Hugh Crichton's Romance

“Arthur, if this affair of Jem’s worries you – ”

“Oh, no, no. It gives me something fresh to think about,” said Arthur, with evident truth. “I’m only – tired.”

“Well, rest then,” said Hugh, with the kind smile that Arthur liked.

Nothing should ever make him thoughtless of Arthur’s comfort; but, unsatisfactory as the conversation had been, there was growing up in Hugh’s mind the conviction that somehow, somewhere, some when, he would have to ask Violante to tell him the truth.

Part 6, Chapter XLV

Past and Present

“’Tis time my past should set my future free

For life’s renewed endeavour.”

Rosa Mattei was sitting by herself in her aunt’s drawing-room. That afternoon Violante was expected to arrive from Oxley, and the next day they would meet Signor Mattei at the lodging close by, which was to be their home for the present. It would not be nearly so pleasant for Rosa as the ease and companionship of her present quarters; but she had learnt to accommodate herself to circumstances, and did not fret over the prospect of dull evenings. Besides, it would not be for very long. Rosa’s fine, considerate face rounded into a look of satisfaction. She had a great deal to tell Violante and her father. How would they take her news?

“Well, Rosa, sitting and repenting?” said her cousin Beatrice, coming into the room.

“No, Trixy, I’m not going to repent,” said Rosa. “I’m very well satisfied with my arrangements.”

“I think you are a wise girl, and a lucky girl,” said Miss Grey; “but I should like to know how you tamed your wild flights down to this result.”

“Well, Beatrice, I never in all my life saw the use of fretting over what can’t be helped. It seems to me that the present is just as good a time as the past, and deserves at least as much from one. Things aren’t any the better really because they happened ever so long ago.”

“Yes. How long have you been so philosophical?”

Rosa blushed, but held her ground.

“When a thing is impossible it may be the best thing in itself, but something else may be far better than the shadow of it.”

”‘A live dog is better than a dead lion?’”

“Well, yes; now, you see, it was not possible for me to go on the stage, so it was better to put away that, and – and my school-girl fancies with it. I’m not imaginative enough to live on memories, particularly memories of – nothing! And this came – ”

“I’m only afraid you might find it a little humdrum – ”

“Humdrum, Beatrice? How could it be when Mr Fairfax is so clever, and so interesting?”

“Ha, ha, Rosy. Come, confess now. This talk is all very well; but you have just gone and fallen in love with Mr Fairfax, and you’ll begin life fresh.”

“If I have I’m afraid it’s since I accepted him! I thought – that is, I did not think. But you see, Beatrice, it is not often that a girl is so fortunate as to meet with anyone – ”

“Like him? I’m quite content, Rosy. You’ll do. And now tell me about the prudent part of it.”

“The prudent part is,” said Rosa, “that he wishes me to have Violante with me whenever I like – always, if need be. If she gets on better with father, and if this concert scheme comes to good, of course that won’t be necessary; but still I shall be able to take care of her, though she has almost grown into a woman.”

“I suppose she will go back to school?”

“Oh, yes, I trust so. It is so good for her. But it is time, I think, that I should go and meet her.”

Rosa was very happy, and just a little ashamed of herself for being so. As she had said, she could not live, and never had lived, on the memories of her first love; though circumstances had at times brought them vividly before her, the very renewal of them had shown her how entirely they were vain. Rosa had a very passionate but by no means a sentimental nature, and both her common-sense and her craving for a vivid, happy life forbade her to find satisfaction, in shadowy recollections.

“I am neither silly enough, nor unworldly enough,” she thought, as she held Mr Fairfax’s letter in her hand, and felt that its offer would be a good exchange for that bitter old sorrow to which she had offered up sacrifices enough already.

And, as for that other dream of ambition, it was tempting, but it was nearly impossible; and Rosa was a woman and had tried what earning her living meant, and could guess pretty well at the taste of the apples of fame, as well as of the Dead-sea fruits of failure. And, as Rosa made up her mind to say yes, she became aware that she was excusing herself for her readiness to do so, not arguing against any lurking unwillingness. It is needless to say that her uncle and aunt were pleased at her good fortune. Everyone would be pleased. And it was wonderful how well Mr Fairfax understood her ideas. Fancy having Violante to stay with her in a pretty little house; or, still better, going with the master of that pretty house to hear Violante sing and feel proud of her talents! It was from such happy visions that Rosa was roused by the sound of Violante’s voice.

