CHAPTER LI.
From the time of Glentworth's return, he had indeed appeared perfectly cured; not an irritable word had escaped him; and as every captious conclusion and petulant observation had been in days past always attributed, very justly, by Isabella either to the dyspepsia, brought on by his grief for Margarita, or the fever he sustained from the climate, her satisfaction had been the greater in his present most amiable temper; but, on this eventful day—the day which had begun so pleasurably—he was apparently cross and unwell.
There was nothing at dinner which he could eat—"the cuisine was execrable."
"Yet you and I have made shift to live upon what was much worse," said Lord Allerton, "within a very few weeks."
"One may live on any thing in a mountainous country, but not in a plain like this. I shall leave Pisa very soon, I assure you."
Letters from England the day following greatly relieved the sisters, as they informed them that Lady Anne had arrived in Welbeck Street, and bore her removal very well; that the Earl of Rotheles, who had been in great danger, was better, and, it was hoped, would speedily be able to receive mamma, when her native air would soon restore her entirely. Lady Anne herself wrote to her eldest, desiring that on her return she would not fail to purchase for her a gown of Genoa velvet, of the richest description. "You can get the money," said Lady Anne, "from Isabella; young wives are privileged, and can always get money out of gentlemen who, although not old, are much their own seniors. Having got the velvet, which must be at least fourteen yards, you must carefully swathe yourself in it, and, being a kind of walking skeleton, I don't suppose the custom-house officers will suspect you. I know the thing has been done, and it therefore can be done again; remember I will have no excuses as to heat, inconvenience, &c. To be sure, if you were to be lost at sea, it might facilitate your drowning; but I don't think much of that, for the sooner you were out of pain the better. I hope, however, that will not be the case, for a real Genoa velvet dress would be a serious loss, especially after you have bought the Mechlin lace to trim it with, which you must manage to get in France. Say nothing about it either to Glentworth, because men who have been in business hate smuggling, and it is necessary to propitiate him, as, I grieve to say, the Marquis of Wentworthdale has given up all thoughts of marriage; and I am, of course, on the look-out for something for Georgiana, who is now with Louisa, and may be tempted to make a low connexion among the city acquaintances of Charles Penrhyn—not that I shall object to a man who keeps two houses, two carriages, and who will give her two hundred pounds pin-money quarterly. Such a marriage might answer to us all; and I ought to think for myself, as your chance has been gone by for years. Lord Allerton will, of course, look out for an heiress; he is travelling on the Continent for that purpose, and has taken the best method—for when people are jumbled together in miserable inns, frightened by banditti, or cheated by shopkeepers, it produces great union of opinion and interests—and there is little doubt of his catching somebody worth the bait his person and position offers. I merely touch on this subject, to guard you from thinking about him, should he cross your path. No man marries two portionless wives, especially after the first has played the fool, as Miss Aubrey has done. At twenty, young men call money dross, but at thirty they know it to be the staff of life; therefore, do not subject yourself to further inconvenience, I beseech you; it is sufficient mortification to any woman to look as old as her mother, which you certainly did when we parted; and I greatly fear the sirocco winds and the blazing suns of Italy have made you resemble a parchment threadpaper at this time."
"Well or ill, near or distant, mamma is all herself to me at least," said Mary, as she put this amiable letter into Isabella's hand. "I have heard several ladies say they could not help having a peculiar feeling for their first-born; in her case, it is more peculiar than agreeable, I must say."
"Dear Mary, we cannot talk of mamma just now. A large packet has been brought to me, which undoubtedly came by the same vessel which brought the mail. My maid was inquired for below, and the pacquet delivered into her hands, with an injunction that she should give it me when I was alone, and say it came from a lady at Marseilles. There can be no doubt that it is from Lady Osmond; it seems to me, from feeling it, to be nearly all paper, and probably contains a history of her life. Had I better mention having received it before I opened it, or after?"
"After, undoubtedly, or you will deal unfairly by the writer, who may not choose to throw her history before the eyes of your husband; but, as it may take a good deal of reading, and Mr. Glentworth may break in upon you, you had better read it in my room. He will be busy with his letters, we know, and I have promised Lord Allerton to drive out with him, so that every thing is convenient; though a married woman should never have a secret of her own, I think she ought to guard those of others when committed to her."
"But no good and wise person will burden with such a thing so young a woman as myself. Oh! Mary, what shall I do without you? surely I shall never be without a sister—but none can be to me what you have been!"
"We shall never be long parted, my precious Isabella," replied Mary, as she pressed her hand, and flew down stairs to fulfil her promise to Lord Allerton.
