Looking like the lovely ghost of herself, her graceful slimnesswrapped in her soft white shawl, the rounded infantine mouth and cheekinevitably suggesting mildness and innocence, Rosamond paused at threeyards' distance from her visitor and bowed. But Dorothea, who hadtaken off her gloves, from an impulse which she could never resist whenshe wanted a sense of freedom, came forward, and with her face full of asad yet sweet openness, put out her hand. Rosamond could not avoidmeeting her glance, could not avoid putting her small hand intoDorothea's, which clasped it with gentle motherliness; and immediately adoubt of her own prepossessions began to stir within her. Rosamond'seye was quick for faces; she saw that Mrs. Casaubon's face looked paleand changed since yesterday, yet gentle, and like the firm softness of herhand. But Dorothea had counted a little too much on her own strength:the clearness and intensity of her mental action this morning were thecontinuance of a nervous exaltation which made her frame asdangerously responsive as a bit of finest Venetian crystal; and in lookingat Rosamond, she suddenly found her heart swelling, and was unable tospeak—all her effort was required to keep back tears. She succeeded inthat, and the emotion only passed over her face like the spirit of a sob;but it added to Rosamond's impression that Mrs. Casaubon's state ofmind must be something quite different from what she had imagined.
So they sat down without a word of preface on the two chairs thathappened to be nearest, and happened also to be close together; thoughRosamond's notion when she first bowed was that she should stay a longway off from Mrs. Casaubon. But she ceased thinking how anythingwould turn out—merely wondering what would come. And Dorotheabegan to speak quite simply, gathering firmness as she went on.
"I had an errand yesterday which I did not finish; that is why I amhere again so soon. You will not think me too troublesome when I tellyou that I came to talk to you about the injustice that has been showntowards Mr. Lydgate. It will cheer you—will it not?—to know a greatdeal about him, that he may not like to speak about himself just becauseit is in his own vindication and to his own honor. You will like to knowthat your husband has warm friends, who have not left off believing inhis high character? You will let me speak of this without thinking that Itake a liberty?"
The cordial, pleading tones which seemed to flow with generousheedlessness above all the facts which had filled Rosamond's mind asgrounds of obstruction and hatred between her and this woman, came assoothingly as a warm stream over her shrinking fears. Of course Mrs.Casaubon had the facts in her mind, but she was not going to speak ofanything connected with them. That relief was too great for Rosamond tofeel much else at the moment. She answered prettily, in the new ease ofher soul—
"I know you have been very good. I shall like to hear anything youwill say to me about Tertius."
"The day before yesterday," said Dorothea, "when I had asked him tocome to Lowick to give me his opinion on the affairs of the Hospital, hetold me everything about his conduct and feelings in this sad eventwhich has made ignorant people cast suspicions on him. The reason hetold me was because I was very bold and asked him. I believed that hehad never acted dishonorably, and I begged him to tell me the history.He confessed to me that he had never told it before, not even to you,because he had a great dislike to say, 'I was not wrong,' as if that wereproof, when there are guilty people who will say so. The truth is, heknew nothing of this man Raffles, or that there were any bad secretsabout him; and he thought that Mr. Bulstrode offered him the moneybecause he repented, out of kindness, of having refused it before. All hisanxiety about his patient was to treat him rightly, and he was a littleuncomfortable that the case did not end as he had expected; but hethought then and still thinks that there may have been no wrong in it onany one's part. And I have told Mr. Farebrother, and Mr. Brooke, and SirJames Chettam: they all believe in your husband. That will cheer you,will it not? That will give you courage?"
Dorothea's face had become animated, and as it beamed onRosamond very close to her, she felt something like bashful timiditybefore a superior, in the presence of this self-forgetful ardor. She said,with blushing embarrassment, "Thank you: you are very kind."
"And he felt that he had been so wrong not to pour out everythingabout this to you. But you will forgive him. It was because he feels somuch more about your happiness than anything else—he feels his lifebound into one with yours, and it hurts him more than anything, that hismisfortunes must hurt you. He could speak to me because I am anindifferent person. And then I asked him if I might come to see you;because I felt so much for his trouble and yours. That is why I cameyesterday, and why I am come to-day. Trouble is so hard to bear, is itnot?— How can we live and think that any one has trouble—piercingtrouble—and we could help them, and never try?"