She looked a little paler and graver than when they had last met, not quite so happy or so much at her ease; and almost her first words were:

“I have been singing a great deal, Rosina, and I think my voice is good.”

“So you have made up your mind to try to sing again?” said Rosa.

“Yes, Rosina, after the summer I will come home and sing.”

“You shall not do it if it frightens you and makes you unhappy, my darling.”

“But – father will wish it. And I think everyone is unhappy.”

“My dear child, what makes you take such a gloomy view of life?”

“Why, look, Rosa. Signor Arthur’s heart is breaking for his Mysie; while Miss Florence loves him, ah, I know how much!”

“Miss Florence! Does she? I thought her head was full of classes and school-girls.”

“Yes, she will not sit and cry; but I know how she listens when Freddie talks of him, and she will not begin herself to speak of him, but when I ask her questions then she will tell me. She thinks I am only a little girl and know nothing.”

“And you, yourself, dear?”

“I,” said Violante; “Rosa, I think he is ashamed of having loved me, and that he will never speak to me again.”

“Violante, it is wrong to let you stay there! I shall not consent to it.”

“Ah, no, Rosina, no! There I can see that he does not care for me; away, I should think – and hope – and fancy – and – and – oh, let me stay!”

“I am afraid that is not true,” said Rosa, and Violante blushed; for she knew in her heart that Rosa was right.

“You look well, Rosina mia,” she said.

“Yes, Violante, I shall surprise you very much. How should you like – you never thought that I should be engaged to anyone?”

“Rosina mia!” exclaimed Violante, with eyes opening wide, and accents of blank astonishment, and then a shower of kisses and questions.

She listened to the story with all the delight that Rosa had anticipated, and after every detail had been discussed between them there was a silence, as Violante sat in her favourite place, leaning against her sister’s knee.

“Now,” she said at last, “now Rosa, you can tell how hard – ”

She paused, and Rosa could hardly help laughing.

“My dear child, I knew that long ago. Listen, Violante, I think it is good for you to know, I was older than you when my trouble came, and I think it was as bad as yours. Yet, you see, I am happy.”

“Did you know Mr Fairfax then?” eagerly said Violante.

“No, no,” said Rosa, “quite another person. It doesn’t signify who he was. It’s all gone now.”

“Oh, Rosina, was it when I was a tiresome little girl, and troubled you?”

“You were my one comfort, my darling, never any trouble. But, you see, I told you to show you that one day happiness may come to you, though quite in a different way from what you now fancy.”

Violante started up, clasping her hands. “No, no, Rosina! I will not be happy so! I would rather have my sorrow. There would be nothing left in my heart without it. If he is cruel, he cannot take that away!”

She spoke so because she was a passionate untaught creature, with instinctive impulses, which she had never learnt to resist. Yet, did not her lover feel every day the force of her words; had he not lost with her the best of himself? Was not Florence, with all her sense, and all her intellect, resigning herself to the same fate? What would Arthur be without the memory that was breaking his heart? Her words awakened an echo strong enough in Rosa’s heart to silence her for the moment.

“If I changed, I should be nothing!” repeated Violante.

“You would be what your life had made you, Violante,” said Rosa, “ready for what might come. And you would want something real. But, dear, how should you know anything about it? I should have said the same.”

Violante said no more; but she thought that, after all, Rosa’s circumstances were different, for her unknown lover could never have been like “Signor Hugo.”

Probably both the girls prepared to meet their father the next day with some trepidation, and as they awaited his arrival they owned to each other that it was very strange to be thinking of supper, and making coffee again.

“It makes me want Maddalena,” said Violante.

“Poor Maddalena! She would not like London fogs. But if I did not make the coffee I am sure there is no one else who could make it fit to drink.”

In due time Signor Mattei arrived, very affectionate, very voluble, and strangely familiar to his daughters.