With a slow step, and tears in her eyes, Mrs. Glentworth, vaticinating trouble of some kind, proceeded to cut the string and break the seal of her pacquet. It consisted of several sheets of written paper, which enclosed a bracelet, the clasp of which was the miniature of a young and beautiful woman, dressed in a stile which, being classical, will be always becoming, the brown flowing hair curled on the forehead, but not so as to hide it, and being turned up behind to the crown of the head, was fastened with a diamond comb, and fell back in a profusion of ringlets.
"What a pretty woman! what a sweet smile! and those deep blue eyes are exactly like little Frank's—the round, dimpled, soft chin, too"
"Knowing your sister was out," said a voice behind her, "I came here to ask you. What have you got that you want to hide, Isabella?"
"The likeness of a very beautiful woman, which is also a likeness of our sweet Frank. I do not want to conceal it from you, Glentworth, beyond two minutes; nor can I tell you whose it is, as I have not read a single line of that parcel of papers from which I have this moment drawn it; but I hold it from you, because I think it will be of great, perhaps overpowering, interest to you."
"How comes the parcel here?—I suppose it is from Riccardini?"
"Oh, no, it is from Marseilles. I think I know the lady who has sent it, and I stepped into this room to ask Mary whether I had better mention the receiving this pacquet to you before I opened it? she thought I ought not; she said, 'though a married woman ought to have no secret of her own, she had no right to divulge another’s.'"
"She is always right; pray do as you think proper in the matter; if it is not Margarita's portrait, it is nothing to me, unless, indeed, it should be one of yourself, which it is natural enough to suppose a little like Frank."
"I shall neyer be so fair and sweet a thing as this," said Isabella, putting the bracelet into his hand.
"God bless me! wherever could this come from? it is my own, my angel mother's; it was painted for her mother when she married. I have seen it many a time when I was a boy, standing about her whilst she dressed her hair; read your packet, I beseech you, Isabella, it is of the utmost interest to me."
Holding the miniature to his lips, his eyes overflowing, and his whole frame in a state of agitation, Glentworth withdrew to his wife's dressing-room, whilst she (personally relieved, but in great solicitude for him,) took up the written papers, and read with deep interest, which increased, whilst she proceeded, as follows:
"My dear Isabella—My whole existence has been a tissue of mystery and misfortune, to myself as well as to others, for the who and what I was only was revealed to me by degrees, and my ignorance having operated as a blight on my own happiness, and must often have communicated a painful influence on those who were willing to love me, I have at length determined, in your person, and for your sake, to end it. I am on the point of leaving Europe once more, and I know I shall never return; the sentence has gone forth which consigns to an early tomb one who has passed through life a stranger to herself and others, an alien to society nature inspired her to seek, and calculated her to enjoy. I have never known poverty, never suffered what is commonly called misfortune, my faculties have been cultivated to the uttermost, and I married the man I loved most fondly, and by whom in return I was idolized; my name is unblemished, my conduct blameless, even meritorious, yet has my grave been dug by shame and sorrow, solicitude and the curiosity of natural affection, created but to be crushed.
"I am persuaded you are a total stranger to many circumstances in your own family history, which your mother would properly keep from a daughter so young as you, and on which it is hardly likely your husband would dilate, if, indeed, he knew them, and it is very probable he does not. My friend and companion, Mrs. Cranstoun, assures me that nothing is more common in England, than for the very nearest connexions of parties, unhappily notorious for misconduct, to be ignorant of circumstances known to all others; few persons will expatiate on the guilt of her husband to a forsaken wife; they are aware she knows it, and suffers enough without the laceration their pity might inflict. But a child is still more sacred in their sight, for not only would they spare him the wound a father's infamy would give, but the knowledge which belongs to that infamy. For years I was thus guarded, and it is very probable Mr. Glentworth was not less so: the intention was good undoubtedly, but it prevented us from knowing any thing of each other, which I hold in the light of a misfortune, and never shall cease to do.
"My heart recoils, my spirit trembles, as I approach my story; no personal sense of my own innocence protects me from the bitter shame, the burning blushes, that seem to blister my whole frame, as I approach the plague-spot of my injured and disgraced existence, yet, to save others from the pangs I feel, I would that every wife verging to my mother's sin could witness my anguish, and so far share it, that she might quickly retrace her steps, renew her vows to her husband, and thankfully adhere even to age and imbecility, loathsome disease, and virulent ill humour, rather. than indulge her own selfish passion at the expence of her suffering offspring.
