed to place himself studiously at a distance, and instantly a deep gloom appeared in the eyes of Agnes to have fallen upon every object.... The lights were dim, every instrument out of tune, and the civilities of Mr. Stephenson so extremely troublesome, that she thought, if they continued, she must certainly leave the room.
The overture began, and she was desired to sit down in the place assigned her; but this, as she found, left her open on one side to the pertinacious whisperings of Mr. Stephenson, and with a movement of irritation quite new to her, she got up again, with her cheeks burning, to ask for a place in the very middle of a row of ladies who could not comply with her request without real difficulty.
As soon as she had reached her new station she raised her eyes, and looked towards the spot where she had seen Colonel Hubert place himself; there he was still, and moreover his eyes were evidently fixed upon her.
“Why will he not speak to me?” mentally exclaimed poor Agnes; ... “or why does he so look at me?”
It would not have been difficult for Colonel Hubert to have given an answer. While they were taking coffee together half an hour before they set off, Frederick Stephenson told his friend that his fate would that night be decided, for he had made up his mind to propose to Miss Willoughby.
Colonel Hubert started.... “Of course, Frederick, you do not decide upon this without being pretty certain what the answer will be,” was the reply of Colonel Hubert.
“You know the definition Silvius gives of love,” returned Frederick. “It is to be all made of faith and service ... and so am I for Agnes.... Wherefore, as my service is, and shall be perfect, so also shall be my faith, nor will I ever submit myself to the misery of doubting.... Either she is mine at once, or I fly where I can never see her more.”
After this, Colonel Hubert very naturally preferred looking on from a distance, to making any approach that might disturb the declared purpose of his friend.
“By-standers see most,” ... is an old proverb, and all such speak truly. Frederick, notwithstanding his “perfect service,” was not by many a degree so near discovering the true state of Miss Willoughby’s feelings as his friend: not, indeed, that Colonel Hubert discovered anything relating to himself, but he saw weariness and distaste in the movement of Agnes’s head, and the mournful expression of her face, even before the decisive manœuvre by which she escaped from him, who was only waiting for an opportunity of confessing himself “to be all made of adoration, duty, and observance.”
An indescribable sensation of pleasure tingled through the veins of Colonel Hubert as he observed this, but the next moment his heart reproached him with a bitter pang. “Am I then a traitor to him who has so frankly trusted me?” thought he. “No, by Heaven!... Poor Frederick!... Angel as she is, he well deserves her, for from the very first he has thought of her, and her only; ... while I ... the study of her aunt’s absurdities I deemed the more attractive speculation of the two.... Agnes, you are avenged!”
The good-humoured Frederick, mean time, though foiled in his hope of engrossing her, quickly found consolation in listening to Miss Peters, who confided to him all her doubts and fears respecting the possibility of her friend’s finding courage to sing before so large an audience.
“For God’s sake, do not plague her about it,” said he. “Though, to be sure, such a voice as hers would be enough to embellish any concert in the world.”
“It is only on mamma’s account,” replied Mary, “that I am anxious for it; ... she has been so disappointed about Miss Roberts!... I wish, after Lucy’s next duet with James, while Elizabeth is accompanying the violoncello, that you would contrive to get near her, where she is trying to keep out of the way, poor thing!... and tell her that my mother wishes to speak to her.”
Frederick readily undertook the commission, not ill pleased to be thus confirmed in his belief that she had not run away from him, but for some other reason which he had not before understood. Miss Peters was far from imagining what an effectual means she had hit upon for making her friend Agnes take a place among the performers. She had continued to sit during the long duet, triumphing in the clever management that had placed her out of the way of everybody, and perfectly aware ... though she by no means appeared to watch him steadily ... that Colonel Hubert did not feel at all more gay or happy than herself. But, lo! just at the moment indicated by Mary, the smiling, bowing, handsome Frederick Stephenson contrived civilly and silently to make his way between crowded rows of full-dressed ladies to the place where Agnes fancied herself in such perfect security. He delivered his message, but not without endeavouring to make her understand how superlatively happy the commission had made him.
