"If Henrietta Noble forms an attachment to any one, Mrs. Casaubon,"said his mother, emphatically,—"she is like a dog—she would take theirshoes for a pillow and sleep the better."
"Mr. Ladislaw's shoes, I would," said Henrietta Noble.
Dorothea made an attempt at smiling in return. She was surprisedand annoyed to find that her heart was palpitating violently, and that itwas quite useless to try after a recovery of her former animation.Alarmed at herself—fearing some further betrayal of a change so markedin its occasion, she rose and said in a low voice with undisguisedanxiety, "I must go; I have overtired myself."
Mr. Farebrother, quick in perception, rose and said, "It is true; youmust have half-exhausted yourself in talking about Lydgate. That sort ofwork tells upon one after the excitement is over."
He gave her his arm back to the Manor, but Dorothea did notattempt to speak, even when he said good-night.
The limit of resistance was reached, and she had sunk back helplesswithin the clutch of inescapable anguish. Dismissing Tantripp with a fewfaint words, she locked her door, and turning away from it towards thevacant room she pressed her hands hard on the top of her head, andmoaned out—
"Oh, I did love him!"
Then came the hour in which the waves of suffering shook her toothoroughly to leave any power of thought. She could only cry in loudwhispers, between her sobs, after her lost belief which she had plantedand kept alive from a very little seed since the days in Rome—after herlost joy of clinging with silent love and faith to one who, misprized byothers, was worthy in her thought—after her lost woman's pride ofreigning in his memory—after her sweet dim perspective of hope, thatalong some pathway they should meet with unchanged recognition andtake up the backward years as a yesterday.
In that hour she repeated what the merciful eyes of solitude havelooked on for ages in the spiritual struggles of man—she besoughthardness and coldness and aching weariness to bring her relief from themysterious incorporeal might of her anguish: she lay on the bare floorand let the night grow cold around her; while her grand woman's framewas shaken by sobs as if she had been a despairing child.
There were two images—two living forms that tore her heart in two,as if it had been the heart of a mother who seems to see her childdivided by the sword, and presses one bleeding half to her breast whileher gaze goes forth in agony towards the half which is carried away bythe lying woman that has never known the mother's pang.
Here, with the nearness of an answering smile, here within thevibrating bond of mutual speech, was the bright creature whom she hadtrusted—who had come to her like the spirit of morning visiting the dimvault where she sat as the bride of a worn-out life; and now, with a fullconsciousness which had never awakened before, she stretched out herarms towards him and cried with bitter cries that their nearness was aparting vision: she discovered her passion to herself in the unshrinkingutterance of despair.
And there, aloof, yet persistently with her, moving wherever shemoved, was the Will Ladislaw' who was a changed belief exhausted ofhope, a detected illusion—no, a living man towards whom there couldnot yet struggle any wail of regretful pity, from the midst of scorn andindignation and jealous offended pride. The fire of Dorothea's anger wasnot easily spent, and it flamed out in fitful returns of spurning reproach.Why had he come obtruding his life into hers, hers that might have beenwhole enough without him? Why had he brought his cheap regard andhis lip-born words to her who had nothing paltry to give in exchange? Heknew that he was deluding her—wished, in the very moment of farewell,to make her believe that he gave her the whole price of her heart, andknew that he had spent it half before. Why had he not stayed among thecrowd of whom she asked nothing—but only prayed that they might beless contemptible?
But she lost energy at last even for her loud-whispered cries andmoans: she subsided into helpless sobs, and on the cold floor she sobbedherself to sleep.
In the chill hours of the morning twilight, when all was dim aroundher, she awoke—not with any amazed wondering where she was or whathad happened, but with the clearest consciousness that she was lookinginto the eyes of sorrow. She rose, and wrapped warm things around her,and seated herself in a great chair where she had often watched before.She was vigorous enough to have borne that hard night without feeling illin body, beyond some aching and fatigue; but she had waked to a newcondition: she felt as if her soul had been liberated from its terribleconflict; she was no longer wrestling with her grief, but could sit downwith it as a lasting companion and make it a sharer in her thoughts. Fornow the thoughts came thickly. It was not in Dorothea's nature, forlonger than the duration of a paroxysm, to sit in the narrow cell of hercalamity, in the besotted misery of a consciousness that only seesanother's lot as an accident of its own.
