CHAPTER XVII.
Never was house so admired and praised as Louisa's, and never husband so lauded as hers, when her emotion had passed by, and her tongue resumed its function; and if she could have given just such a partner, such a house, and such prospects as her own to each sister, she would have been satisfied that the world contained no other being so happy, save Isabella, who, in helping all, had a right to be happier than any. Charles said that letters might now be every day expected, and her anxiety to hear of the safety of the travellers was become her only one: hitherto, she had been, of course, uneasy under mamma's displeasure.
Alas! how seldom are any of us quite happy at the passing moment.
Two golden hours, in which the astonishing news of the intended party was revealed to Louisa, with all of its contrivances, expenses, and mitigations, so far as they were elucidated, were given and said to be "done in her honour;" but of this the young wife doubted; nor could she help shaking her head, in a prognosticating manner. She said, "she knew what housekeeping cost, for she had a book, in which she put down every thing; and, although she had only a footman and a cook, and had only received the partners of her husband and their ladies once to dinner, it had shewn her clearly what mamma could do, and what she could not do, and she deprecated the party in every respect, save as it would introduce her kind friend Mrs. Gooch to a circle which she had repeatedly said "she should like to see once in her life or so."
"But, surely," said Georgiana, "you should be glad on our account. We have no good Mr. Glentworth now to take us any where; and our little home-circle is so much thinned, we want some amusement from without. We are not like you, expecting a husband at dinner-time, who will sit with us all the evening."
"Well, my love, that is all very true," replied Louisa, colouring with the consciousness of being a great monopolist; "but I cannot help fearing more pain will arise to you eventually than the pleasure is worth; and I trust, that when mamma has once received us, she will allow you to come here frequently, as you are not afraid of a long walk; and if she cannot spare the page to attend you, I can send William, and dear Charles himself can drive you home in his cab; nobody will see you are three by lamplight. Oh! I foresee so much pleasure for us all. But who is mamma going to invite?"
"I have heard her mention very few names. Sir Henry Calthorpe, your Brighton lover, was the first, which I thought very indelicate, considering he would meet as a bride the girl who refused him. 'Tis true she did not know it"
"She means him to become your suitor, Helen, because you are very like me, you know, so be on your guard. He is a silly young man, and not a very good one; you must not have him—marriage is a very serious thing."
"Lord and Lady Allerton mamma named also."
"I don't know which of them I dislike most—they were the ruin of our dear Mary's peace of mind, and her constitution also."
"Sir William and Lady Anstey, their son and two daughters, she named, and the Marquess of Wentworthdale; two Mr. Allinghams, whom she has met at Lord Penrhyn's; Colonel Hawthornden and Mr. Bickmansworth, the barrister; Mrs. Ryall and her sister."
"But she wants, of all things, some kind of a lion," cried Helen, "a Turk, or a Rajah, dressed in satin, who eats with his fingers, or she would put up with a distinguished author, I believe, if she could get one; or the Chinese lady, or a Welch harper, if he had white, silky hair. She would rather have Sir William Honeywood Hales Courtenay than any body, a great deal; but he is in prison, and they won't let him out, dear heart! What with his moustachios, his long beard, his richly embroidered crimson dress, and his Maltese cross and sword, he would be invaluable."
"He is mad, perfectly mad!" cried Louisa.
"But he is no worse for that, mamma says."
"Poor soul!" ejaculated Mrs. Palmer, "she must be far gone herself."
"Such a person would save paying singers, which she can ill afford," said Helen; "and surely it would be folly to afford them, in any case, with a daughter who can warble a simple ballad as well as you, and another who can sing duets with mine most delightfully. You have no idea how well Mrs. Penrhyn and Mrs. Gooch sing together; the first has the finer voice, the last the better instruction; but they manage admirably together," said Mrs. Palmer.
