Kabanata Kabanata 14 · Chapter XIV

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I will not clothe myself in wreck—wear gems

Sawed from cramped finger-bones of women drowned;

Feel chilly vaporous hands of ireful ghosts

Clutching my necklace: trick my maiden breast

With orphans’ heritage. Let your dead love

Marry its dead.

Gwendolen looked lovely and vigorous as a tall, newly-opened lily the

next morning: there was a reaction of young energy in her, and

yesterday’s self-distrust seemed no more than the transient shiver on

the surface of a full stream. The roving archery match in Cardell Chase

was a delightful prospect for the sport’s sake: she felt herself

beforehand moving about like a wood-nymph under the beeches (in

appreciative company), and the imagined scene lent a charm to further

advances on the part of Grandcourt—not an impassioned lyrical Daphnis

for the wood-nymph, certainly: but so much the better. To-day Gwendolen

foresaw him making slow conversational approaches to a declaration, and

foresaw herself awaiting and encouraging it according to the rational

conclusion which she had expressed to her uncle.

When she came down to breakfast (after every one had left the table

except Mrs. Davilow) there were letters on her plate. One of them she

read with a gathering smile, and then handed it to her mamma, who, on

returning it, smiled also, finding new cheerfulness in the good spirits

her daughter had shown ever since waking, and said,

“You don’t feel inclined to go a thousand miles away?”

“Not exactly so far.”

“It was a sad omission not to have written again before this. Can’t you

write now—before we set out this morning?”

“It is not so pressing. To-morrow will do. You see they leave town

to-day. I must write to Dover. They will be there till Monday.”

“Shall I write for you, dear—if it teases you?”

Gwendolen did not speak immediately, but after sipping her coffee,

answered brusquely, “Oh no, let it be; I will write to-morrow.” Then,

feeling a touch of compunction, she looked up and said with playful

tenderness, “Dear, old, beautiful mamma!”

“Old, child, truly.”

“Please don’t, mamma! I meant old for darling. You are hardly

twenty-five years older than I am. When you talk in that way my life

shrivels up before me.”

“One can have a great deal of happiness in twenty-five years, my dear.”

“I must lose no time in beginning,” said Gwendolen, merrily. “The

sooner I get my palaces and coaches the better.”

“And a good husband who adores you, Gwen,” said Mrs. Davilow,

encouragingly.

Gwendolen put out her lips saucily and said nothing.

It was a slight drawback on her pleasure in starting that the rector

was detained by magistrate’s business, and would probably not be able

to get to Cardell Chase at all that day. She cared little that Mrs.

Gascoigne and Anna chose not to go without him, but her uncle’s

presence would have seemed to make it a matter of course that the

decision taken would be acted on. For decision in itself began to be

formidable. Having come close to accepting Grandcourt, Gwendolen felt

this lot of unhoped-for fullness rounding itself too definitely. When

we take to wishing a great deal for ourselves, whatever we get soon

turns into mere limitation and exclusion. Still there was the

reassuring thought that marriage would be the gate into a larger

freedom.

The place of meeting was a grassy spot called Green Arbor, where a bit

of hanging wood made a sheltering amphitheatre. It was here that the

coachful of servants with provisions had to prepare the picnic meal;

and the warden of the Chase was to guide the roving archers so as to

keep them within the due distance from this centre, and hinder them

from wandering beyond the limit which had been fixed on—a curve that

might be drawn through certain well-known points, such as the double

Oak, the Whispering Stones, and the High Cross. The plan was to take

only a preliminary stroll before luncheon, keeping the main roving

expedition for the more exquisite lights of the afternoon. The muster

was rapid enough to save every one from dull moments of waiting, and

when the groups began to scatter themselves through the light and

shadow made here by closely neighboring beeches and there by rarer

oaks, one may suppose that a painter would have been glad to look on.