“Ah, my children; how I have pined for you! While I have been toiling, you have prospered, and I find you richly clothed;” here he indicated a piece of new pink ribbon that was tied round Violante’s neck.

“Yes, father,” said Rosa, “we have some good news for you, each of us. Will you have mine first?” and, Signor Mattei assenting, she made her communication, while Violante sat by wondering how this love-story would be received.

But Signor Mattei was romantic only on one point.

“He is, no doubt,” he said, “a fascinating youth, and respectable, since he is your uncle’s friend; but, figlia mia, his income? Ah, you cannot live on air!”

“Mr Fairfax is not a youth, father,” said Rosa, slightly hurt; “he is five-and-thirty, and he has a very good income, which he will explain to you, himself, to-night, if you will allow him. I shouldn’t think of living on air.”

Violante had not a strong sense of the ludicrous; but even she could hardly help smiling a little at Rosa’s aggrieved air, and could not help wondering how her father would have managed to coerce her resolute, independent sister, even if he had been dissatisfied with “the fascinating youth’s” prospects, as he replied:

“Then, Rosina, if that point is clear, I will consent.”

“Thank you, father.”

“And will Violante bake a crust of bread for her poor old father when you have left us?”

“Yes, father. I – My voice is come back. I can sing now.”

Signor Mattei’s whole face changed from its sentimental air to a look of fiery enthusiasm. He started to his feet, and caught her hands.

“Your voice, child? All your voice – every note? Let me hear, let me hear.”

He pulled her towards the piano, which had been esteemed by Rosa a necessary part of the furniture of their lodgings, and, controlling her heart-beating, with a great effort she sang up and down the scale. Signor Mattei fairly wept for joy. He kissed her over and over again, he made her repeat the notes, he crossed himself, and thanked the Saints in devouter language than his daughters had often heard from him; but finally exclaimed, with an air of chagrin:

“And Vasari has married a woman with a voice like a screech-owl!”

“That is surely of no consequence,” said Rosa. “Violante can never try opera-singing again. She will never be an actress, and her health would fail again directly if she attempted it. But she is willing, after her year at school is over, to try what she can do in the way of concert-singing. And you know that, here in England, no career could be better or more profitable.”

“If you wish it, padre mio,” said Violante, “I will try now to do what you wish.”

“My sacrifices are repaid!” said Signor Mattei, though he could hardly have defined what the sacrifices were.

The interview with Mr Fairfax, who shortly arrived, was beyond Rosa’s hopes. Violante, though secretly wondering at her sister’s taste, could not but be pleased at his kindness, and was forced to acknowledge to herself that, under the most favourable circumstances, she could not have imagined Signor Hugo either condescending to so many explanations, managing to praise exactly the music Signor Mattei liked, or giving quite such a comprehending and encouraging smile and nod as the one received by Rosa, when her father was a little argumentative.

Signor Mattei obtained one or two evening engagements, and a good many pupils, so that Violante did not feel bound to begin her new life in a hurry; and Rosa began with a good heart her modest preparations for the wedding, which was to take place in the middle of August. The Greys gave a musical party, at which Signor Mattei played, and once Mr Fairfax took them all to the opera. Rather to Rosa’s surprise, Violante showed no reluctance to make one of the party. How did she feel when she sat and looked on at “Il Don Giovanni,” and saw another, and how superior, performer playing her old part of Zerlina? Her voice, at its sweetest and clearest, had never been quite such as this, and she seemed for the first time to know what was meant by acting, as she looked on at the world-famous prima donna.

This power, this popularity, this applause was what the father had looked for; the loss of this was what he had mourned. Could she ever have had it, or anything like it? Did she regret now that she could not? Did the woman see the value of what the girl had turned from with tears and distaste? For in this past year, what with trouble, change, and experience, Violante had grown into a woman.

She sat quite still, with her delicate face, pale and passive, and her eyes fixed on the stage. She had pushed all this away from her, all this light and sparkle, this splendour and excitement that had seemed so hard and glaring, so utterly untempting to her shy, tender spirit. What had she gained from that other vision that had worn such a lovely hue? It seemed just then to Violante as if both love and fame had played her false. Since she had lost the first, would it not be better to try and regain the second? It was but a passing thought, but it touched her to the quick. She put put her hand, and held Rosa’s tight, as Zerlina curtseyed, and picked up her bouquets.