"My unhappy parent had no such excuse; she left a young, handsome, idolizing husband, who had given her rank and title, being no other than your own uncle, Lord Rotheles, to share the shame of a younger brother, already married to a lovely (an angelic) wife and the father of a promising boy about seven years old; that boy is Francis Glentworth, your worthy husband; alas! his only relation was a sister, unknown and of course unowned, my own wretched self.
"Mrs. Glentworth sickened and died within two years of her husband's flight to Pisa, where I was born, about seven or eight months after the elopement, and I understand, that Lord Rotheles took some steps to recover me, (believing I was his child,) but ineffectually, which I am glad of, for I am in fact decidedly like the Glentworths. My mother (who had been married extremely young,) never quite recovered a severe cold, caught at the time of my birth, was advised to remain in Italy, yet frequently to change the air, and my father devoted himself entirely to her, with the tenderness of a parent, not less than the devotedness of a lover: they passed under the name of Delamaine. Lord Rotheles procured, from his prosecution, a sum of money, which he gave to the county hospital, and a divorce; he refused to have any thing to do with my mother's fortune, which was still in the hands of her guardians, who had a right to retain it till she was twenty-three, and entertaining a very bad opinion of my father, they refused consent to her marriage with him, after the death of his amiable lady permitted him to offer it; before the time came when she might have been a bride, she was herself a corpse; so nearly did she live to complete a long minority, that it was supposed anxiety on that point hastened her decease: all I recollect of her is, that a pale and pretty lady often stood by my bed-side, weeping, or fed me with sweet cakes; I have also sad memories of a funeral, and of papa appearing distracted.
"What passed between them previous to my mother's death I never have been told, but cannot doubt that my father solemnly promised, that since I was not her heir, he would provide for me to the utmost of his power. He kept his promise only too strictly, in fact, he doated on me but too fondly. After my mother's death, I was taken by him to England, and placed for a time in a boarding-school on the sea-coast, but being delicate, when I was about seven or eight, he hastened with me to Pisa, as being native air, and settled me as a pensioner in a convent, where there were many women of rank, and all things were conducted on the most liberal footing. Here I obtained that knowledge of music which has constituted the solace of my existence, but here also I experienced that want of the heart, the kindness of the good nuns could not supply. I was the only English child, but that was of little importance, since Italian was my native tongue; but every other girl in the place had brothers and sisters at home, or with them; I only was an isolated, unconnected child; I only, with a heart overflowing with love, had no object on which I could lavish the fraternal feeling."
"Poor little girl," cried Isabella, "how I do pity her, what a wretched child must I have been but for my sisters: oh! that I had her here, how gladly would I fold her to my heart, and call her my own, dear, dear sister!"
"Have you finished your long letter?" said Glentworth, probably hearing her voice in exclamation; "you cannot doubt my anxiety respecting a circumstance so extraordinary."
"It is indeed extraordinary, and still more affecting. The writer is your sister, my dear Glentworth."
"Sister! She will not dare to say so, be she who she may! My father I have some reason to believe forsook my mother, who unquestionably died of a broken heart. Boy as I was, I can remember enough to believe that. After some time he appeared so sorrowful that he won upon my affections; but all the time I was at Harrow he was running about on the Continent; nevertheless, he paid my bills, and supplied my wants fairly, if not liberally. He died suddenly—I never knew how; and five or six hundred pounds were all that remained to me after his estate was sold and his creditors paid. That they were paid is my consolation now; though it was difficult for a youth, brought up as I had been, to exchange a college for a counting-house. Pardon me if I speak hastily; but a man's mother—such a mother as this miniature has shewn you—can never be forgotten, or even coldly remembered."
"Dear Mr. Glentworth; surely you know how much I must feel with you, and for you, in all that respects that sweet lady to whom I could have been the fondest, tenderest, daughter that ever lived. But I know more than you of this melancholy case, and I wish you would read what I have read, before you say more."
Moved by the earnestness of her manner, and certainly experiencing much painful curiosity, he took the sheets she had laid down, with a condescending air not a little repellant to poor Isabella's feelings, though she could fully account for it when she remembered the accumulated wrongs of his mother, continued, as they had been, to the unoffending and promising son of a father, who ought to have strained every nerve to serve him. She well remembered the many luxuries of Mrs. Cranstoun's elegant cottage at Brighton, and could not forbear contrasting them with the situation of dear "uncle Frank," when he lived in the city. She returned to the perusal of the sad detail before her with a sense of pity as divided as it was ameliorated. She was at least assured that the sympathies of her husband would be consistent with the justice of his character and the goodness of his disposition; her only fear was the effect of that excitement too likely to be awakened in the bosom of a man so prone to feel too acutely, even when his self-command appeared to supersede his sensibility the most completely.