She began now to live through that yesterday morning deliberatelyagain, forcing herself to dwell on every detail and its possible meaning.Was she alone in that scene? Was it her event only? She forced herself tothink of it as bound up with another woman's life—a woman towardswhom she had set out with a longing to carry some clearness andcomfort into her beclouded youth. In her first outleap of jealousindignation and disgust, when quitting the hateful room, she had flungaway all the mercy with which she had undertaken that visit. She hadenveloped both Will and Rosamond in her burning scorn, and it seemedto her as if Rosamond were burned out of her sight forever. But that baseprompting which makes a women more cruel to a rival than to a faithlesslover, could have no strength of recurrence in Dorothea when thedominant spirit of justice within her had once overcome the tumult andhad once shown her the truer measure of things. All the active thoughtwith which she had before been representing to herself the trials ofLydgate's lot, and this young marriage union which, like her own,seemed to have its hidden as well as evident troubles—all this vividsympathetic experience returned to her now as a power: it asserted itselfas acquired knowledge asserts itself and will not let us see as we saw inthe day of our ignorance. She said to her own irremediable grief, that itshould make her more helpful, instead of driving her back from effort.
And what sort of crisis might not this be in three lives whose contactwith hers laid an obligation on her as if they had been suppliants bearingthe sacred branch? The objects of her rescue were not to be sought outby her fancy: they were chosen for her. She yearned towards the perfectRight, that it might make a throne within her, and rule her errant will."What should I do—how should I act now, this very day, if I could clutchmy own pain, and compel it to silence, and think of those three?"
It had taken long for her to come to that question, and there waslight piercing into the room. She opened her curtains, and looked outtowards the bit of road that lay in view, with fields beyond outside theentrance-gates. On the road there was a man with a bundle on his backand a woman carrying her baby; in the field she could see figuresmoving—perhaps the shepherd with his dog. Far off in the bending skywas the pearly light; and she felt the largeness of the world and themanifold wakings of men to labor and endurance. She was a part of thatinvoluntary, palpitating life, and could neither look out on it from herluxurious shelter as a mere spectator, nor hide her eyes in selfishcomplaining.
What she would resolve to do that day did not yet seem quite clear,but something that she could achieve stirred her as with an approachingmurmur which would soon gather distinctness. She took off the clotheswhich seemed to have some of the weariness of a hard watching in them,and began to make her toilet. Presently she rang for Tantripp, who camein her dressing-gown.
"Why, madam, you've never been in bed this blessed night," burst outTantripp, looking first at the bed and then at Dorothea's face, which inspite of bathing had the pale cheeks and pink eyelids of a materdolorosa. "You'll kill yourself, you will. Anybody might think now youhad a right to give yourself a little comfort."
"Don't be alarmed, Tantripp," said Dorothea, smiling. "I have slept; Iam not ill. I shall be glad of a cup of coffee as soon as possible. And Iwant you to bring me my new dress; and most likely I shall want my newbonnet to-day."
"They've lain there a month and more ready for you, madam, andmost thankful I shall be to see you with a couple o' pounds' worth less ofcrape," said Tantripp, stooping to light the fire. "There's a reason inmourning, as I've always said; and three folds at the bottom of your skirtand a plain quilling in your bonnet—and if ever anybody looked like anangel, it's you in a net quilling—is what's consistent for a second year. Atleast, that's my thinking," ended Tantripp, looking anxiously at the fire;"and if anybody was to marry me flattering himself I should wear thosehijeous weepers two years for him, he'd be deceived by his own vanity,that's all."
"The fire will do, my good Tan," said Dorothea, speaking as she usedto do in the old Lausanne days, only with a very low voice; "get me thecoffee."
She folded herself in the large chair, and leaned her head against itin fatigued quiescence, while Tantripp went away wondering at thisstrange contrariness in her young mistress—that just the morning whenshe had more of a widow's face than ever, she should have asked for herlighter mourning which she had waived before. Tantripp would neverhave found the clew to this mystery. Dorothea wished to acknowledgethat she had not the less an active life before her because she had burieda private joy; and the tradition that fresh garments belonged to allinitiation, haunting her mind, made her grasp after even that slightoutward help towards calm resolve. For the resolve was not easy.
Nevertheless at eleven o'clock she was walking towardsMiddlemarch, having made up her mind that she would make as quietlyand unnoticeably as possible her second attempt to see and saveRosamond.