This roving archery was far prettier than the stationary game, but

success in shooting at variable marks were less favored by practice,

and the hits were distributed among the volunteer archers otherwise

than they would have been in target-shooting. From this cause, perhaps,

as well as from the twofold distraction of being preoccupied and

wishing not to betray her preoccupation, Gwendolen did not greatly

distinguish herself in these first experiments, unless it were by the

lively grace with which she took her comparative failure. She was in

white and green as on the day of the former meeting, when it made an

epoch for her that she was introduced to Grandcourt; he was continually

by her side now, yet it would have been hard to tell from mere looks

and manners that their relation to each other had at all changed since

their first conversation. Still there were other grounds that made most

persons conclude them to be, if not engaged already, on the eve of

being so. And she believed this herself. As they were all returning

toward Green Arbor in divergent groups, not thinking at all of taking

aim but merely chattering, words passed which seemed really the

beginning of that end—the beginning of her acceptance. Grandcourt

said, “Do you know how long it is since I first saw you in this dress?”

“The archery meeting was on the 25th, and this is the 13th,” said

Gwendolen, laughingly. “I am not good at calculating, but I will

venture to say that it must be nearly three weeks.”

A little pause, and then he said, “That is a great loss of time.”

“That your knowing me has caused you? Pray don’t be uncomplimentary; I

don’t like it.”

Pause again. “It is because of the gain that I feel the loss.”

Here Gwendolen herself left a pause. She was thinking, “He is really

very ingenious. He never speaks stupidly.” Her silence was so unusual

that it seemed the strongest of favorable answers, and he continued:

“The gain of knowing you makes me feel the time I lose in uncertainty.

Do _you_ like uncertainty?”

“I think I do, rather,” said Gwendolen, suddenly beaming on him with a

playful smile. “There is more in it.”

Grandcourt met her laughing eyes with a slow, steady look right into

them, which seemed like vision in the abstract, and then said, “Do you

mean more torment for me?”

There was something so strange to Gwendolen in this moment that she was

quite shaken out of her usual self-consciousness. Blushing and turning

away her eyes, she said, “No, that would make me sorry.”

Grandcourt would have followed up this answer, which the change in her

manner made apparently decisive of her favorable intention; but he was

not in any way overcome so as to be unaware that they were now, within

sight of everybody, descending the space into Green Arbor, and

descending it at an ill-chosen point where it began to be

inconveniently steep. This was a reason for offering his hand in the

literal sense to help her; she took it, and they came down in silence,

much observed by those already on the level—among others by Mrs.

Arrowpoint, who happened to be standing with Mrs. Davilow. That lady

had now made up her mind that Grandcourt’s merits were not such as

would have induced Catherine to accept him, Catherine having so high a

standard as to have refused Lord Slogan. Hence she looked at the tenant

of Diplow with dispassionate eyes.

“Mr. Grandcourt is not equal as a man to his uncle, Sir Hugo

Mallinger—too languid. To be sure, Mr. Grandcourt is a much younger

man, but I shouldn’t wonder if Sir Hugo were to outlive him,

notwithstanding the difference of years. It is ill calculating on

successions,” concluded Mrs. Arrowpoint, rather too loudly.

“It is indeed,” said Mrs. Davilow, able to assent with quiet

cheerfulness, for she was so well satisfied with the actual situation

of affairs that her habitual melancholy in their general

unsatisfactoriness was altogether in abeyance.

I am not concerned to tell of the food that was eaten in that green

refectory, or even to dwell on the stories of the forest scenery that

spread themselves out beyond the level front of the hollow; being just

now bound to tell a story of life at a stage when the blissful beauty

of earth and sky entered only by narrow and oblique inlets into the

consciousness, which was busy with a small social drama almost as

little penetrated by a feeling of wider relations as if it had been a

puppet-show. It will be understood that the food and champagne were of

the best—the talk and laughter too, in the sense of belonging to the

best society, where no one makes an invidious display of anything in

particular, and the advantages of the world are taken with that

high-bred depreciation which follows from being accustomed to them.

Some of the gentlemen strolled a little and indulged in a cigar, there

being a sufficient interval before four o’clock—the time for

beginning to rove again. Among these, strange to say, was Grandcourt;