While these observations were passing, at the happy dwelling of the lately proscribed daughter, her mother, in a state of great perturbation, wrote and re-wrote note after note, to her dear friend Lady Penrhyn, all of which were meant, in fact, to say, "I invite you earnestly, but I hope you won't come." It is a very difficult thing for the most cunning, when they say one thing and mean another, to hide their wishes from one as practised as themselves; and an awkward thing to commit yourselves in writing at all where a secret or a scheme is concerned. Lady Anne had just determined to abandon all writing, save the common routine card-call upon her friend, and leave to the chances of conversation the impression she desired to make, when a knock was heard, and, in another moment, as if she had possessed the power "to call spirits from the vasty deep" of luxury, Lady Penrhyn stood before her.
"I have been dying to see you," said the beauty, "for I knew, of course, you were completely au desespoir; that wretched paragraph would destroy your nerves."
"Not in the least; I saw it was an abbreviation from the first annunciation of the marriage, as communicated by the earl of Rotheles; here it is."
Lady Penrhyn glanced her eye over the paper, and said, "Could you spare me this, just to shew Penrhyn? The fact is, he is perfectly lost for want of Charles, and, of course, very cross; which was the reason I could not get to you before; and, in the course of his pets and his papers, he has really gone abominable lengths in abusing the poor fellow for making such a low connection."
"Low connection!—low!" cried Lady Anne, with an absolute shriek; "the granddaughter of the Earl of Rotheles termed low by a baron of two descents! this is beyond bearing."
"Not low, my dear creature; that is not the word; but imprudent, poor, a mere love-match, a positive irremediable, ruinous affair."
"The Earl of Rotheles is of a very different way of thinking; he supposes that a young man, with next to nothing, that marries a young woman of family, who takes him from the beggary of dependence and secures him an increasing income, which begins with a thousand per ann., may be termed ‘a fortunate youth.’ "
"But, supposing this is the case, the income is derived from trade; it is the consequence of degradation."
"The degradation which made my son-in-law, Mr. Glentworth, the possessor of uncounted thousands, and enables him to support your brother, Lady Penrhyn, who will find him a somewhat kinder patron than your husband, I have a notion; he will not upbraid him on the score of gaining a place of a hundred and fifty pounds a-year, well earned by his drudgery in his lordship's service. Shockingly as my daughter has thrown herself away, I must say I have pitied Charles a thousand times, and always considered him an amiable, ill-used young man."
"As to Louisa throwing herself away on my brother, Lady Anne Granard, it is too ridiculous. Charles has five thousand pounds of his own, which, I am told, he has settled on his wife; those very people mentioned as their friends being her trustees; and when my father's second wife dies, he will have an estate of eight hundred a year, hitherto tied up to pay her jointure and my two younger sisters' fortunes; and with his person and connections you must yourself see he might have done better."
"As to person, my daughter's pretensions, may surely"
Lady Anne checked herself, for she heard a carriage stop at the door, and her daughters enter the house; and she had not made up her mind as to the turn she should give to their conciliatory visit. In fact, both ladies had, in the course of their recriminatory dialogue, seen so clearly, that in worldly matters the couple in question were most equally matched, and neither of them could doubt so happily, that they found it a difficult thing not to own the truth so near their lips; and when the sisters, too happy to contain their joy and gratitude, broke on the angry tête-à-tête, their cold hearts and laboured malignity, to their own astonishment, gave way before the genuine atmosphere of better feelings.
"Oh! mamma, thank you a thousand times for letting us go; Louisa is so very thankful, and so very happy!"
"But she did cry so hard when she first saw us and became aware of your kindness, that it would have made any body else cry."
"Very sentimental, indeed! Then it seems she is forgiven?" said Lady Penrhyn.
"It would not do for me to oppose Lord Rotheles, as you very well know," answered Lady Anne.
"Oh! I don't blame you at all; Lord Penrhyn has vexed me so much that I mean to see Charles before long, I assure you; for, after all, he is my only brother—pray, what kind of a crib did you find them stuffed into?"
"Crib! indeed, it is the prettiest little house that ever was beheld."
"With a greengrocer's repository on one side, and a coalshed on the other?"