“Oh,” she thought, “I would be Zerlina. I would do it all, all, if he would throw one. It was better to have all the trouble when he loved me – when he gave me my flowers – my flowers – ”

Rosa was not surprised that the old association cost Violante that night such tears as she had not shed for many a month, and Violante wept in silence, uttering no word of her secret yearning and regret.

Part 6, Chapter XLVI

Perplexities

“Does the road wind up-hill all the way?”

While Violante was in London James Crichton, at some happy juncture, brought his wooing to a crisis, and became the accepted lover of Helen Hayward. His choice was equally surprising and delightful to his mother, who threw herself with the greatest interest into all his preparations for his marriage in the autumn, invited Helen whenever her mother would spare her, and regained all her elastic spirits in this new interest; while James smiled more than ever, and talked about Helen to everyone who would listen. Both his cousin and his brother were naturally strongly affected by this new love-story working itself out beside them. Lengthening days, summer weather, summer flowers, and summer habits, could not but remind both of them of what these young days of last year had been to them. There awoke in Hugh all the old questioning with himself; all the old arguments that he had thought laid at rest for ever; all the old passion, which jealousy and self-reproach had for the time overclouded. He hardly knew how; but his belief in the causes which he had for jealousy had gradually faded, and he no longer believed that Violante was either engaged to the manager or that she was pining for his loss. A little reflection convinced him that all that Arthur had told him of her sadness might have been caused by the memory of himself, and something in the look of her eyes at their two brief meetings confirmed this thought. As Hugh’s mind gradually freed itself from the hard, bitter judgment of himself and of others that had followed the stern self-reproach and self-pity which had for so long occupied it, as his new kindliness towards Arthur warmed and softened him, he came to view things in a more natural light, and ceased to tell himself that his love, like everything else, was turned to bitterness. No, it was sweet and soft and strong as in the May-days of last year; but Hugh had become far more conscious of the difficulties attending it, and Hugh had lost in this year of sorrow and self-distrust the bounding energy by which he had intended to overcome them. Besides, he was no longer quite the authority that he had been at home, and, though Violante was doubtless really more fitted to marry him by her school-life, she had lost a great advantage in having become known first to his mother as a girl whom there was not the slightest likelihood of his fancying. A wonderful Italian unknown beauty was one thing; a little foreign, penniless girl, half-singer, half-school-teacher, was quite another. And though Hugh was, of course, his own master, his relations to his family formed so large a part of his life that he hardly knew how to disturb them, and the Crichtons belonged to exactly the class most easily disturbed by an incongruous marriage. He had given up the notion that he ought to punish himself for the destruction of Arthur’s happiness by destroying his own; but his feelings strongly revolted against any deliberate effort to secure it just at the time then coming, and there was nothing morbid in the belief that he was bound to make Arthur his first consideration; for Arthur’s sake, not for that of his own conscience. And what was to become of Arthur was a problem that grew in difficulty.

The recurrence of these once happy summer days, perhaps spite of himself, Jem’s bright hopes, and the return to the amusement and occupations of which Mysie had been the centre, were more than he could bear, and cost him such heart-sickness as he had never yet known.

It seemed as if his light-hearted youth had been beaten at last in the struggle, and efforts to brave it out only made matters worse; and, though he had, perhaps, never fought so hard with himself, he got none of the credit that had attached to his first home-coming. They did not cease to pity him for his sorrow, but it did become wearisome to sympathise with the indications of it, and it was impossible to order matters only with reference to him. He was out of place among them, and he felt it keenly, yet he could not resolve to go away by himself, he had grown very reserved, and certainly tried as much as possible to avoid notice; and even Hugh, who saw the most of him, found it very difficult to know how to deal with him, and turned over many plans in his mind, none of which appeared to him quite satisfactory.