but not Mr. Lush, who seemed to be taking his pleasure quite generously

to-day by making himself particularly serviceable, ordering everything

for everybody, and by this activity becoming more than ever a blot on

the scene to Gwendolen, though he kept himself amiably aloof from her,

and never even looked at her obviously. When there was a general move

to prepare for starting, it appeared that the bows had all been put

under the charge of Lord Brackenshaw’s valet, and Mr. Lush was

concerned to save ladies the trouble of fetching theirs from the

carriage where they were propped. He did not intend to bring

Gwendolen’s, but she, fearful lest he should do so, hurried to fetch it

herself. The valet, seeing her approach, met her with it, and in giving

it into her hand gave also a letter addressed to her. She asked no

question about it, perceived at a glance that the address was in a

lady’s handwriting (of the delicate kind which used to be esteemed

feminine before the present uncial period), and moving away with her

bow in her hand, saw Mr. Lush coming to fetch other bows. To avoid

meeting him she turned aside and walked with her back toward the stand

of carriages, opening the letter. It contained these words,

If Miss Harleth is in doubt whether she should accept Mr. Grandcourt,

let her break from her party after they have passed the Whispering

Stones and return to that spot. She will then hear something to decide

her; but she can only hear it by keeping this letter a strict secret

from every one. If she does not act according to this letter, she will

repent, as the woman who writes it has repented. The secrecy Miss

Harleth will feel herself bound in honor to guard.

Gwendolen felt an inward shock, but her immediate thought was, “It is

come in time.” It lay in her youthfulness that she was absorbed by the

idea of the revelation to be made, and had not even a momentary

suspicion of contrivance that could justify her in showing the letter.

Her mind gathered itself up at once into the resolution, that she would

manage to go unobserved to the Whispering Stones; and thrusting the

letter into her pocket she turned back to rejoin the company, with that

sense of having something to conceal which to her nature had a bracing

quality and helped her to be mistress of herself.

It was a surprise to every one that Grandcourt was not, like the other

smokers, on the spot in time to set out roving with the rest. “We shall

alight on him by-and-by,” said Lord Brackenshaw; “he can’t be gone

far.” At any rate, no man could be waited for. This apparent

forgetfulness might be taken for the distraction of a lover so absorbed

in thinking of the beloved object as to forget an appointment which

would bring him into her actual presence. And the good-natured Earl

gave Gwendolen a distant jocose hint to that effect, which she took

with suitable quietude. But the thought in her mind was “Can he too be

starting away from a decision?” It was not exactly a pleasant thought

to her; but it was near the truth. “Starting away,” however, was not

the right expression for the languor of intention that came over

Grandcourt, like a fit of diseased numbness, when an end seemed within

easy reach: to desist then, when all expectation was to the contrary,

became another gratification of mere will, sublimely independent of

definite motive. At that moment he had begun a second large cigar in a

vague, hazy obstinacy which, if Lush or any other mortal who might be

insulted with impunity had interrupted by overtaking him with a request

for his return, would have expressed itself by a slow removal of his

cigar, to say in an undertone, “You’ll be kind enough to go to the

devil, will you?”

But he was not interrupted, and the rovers set off without any visible

depression of spirits, leaving behind only a few of the less vigorous

ladies, including Mrs. Davilow, who preferred a quiet stroll free from

obligation to keep up with others. The enjoyment of the day was soon at

its highest pitch, the archery getting more spirited and the changing

scenes of the forest from roofed grove to open glade growing lovelier

with the lengthening shadows, and the deeply-felt but undefinable

gradations of the mellowing afternoon. It was agreed that they were

playing an extemporized _As you like it_; and when a pretty compliment

had been turned to Gwendolen about her having the part of Rosalind, she

felt the more compelled to be surpassing in loveliness. This was not

very difficult to her, for the effect of what had happened to-day was

an excitement which needed a vent—a sense of adventure rather than

alarm, and a straining toward the management of her retreat, so as not

to be impeded.

The roving had been lasting nearly an hour before the arrival at the

Whispering Stones, two tall conical blocks that leaned toward each

other like gigantic gray-mantled figures. They were soon surveyed and

passed by with the remark that they would be good ghosts on a starlit

night. But a soft sunlight was on them now, and Gwendolen felt daring.

The stones were near a fine grove of beeches, where the archers found

plenty of marks.

“How far are we from Green Arbor now?” said Gwendolen, having got in

front by the side of the warden.

“Oh, not more than half a mile, taking along the avenue we’re going to

cross up there: but I shall take round a couple of miles, by the High

Cross.”