"There is nothing of the kind even within view," cried Helen, warmly, "nor any one object that could offend the most fastidious eye, as Mrs. Palmer observed; a duchess might delight in it; every thing is so clean without, and so good within: such beautiful carpets and rugs to match! such handsome chiffoniers, and elegant books! it does one good to look at them; and Louisa herself, the prettiest thing of all; her bright hair in bands, and altogether such a sweet coiffure! How very lovely she is!"
"And how good!" chimed in Helen; "she understands the necessity for care, and the duties of a wife, and she does so love her husband—you can't think!"
A sneer came over the faces of both ladies, as the word "love" was pronounced; yet each said in her heart, "it is not, in her case, a bad thing to love, seeing she cannot be unmarried now;" but the dowager observed, in a cold tone—
"I beg you will not admire the romantic, young ladies; for, depend upon it, I shall never give way to it. If circumstances induce me to admit your sister and Mr. Penrhyn to visit here occasionally, let it be always understood that, although I may pardon, yet I shall never approve their union; it is one thing to bear a misfortune with fortitude, and another to encourage its repetition."
The poor girls curtseyed, and withdrew to their own cheerless apartments, where alone they could luxuriate in another's happiness—that other, their blooming and beloved Louisa. Whilst thinking or talking over all those little particulars in her situation, which appeared like gems on the brow of beauty, diffusing brilliance as a whole, yet each possessing an individual value, they alike seemed to think that the happiest thing belonging to her was the power of hearing from Isabella and Mary most frequently. "You see," said Georgiana, "Charles will have letters from Mr. Glentworth, and Louisa letters from our sisters, at the same time; and, between the two, they will learn every thing that belongs to them: they will, as it were, eat at the same table, dress in the same colours, see the same things, and think with the same thoughts; how happy Louisa will be! she will have her old friends in her new home."
Of course, the poor girl knew little of those missives called "letters of business," which, although they direct all the great affairs of mankind, and are constantly employed in sending forth or recalling that mighty power which commands men, controls circumstances, constitutes the sinews of war and the charm of peace, has little to do in wafting either a smile or "sigh from Indus to the Pole." Little did they dream in how few lines might be given all that their two brothers-in-law were likely to say to each other. The free pen, prone to pour out the suggestions of artless affection, vivid imagination, or domestic anecdote, is as much woman's especial instrument as the needle: how many heavy hours have been lightened by both? how much pleasure has the former communicated to others? how often has the latter tranquillized the spirits, or diverted the anxieties of her own heart!
So delighted were the dear girls with their visit, that the grand affair of the party was actually forgotten; for, cribbed and stinted in all the common pleasures of their age and station, they were wont to live much on the heart; and their unavoidable loss of two sisters, and more especially Louisa's supposed uneasiness and enforced estrangement, had rendered them exceedingly solicitous respecting her; and at this time she might be said to "engross them wholly." Not so their lady-mother, who was at this very juncture managing to start her scheme of a party in such a manner, that the idea appeared to proceed from Lady Penrhyn, who honestly confessed "that her curiosity was exceedingly excited on the subject of how the couple in question appeared since their degradation, and whether they actually retained the power of looking any body in the face who was really somebody.
"Besides," she added, "though it is a weakness, and certainly the last in the world a woman in my circle ought to indulge, to you, my dear Lady Anne, who cannot, under existing circumstances, condemn me for it, I may say there is something awkward, even painful, in losing sight all at once, in so disagreeable a way, of your only brother—one who in childhood was, from the death of our mother, consigned to my especial tenderness, and who is really of so sweet a temper, so cheerful a disposition, loved me so well, and for my sake exerted himself so much, and has borne so much (I may say) from Lord Penrhyn, that altogether I find it by no means agreeable to hold him in the light of a banished man, and should rejoice to meet him in any house but my own."