CHAPTER LXXXI.
"Du Erde warst auch diese Nacht bestandig,
Und athmest neu erquickt zu meinen Fussen,
Beginnest schon mit Lust mich zu umgeben,
Zum regst und ruhrst ein kraftiges Reschliessen
Zum hochsten Dasein immerfort zu streben.
—Faust: 2r Theil.
When Dorothea was again at Lydgate's door speaking to Martha, hewas in the room close by with the door ajar, preparing to go out. Heheard her voice, and immediately came to her.
"Do you think that Mrs. Lydgate can receive me this morning?" shesaid, having reflected that it would be better to leave out all allusion toher previous visit.
"I have no doubt she will," said Lydgate, suppressing his thoughtabout Dorothea's looks, which were as much changed as Rosamond's, "ifyou will be kind enough to come in and let me tell her that you are here.She has not been very well since you were here yesterday, but she isbetter this morning, and I think it is very likely that she will be cheeredby seeing you again."
It was plain that Lydgate, as Dorothea had expected, knew nothingabout the circumstances of her yesterday's visit; nay, he appeared toimagine that she had carried it out according to her intention. She hadprepared a little note asking Rosamond to see her, which she would havegiven to the servant if he had not been in the way, but now she was inmuch anxiety as to the result of his announcement.
After leading her into the drawing-room, he paused to take a letterfrom his pocket and put it into her hands, saying, "I wrote this last night,and was going to carry it to Lowick in my ride. When one is grateful forsomething too good for common thanks, writing is less unsatisfactorythan speech—one does not at least hear how inadequate the words are."
Dorothea's face brightened. "It is I who have most to thank for, sinceyou have let me take that place. You have consented?" she said,suddenly doubting.
"Yes, the check is going to Bulstrode to-day."
He said no more, but went up-stairs to Rosamond, who had butlately finished dressing herself, and sat languidly wondering what sheshould do next, her habitual industry in small things, even in the days ofher sadness, prompting her to begin some kind of occupation, which shedragged through slowly or paused in from lack of interest. She looked ill,but had recovered her usual quietude of manner, and Lydgate had fearedto disturb her by any questions. He had told her of Dorothea's lettercontaining the check, and afterwards he had said, "Ladislaw is come,Rosy; he sat with me last night; I dare say he will be here again to-day. Ithought he looked rather battered and depressed." And Rosamond hadmade no reply.
Now, when he came up, he said to her very gently, "Rosy, dear, Mrs.Casaubon is come to see you again; you would like to see her, would younot?" That she colored and gave rather a startled movement did notsurprise him after the agitation produced by the interview yesterday—abeneficent agitation, he thought, since it seemed to have made her turnto him again.
Rosamond dared not say no. She dared not with a tone of her voicetouch the facts of yesterday. Why had Mrs. Casaubon come again? Theanswer was a blank which Rosamond could only fill up with dread, forWill Ladislaw's lacerating words had made every thought of Dorothea afresh smart to her. Nevertheless, in her new humiliating uncertainty shedared do nothing but comply. She did not say yes, but she rose and letLydgate put a light shawl over her shoulders, while he said, "I am goingout immediately." Then something crossed her mind which prompted herto say, "Pray tell Martha not to bring any one else into the drawing-room." And Lydgate assented, thinking that he fully understood thiswish. He led her down to the drawing-room door, and then turned away,observing to himself that he was rather a blundering husband to bedependent for his wife's trust in him on the influence of another woman. Rosamond, wrapping her soft shawl around her as she walkedtowards Dorothea, was inwardly wrapping her soul in cold reserve. HadMrs. Casaubon come to say anything to her about Will? If so, it was aliberty that Rosamond resented; and she prepared herself to meet everyword with polite impassibility. Will had bruised her pride too sorely forher to feel any compunction towards him and Dorothea: her own injuryseemed much the greater. Dorothea was not only the "preferred" woman,but had also a formidable advantage in being Lydgate's benefactor; andto poor Rosamond's pained confused vision it seemed that this Mrs.Casaubon—this woman who predominated in all things concerning her—must have come now with the sense of having the advantage, and withanimosity prompting her to use it. Indeed, not Rosamond only, but anyone else, knowing the outer facts of the case, and not the simpleinspiration on which Dorothea acted, might well have wondered why shecame.