This was too much.... To sit within the same room that held Colonel Hubert, without his taking the slightest notice of her, and that, too, after all the sweet delusive visions of the morning, was quite dreadful enough, without having to find answers for words she did not hear, and dress her face in smiles, when she was so very much disposed to weep. “I will sing every song they will let me,” thought she. “Ill or well, it matters not now.... I will bear anything but being talked to!”
Giving the eager messenger nothing but a silent nod in return for all his trouble, Agnes again rose, and made her way to Mrs. Peters.
It chanced that Mary, Lucy, and one or two other ladies were in consultation with her at a part of the room exactly within sight of Mrs. Barnaby, who, having found her neighbours civilly disposed to answer all her questions, had thus far remained tolerably contented and quiet. But the scene she now witnessed aroused her equally to jealousy and astonishment. Mrs. Peters — who, from the moment she had deposited her on the sofa, had never bestowed a single word upon her, but, on the contrary, kept very carefully out of her way, — had hitherto been supposed by her self-satisfied sister-in-law to be too much occupied in arranging the progress of the musical performance to have any time left to bestow upon her relations; yet now she saw her in the centre of the room, devoting her whole attention to Agnes, evidently presenting her to one or two of the most elegant-looking among her company, and finally taking her by the hand, as if she had been the most important personage present, and leading her with smiles, and an air of the most flattering affection, to the pianoforte.
“Who is that beautiful girl, ma’am?” said one of Mrs. Barnaby’s talkative neighbours, thinking, perhaps, that she had a right, in her turn, to question a person who had so freely questioned her.
“What girl, ma’am?” returned Mrs. Barnaby; for use so lessens marvel, that she had become almost unconscious of the uncommon loveliness of her niece; or, at any rate, was too constantly occupied by other concerns to pay much attention to it.
“That young lady in black crape, whom Mrs. Peters has just led to the instrument.... Upon my word, I think she is the most beautiful person I ever saw!”
“Oh!... that’s my niece, ma’am; ... and I’m sure I don’t know what nonsense my sister Peters has got in her head about her.... I hope she is not going to pretend to play without asking my leave. It is time I should look after her.” And so saying the indignant Mrs. Barnaby arose, determined upon sharing the notice at least, if not the favour, bestowed upon her dependant kinswoman. But she was immediately compelled to reseat herself by the universal “Hush!...” that
buzzed around her; for at that moment the superb voice of Agnes burst upon the room, and “startled the dull ear” of the least attentive listener in it.
The effect was so wholly unlooked-for, and so great, that the demonstration of it might naturally have been expected to overpower so young a performer; Miss Peters, therefore, the moment the song was over, hastened to her friend, expecting to find her agitated, trembling, and in want of an arm to support her; but instead of this she found Agnes perfectly tranquil ... apparently unconscious of having produced any sensation at all in the company at large, and in fact looking, for the first time since she entered the room, happy and at her ease.
The cause of this could only be found where Miss Peters never thought of looking for it, — namely, in the position and countenance of Colonel Hubert. He had not, indeed, yet spoken much to her; but enough, at least, to convince her that he was not more indifferent than in the morning, and, ... in short, enough to raise her from the miserable state of dejection and annoyance which made her fly with such irritated feelings from the attentions of Frederick, to such a state of joyous hopefulness as made her almost giddily unmindful of every human being around her, save one.
Though Agnes had restlessly left the place whence she had first seen Colonel Hubert ensconce himself in a corner, apparently as far from her as possible, she chose another equally convenient for tormenting herself by watching him, and for perceiving also that nothing, save his own will and pleasure, detained him from her. From this, as we have seen, she was again driven by poor Frederick; and forgetting her shyness and all other minor evils in the misery of being talked to when her heart was breaking, she determined upon singing, solely to get out of his way.
Her false courage, however, faded fast as she approached the instrument. She remembered, with a keenness amounting almost to agony, those songs of the morning that she had since been rehearsing in spirit, in the dear belief that they had charmed away his stately reserve for ever; and she was desperately meditating the best mode of making a precipitate retreat, when, on reaching the spot kept sacred to the performers and their music-desks, she perceived Colonel Hubert in the midst of them, who immediately placed himself at her side, (where, according to rule, he had no business to be,) and asked her in a whisper, if she meant to accompany herself.
Collected Works of Frances Trollope Page 132