"I am sure I would get up a little affair on purpose to enable you to do so, dear Lady Penrhyn; but, in my narrow circumstances (to you I do not hesitate to refer to them), it is an object, I confess; and, when one has few servants and few things, the hiring of plate, and so forth, becomes very expensive, you know."
"Don't hesitate on that account, I beseech you; let Fanchette come in a hackney-coach in the morning, and I will direct the housekeeper to send you something of every thing—plate, candlesticks, lamps, damask—and you won't take it amiss if we should happen to have game or poultry come up that I put that amongst the conveniences; and I am sure you will permit me to invite a friend or two, for you know I only deal with choice spirits, the élite of the beau monde."
Much as Lady Anne had rejoiced in the ruse which had so materially assisted her plans, yet these latter words produced a kind of cold trickling through her frame; she remembered the Countess of Rotheles's advice, and she well knew the very pointed words and looks Lady Allerton could assume when it suited her humour to be censorious, and was well aware that every particular of the evening's entertainment would be transmitted with a jaundiced tint to Rotheles Castle for the amusement and animadversion of her invalid brother. He must see the propriety of young Penrhyn's being well with his brother-in-law, who was known to be well with the ministry, and, of course, of meeting with his sister; therefore, if she would forego her usual habits, and especially relinquish a certain Russian count attached to the embassy, who had succeeded the late German baron, all would be well; but, if she persisted in drawing attention and awakening scandal, there was no saying where the mischief would stop.
That the countess knew her brother, the earl, made an addition to her income she was well aware, but she was not less so that the lady did not know to what amount, and she trusted the secret would remain undivulged; nevertheless, it had struck her as by no means unlikely, that the amiable lady in question might suggest the propriety of diminishing her allowance (be it either small or large) now her family was diminished, and, of course, dreaded exposing herself by any possible error of conduct to such an event. Hastily arranging her necessities, her wishes, her fears, and her desires, she thus began to address the dear friend she alike dreaded, despised, and persevered in attaching to herself and her measures:—
"Bring any one you deem a desirable parti, of course, but allow me to observe, dear Lady Penrhyn, that"
"Yes! I see, that they must be really crême a la crême. I know all that, because you are compelled to ask what Mary Wolstonecraft, in days gone by, would term 'the square-elbowed, family drudge,' Mrs. Palmer, and her furbelowed daughters-in-law, who will probably carry enough of the scarlet fever about them, to remind you unpleasantly of the officiousness which preserved the lives of three daughters, when two might have been parted with advantageously enough."
"You never were a mother, my dear friend, or"
"Or I should have been glad to part with the whole garland of roses wherewith Fate had crowned me. No, thank Heaven! like the fat king, once so enchanting and afterwards so abdominal, I have no predilections save for the distinguishing few who love to bask in mes beaux yeux. However, depend upon it, any persons I may bring, or cause to come, will be the very exquisites de la societé, and will sweeten your city connexions, my own poor Charles among the rest—him for whom my affections had often ambitioned a far different fate."
"Allow me to say, that if your ladyship could contrive to bear his company one whole evening, it might have the happiest effects. Count Beniowskoff would be reduced to despair, and withdraw his attentions. Strangers would give you the credit of attracting a fine young man, even in his honeymoon, with a very charming woman; and friends would praise you for showing that family affection often exhibited by royalty itself, and always to be admired and approved in the daughter of a mere country gentleman."
Poor Lady Anne! the three last words lost her all the benefit of her previous harangue. Lady Penrhyn, who had almost determined at once to appear charming as a Circean nymph, yet correct as a vestal, by flirting only with her own handsome brother, recalled by the pride of rank to the memory of her highly-respectable but very remote affinity to aristocracy, determined at once to assert the privileges given by nature, which, in bestowing the patent of beauty, had outstripped the Herald's Office. With a smile, in which there was more of malice than affection, she hastily bade adieu; and Lady Anne, for the present, felt as if Fanchette and her coach full of accommodations, heavy as they might once be supposed to be, were suddenly swallowed up in that awful sea, to which so many refractory spirits have been exorcised and consigned.