Dorothea, completely swayed by the feeling that she was uttering,forgot everything but that she was speaking from out the heart of herown trial to Rosamond's. The emotion had wrought itself more and moreinto her utterance, till the tones might have gone to one's very marrow,like a low cry from some suffering creature in the darkness. And she hadunconsciously laid her hand again on the little hand that she had pressedbefore.
Rosamond, with an overmastering pang, as if a wound within herhad been probed, burst into hysterical crying as she had done the daybefore when she clung to her husband. Poor Dorothea was feeling a greatwave of her own sorrow returning over her—her thought being drawn tothe possible share that Will Ladislaw might have in Rosamond's mentaltumult. She was beginning to fear that she should not be able tosuppress herself enough to the end of this meeting, and while her handwas still resting on Rosamond's lap, though the hand underneath it waswithdrawn, she was struggling against her own rising sobs. She tried tomaster herself with the thought that this might be a turning-point inthree lives—not in her own; no, there the irrevocable had happened,but—in those three lives which were touching hers with the solemnneighborhood of danger and distress. The fragile creature who was cryingclose to her—there might still be time to rescue her from the misery offalse incompatible bonds; and this moment was unlike any other: sheand Rosamond could never be together again with the same thrillingconsciousness of yesterday within them both. She felt the relationbetween them to be peculiar enough to give her a peculiar influence,though she had no conception that the way in which her own feelingswere involved was fully known to Mrs. Lydgate.
It was a newer crisis in Rosamond's experience than even Dorotheacould imagine: she was under the first great shock that had shattered herdream-world in which she had been easily confident of herself andcritical of others; and this strange unexpected manifestation of feeling ina woman whom she had approached with a shrinking aversion anddread, as one who must necessarily have a jealous hatred towards her,made her soul totter all the more with a sense that she had been walkingin an unknown world which had just broken in upon her.
When Rosamond's convulsed throat was subsiding into calm, and shewithdrew the handkerchief with which she had been hiding her face, hereyes met Dorothea's as helplessly as if they had been blue flowers. Whatwas the use of thinking about behavior after this crying? And Dorothealooked almost as childish, with the neglected trace of a silent tear. Pridewas broken down between these two.
"We were talking about your husband," Dorothea said, with sometimidity. "I thought his looks were sadly changed with suffering the otherday. I had not seen him for many weeks before. He said he had beenfeeling very lonely in his trial; but I think he would have borne it allbetter if he had been able to be quite open with you."
"Tertius is so angry and impatient if I say anything," said Rosamond,imagining that he had been complaining of her to Dorothea. "He oughtnot to wonder that I object to speak to him on painful subjects."
"It was himself he blamed for not speaking," said Dorothea. "What hesaid of you was, that he could not be happy in doing anything whichmade you unhappy—that his marriage was of course a bond which mustaffect his choice about everything; and for that reason he refused myproposal that he should keep his position at the Hospital, because thatwould bind him to stay in Middlemarch, and he would not undertake todo anything which would be painful to you. He could say that to me,because he knows that I had much trial in my marriage, from myhusband's illness, which hindered his plans and saddened him; and heknows that I have felt how hard it is to walk always in fear of hurtinganother who is tied to us."