She was falling back among the rest, when suddenly they seemed all to

be hurrying obliquely forward under the guidance of Mr. Lush, and

lingering a little where she was, she perceived her opportunity of

slipping away. Soon she was out of sight, and without running she

seemed to herself to fly along the ground and count the moments nothing

till she found herself back again at the Whispering Stones. They turned

their blank gray sides to her: what was there on the other side? If

there were nothing after all? That was her only dread now—to have to

turn back again in mystification; and walking round the right-hand

stone without pause, she found herself in front of some one whose large

dark eyes met hers at a foot’s distance. In spite of expectation, she

was startled and shrank bank, but in doing so she could take in the

whole figure of this stranger and perceive that she was unmistakably a

lady, and one who must have been exceedingly handsome. She perceived,

also, that a few yards from her were two children seated on the grass.

“Miss Harleth?” said the lady.

“Yes.” All Gwendolen’s consciousness was wonder.

“Have you accepted Mr. Grandcourt?”

“No.”

“I have promised to tell you something. And you will promise to keep my

secret. However you may decide you will not tell Mr. Grandcourt, or any

one else, that you have seen me?”

“I promise.”

“My name is Lydia Glasher. Mr. Grandcourt ought not to marry any one

but me. I left my husband and child for him nine years ago. Those two

children are his, and we have two others—girls—who are older. My

husband is dead now, and Mr. Grandcourt ought to marry me. He ought to

make that boy his heir.”

She looked at the boy as she spoke, and Gwendolen’s eyes followed hers.

The handsome little fellow was puffing out his cheeks in trying to blow

a tiny trumpet which remained dumb. His hat hung backward by a string,

and his brown curls caught the sun-rays. He was a cherub.

The two women’s eyes met again, and Gwendolen said proudly, “I will not

interfere with your wishes.” She looked as if she were shivering, and

her lips were pale.

“You are very attractive, Miss Harleth. But when he first knew me, I

too was young. Since then my life has been broken up and embittered. It

is not fair that he should be happy and I miserable, and my boy thrust

out of sight for another.”

These words were uttered with a biting accent, but with a determined

abstinence from anything violent in tone or manner. Gwendolen, watching

Mrs. Glasher’s face while she spoke, felt a sort of terror: it was as

if some ghastly vision had come to her in a dream and said, “I am a

woman’s life.”

“Have you anything more to say to me?” she asked in a low tone, but

still proud and coldly. The revulsion within her was not tending to

soften her. Everyone seemed hateful.

“Nothing. You know what I wished you to know. You can inquire about me

if you like. My husband was Colonel Glasher.”

“Then I will go,” said Gwendolen, moving away with a ceremonious

inclination, which was returned with equal grace.

In a few minutes Gwendolen was in the beech grove again but her party

had gone out of sight and apparently had not sent in search of her, for

all was solitude till she had reached the avenue pointed out by the

warden. She determined to take this way back to Green Arbor, which she

reached quickly; rapid movements seeming to her just now a means of

suspending the thoughts which might prevent her from behaving with due

calm. She had already made up her mind what step she would take.

Mrs. Davilow was of course astonished to see Gwendolen returning alone,

and was not without some uneasiness which the presence of other ladies

hindered her from showing. In answer to her words of surprise Gwendolen

said,

“Oh, I have been rather silly. I lingered behind to look at the

Whispering Stones, and the rest hurried on after something, so I lost

sight of them. I thought it best to come home by the short way—the

avenue that the warden had told me of. I’m not sorry after all. I had

had enough walking.”

“Your party did not meet Mr. Grandcourt, I presume,” said Mrs.

Arrowpoint, not without intention.

“No,” said Gwendolen, with a little flash of defiance, and a light

laugh. “And we didn’t see any carvings on the trees, either. Where can

he be? I should think he has fallen into the pool or had an apoplectic

fit.”

With all Gwendolen’s resolve not to betray any agitation, she could not

help it that her tone was unusually high and hard, and her mother felt

sure that something unpropitious had happened.

Mrs. Arrowpoint thought that the self-confident young lady was much

piqued, and that Mr. Grandcourt was probably seeing reason to change

his mind.

“If you have no objection, mamma, I will order the carriage,” said

Gwendolen. “I am tired. And every one will be going soon.”

Mrs. Davilow assented; but by the time the carriage was announced as

ready—the horses having to be fetched from the stables on the warden’s

premises—the roving party reappeared, and with them Mr. Grandcourt.