They were walking home together one afternoon by the field-path from Oxley. The summer heat was beginning to be felt in the air, the summer look was coming over the woods and fields. The summer silence would soon succeed to the perpetual song and twitter of the birds. They were walking on silently, when, tripping down the path came a smartly-dressed girl, with fair hair flying. It was Alice Wood, who had been absent all the year. As she recognised them, she started violently and stopped, a sudden look of agitation in her face as she made a half-curtsey.

Arthur hesitated, then went up rather eagerly, and shook hands with her.

“How d’ye do – you have been away?” he said.

“Yes, sir, at my aunt’s, learning dressmaking. I – I hope you are pretty well, Mr Arthur,” she added, faltering.

Arthur seemed unable to say more; he turned away from her, and she hurried on, crying as she went.

The two young men stood still, each of them overpowered by the sight of her. Then Hugh saw that Arthur shivered, and was very pale. He turned towards a tree-trunk near, and sat there with hidden face, trying to recover himself, while all Hugh’s agony of remorse once more came over him.

“God knows, Arthur, I wish the stroke had fallen on me!” he said. “It is from me you should shrink. How can you bear the sight of me!”

Arthur did not answer, but he looked up after a few minutes, and said simply:

“I am very sorry. I wish I could get over these things.”

“This was not a thing to be got over.”

“No. But, Hugh, the canal – the meadows – it’s like a nightmare – I can’t forget them. I have trial to go there – to conquer it, but I never could. Yet I have dreamt over and over again of it.”

“You never spoke of this?” said Hugh.

“Oh, no. Hugh, have you ever been there?”

“Yes,” said Hugh, “often at first. It was better than thinking of it.”

“Will you come with me, and get it done? I think I could – with you.”

“Oh, my dear boy, I don’t think I ought to let you do that.”

“It would be over. But I don’t know – In the morning, when it looks different.”

“Yes, not now,” said Hugh, firmly. “See here, Arthur. I have guessed at these feelings of yours. I know too well how natural and inevitable they are. But Redhurst is no fit place for you just now, and I have a plan. Should you like to come back to the Bank House and stay there with me? I think it’s comfortable, and you could rest, and there would be no discussions about society, and no worries. If you could like to be alone with me?”

“I should like it very much,” said Arthur, decidedly. “I know I’m no good at home, but I cannot bear the thought of wandering about.”

“Well, then, shall we come back now? You are tired and shaken, and I will go and explain things at home.”

“Yes. Hugh, we shan’t rake up all these matters again; but I want to tell you, once for all, that you mistook my feeling about yourself. I need not say I never blamed you – how could I? But all this nervous folly can only belong to – to indifferent objects. You suffered too, only at first I could not think of that. But you do help me – you always know the right thing for me.”

“I would lay down my life for you,” said Hugh, passionately.

“No. But you will help me to recover myself. I’m glad I have told you. And as for what must remain, when – when I have ‘got over it,’ as they say – life without her – though you wouldn’t think it after this, I believe I am learning to look forward to it a little better, and I shall have you to help me.”

“I have been very miserable about it,” said Hugh, moved to equal simplicity by Arthur’s straightforwardness. “It was my first comfort when you said I helped you. Nothing shall ever come between us: you shall be my first thought, for ever.”

Hugh’s voice swelled and quivered; he did nothing but hold Arthur’s hand for a moment, but no sign or gesture of passionate emotion would have seemed exaggerated to his feeling then. “I can make atonement,” he thought.

Arthur, who, after all, cared far less about the relations between them, though his affectionate expressions had been perfectly genuine, said more lightly:

“Then are we to turn back to Oxley?”

“Yes; then you will not have to talk it all over at home; I’ll settle it.”

So they retraced their steps; and Hugh took Arthur into the Bank House and upstairs, where he had never been for years. It was rather a large house, in the time of their grandfather the largest in Oxley, and was well-furnished and handsome. The drawing-room had never been used by Hugh; but he had established himself in the library, a stiff, old-fashioned room, with two long, narrow windows, with high window-seats in them. His writing-table, with its untidy masculine papers, had intruded on the orderly arrangements in which his grandmother, who had long survived her husband, had delighted. Arthur sat down in one of the window-seats while Hugh gave the orders rendered necessary by this unexpected decision.