Dorothea waited a little; she had discerned a faint pleasure stealingover Rosamond's face. But there was no answer, and she went on, with agathering tremor, "Marriage is so unlike everything else. There issomething even awful in the nearness it brings. Even if we loved someone else better than—than those we were married to, it would be nouse"—poor Dorothea, in her palpitating anxiety, could only seize herlanguage brokenly—"I mean, marriage drinks up all our power of givingor getting any blessedness in that sort of love. I know it may be verydear—but it murders our marriage—and then the marriage stays with uslike a murder—and everything else is gone. And then our husband—if heloved and trusted us, and we have not helped him, but made a curse inhis life—"
Her voice had sunk very low: there was a dread upon her ofpresuming too far, and of speaking as if she herself were perfectionaddressing error. She was too much preoccupied with her own anxiety,to be aware that Rosamond was trembling too; and filled with the needto express pitying fellowship rather than rebuke, she put her hands onRosamond's, and said with more agitated rapidity,—"I know, I know thatthe feeling may be very dear—it has taken hold of us unawares—it is sohard, it may seem like death to part with it—and we are weak—I amweak—"
The waves of her own sorrow, from out of which she was strugglingto save another, rushed over Dorothea with conquering force. Shestopped in speechless agitation, not crying, but feeling as if she werebeing inwardly grappled. Her face had become of a deathlier paleness,her lips trembled, and she pressed her hands helplessly on the handsthat lay under them.
Rosamond, taken hold of by an emotion stronger than her own—hurried along in a new movement which gave all things some new, awful,undefined aspect—could find no words, but involuntarily she put her lipsto Dorothea's forehead which was very near her, and then for a minutethe two women clasped each other as if they had been in a shipwreck.
"You are thinking what is not true," said Rosamond, in an eager half-whisper, while she was still feeling Dorothea's arms round her—urged bya mysterious necessity to free herself from something that oppressed heras if it were blood guiltiness.
They moved apart, looking at each other.
"When you came in yesterday—it was not as you thought," saidRosamond in the same tone.
There was a movement of surprised attention in Dorothea. Sheexpected a vindication of Rosamond herself.
"He was telling me how he loved another woman, that I might knowhe could never love me," said Rosamond, getting more and more hurriedas she went on. "And now I think he hates me because—because youmistook him yesterday. He says it is through me that you will think ill ofhim—think that he is a false person. But it shall not be through me. Hehas never had any love for me—I know he has not—he has alwaysthought slightly of me. He said yesterday that no other woman existedfor him beside you. The blame of what happened is entirely mine. Hesaid he could never explain to you—because of me. He said you couldnever think well of him again. But now I have told you, and he cannotreproach me any more."
Rosamond had delivered her soul under impulses which she had notknown before. She had begun her confession under the subduinginfluence of Dorothea's emotion; and as she went on she had gatheredthe sense that she was repelling Will's reproaches, which were still like aknife-wound within her.
The revulsion of feeling in Dorothea was too strong to be called joy.It was a tumult in which the terrible strain of the night and morningmade a resistant pain:—she could only perceive that this would be joywhen she had recovered her power of feeling it. Her immediateconsciousness was one of immense sympathy without cheek; she caredfor Rosamond without struggle now, and responded earnestly to her lastwords—
"No, he cannot reproach you any more."
With her usual tendency to over-estimate the good in others, she felta great outgoing of her heart towards Rosamond, for the generous effortwhich had redeemed her from suffering, not counting that the effort wasa reflex of her own energy. After they had been silent a little, she said—
"You are not sorry that I came this morning?"
"No, you have been very good to me," said Rosamond. "I did notthink that you would be so good. I was very unhappy. I am not happynow. Everything is so sad."
"But better days will come. Your husband will be rightly valued. Andhe depends on you for comfort. He loves you best. The worst loss wouldbe to lose that—and you have not lost it," said Dorothea.
She tried to thrust away the too overpowering thought of her ownrelief, lest she should fail to win some sign that Rosamond's affectionwas yearning back towards her husband.
"Tertius did not find fault with me, then?" said Rosamond,understanding now that Lydgate might have said anything to Mrs.Casaubon, and that she certainly was different from other women.Perhaps there was a faint taste of jealousy in the question. A smile beganto play over Dorothea's face as she said—
"No, indeed! How could you imagine it?" But here the door opened,and Lydgate entered.
"I am come back in my quality of doctor," he said. "After I wentaway, I was haunted by two pale faces: Mrs. Casaubon looked as muchin need of care as you, Rosy. And I thought that I had not done my dutyin leaving you together; so when I had been to Coleman's I came homeagain. I noticed that you were walking, Mrs. Casaubon, and the sky haschanged—I think we may have rain. May I send some one to order yourcarriage to come for you?"