“Ah, there you are!” said Lord Brackenshaw, going up to Gwendolen, who

was arranging her mamma’s shawl for the drive. “We thought at first you

had alighted on Grandcourt and he had taken you home. Lush said so. But

after that we met Grandcourt. However, we didn’t suppose you could be

in any danger. The warden said he had told you a near way back.”

“You are going?” said Grandcourt, coming up with his usual air, as if

he did not conceive that there had been any omission on his part. Lord

Brackenshaw gave place to him and moved away.

“Yes, we are going,” said Gwendolen, looking busily at her scarf, which

she was arranging across her shoulders Scotch fashion.

“May I call at Offendene to-morrow?”

“Oh yes, if you like,” said Gwendolen, sweeping him from a distance

with her eyelashes. Her voice was light and sharp as the first touch of

frost.

Mrs. Davilow accepted his arm to lead her to the carriage; but while

that was happening, Gwendolen with incredible swiftness had got in

advance of them, and had sprung into the carriage.

“I got in, mamma, because I wished to be on this side,” she said,

apologetically. But she had avoided Grandcourt’s touch: he only lifted

his hat and walked away—with the not unsatisfactory impression that

she meant to show herself offended by his neglect.

The mother and daughter drove for five minutes in silence. Then

Gwendolen said, “I intend to join the Langens at Dover, mamma. I shall

pack up immediately on getting home, and set off by the early train. I

shall be at Dover almost as soon as they are; we can let them know by

telegraph.”

“Good heavens, child! what can be your reason for saying so?”

“My reason for saying it, mamma, is that I mean to do it.”

“But why do you mean to do it?”

“I wish to go away.”

“Is it because you are offended with Mr. Grandcourt’s odd behavior in

walking off to-day?”

“It is useless to enter into such questions. I am not going in any case

to marry Mr. Grandcourt. Don’t interest yourself further about it.”

“What can I say to your uncle, Gwendolen? Consider the position you

place me in. You led him to believe only last night that you had made

up your mind in favor of Mr. Grandcourt.”

“I am very sorry to cause you annoyance, mamma, dear, but I can’t help

it,” said Gwendolen, with still harder resistance in her tone.

“Whatever you or my uncle may think or do, I shall not alter my

resolve, and I shall not tell my reason. I don’t care what comes of it.

I don’t care if I never marry any one. There is nothing worth caring

for. I believe all men are bad, and I hate them.”

“But need you set off in this way, Gwendolen?” said Mrs. Davilow,

miserable and helpless.

“Now mamma, don’t interfere with me. If you have ever had any trouble

in your own life, remember it and don’t interfere with me. If I am to

be miserable, let it be by my own choice.”

The mother was reduced to trembling silence. She began to see that the

difficulty would be lessened if Gwendolen went away.

And she did go. The packing was all carefully done that evening, and

not long after dawn the next day Mrs. Davilow accompanied her daughter

to the railway station. The sweet dews of morning, the cows and horses

looking over the hedges without any particular reason, the early

travelers on foot with their bundles, seemed all very melancholy and

purposeless to them both. The dingy torpor of the railway station,

before the ticket could be taken, was still worse. Gwendolen had

certainly hardened in the last twenty-four hours: her mother’s trouble

evidently counted for little in her present state of mind, which did

not essentially differ from the mood that makes men take to worse

conduct when their belief in persons or things is upset. Gwendolen’s

uncontrolled reading, though consisting chiefly in what are called

pictures of life, had somehow not prepared her for this encounter with

reality. Is that surprising? It is to be believed that attendance at

the _opéra bouffe_ in the present day would not leave men’s minds

entirely without shock, if the manners observed there with some

applause were suddenly to start up in their own families. Perspective,

as its inventor remarked, is a beautiful thing. What horrors of damp

huts, where human beings languish, may not become picturesque through

aerial distance! What hymning of cancerous vices may we not languish

over as sublimest art in the safe remoteness of a strange language and

artificial phrase! Yet we keep a repugnance to rheumatism and other

painful effects when presented in our personal experience.

Mrs. Davilow felt Gwendolen’s new phase of indifference keenly, and as

she drove back alone, the brightening morning was sadder to her than

before.

Mr. Grandcourt called that day at Offendene, but nobody was at home.