ROSALIND herself was much aroused by this discussion. She thought it unjust and cruel. She had done nothing to call for such a reproach. She had not attempted to make Mr. Rivers love her, nor to keep him from his work, nor to interfere in any way with his movements. She had even avoided him at the first—almost disliked him, she said to herself—and that she should be exposed to remark on his account was not to be borne. She retired to her room, full of lively indignation against her aunt and Roland, and even against Rivers, who was entirely innocent, surely, if ever man was. This was another phase, one she had not thought of, in the chapter of life which had begun by that wonder in her mind why she had no lover. She had been surprised by the absence of that figure in her life, and then had seen him appear, and had felt the elation, the secret joy, of being worshipped. But now the matter had entered into another phase, and she herself was to be judged as an independent actor in it; she, who had been only passive, doing nothing, looking on with curiosity and interest, and perhaps pleasure, but no more. What had she to do with it? She had no part in the matter: it was their doing, theirs only, all through. She had done nothing to influence his fate. She had conducted herself towards him no otherwise than she did to old Sir John, or Mr. Penworthy, the clergyman, both of whom were Rosalind’s good friends. If Mr. Rivers had taken up a different idea of her, that was his doing, not hers. She detain him, keep him from his business, interfere with his career! She thought Aunt Sophy must be mad, or dreaming. Rosalind was indignant to be made a party at all in the matter. It had thus entered a stage of which she had no anticipation. It had been pleasant inasmuch as it was entirely apart from herself, the attentions unsolicited, the admiration unsought. It was a new idea altogether that she should be considered accountable, or brought within the possibility of blame. What was she to do? Mr. Rivers was expected at the Elms that very evening, at one of Mrs. Lennox’s everlasting dinner-parties. Rosalind had not hitherto looked upon them as everlasting dinner-parties. She had enjoyed the lively flow of society, which Aunt Sophy (who enjoyed it very much) considered herself obliged to keep up for Rosalind’s sake, that she should have pleasant company and amusement. Now, however, Miss Trevanion was suddenly of opinion that she had hated them all along; that, above all, she had disliked the constant invitations to these men. It would be indispensable that she should put up with this evening’s party, which it was now much too late to elude. But after to-night she resolved that she would make a protest. She would say to Aunt Sophy that henceforward she must be excused. Whatever happened, she must disentangle herself from this odious position as a girl who was responsible for the feeling, whatever it was, entertained for her by a gentleman. It was preposterous, it was insupportable. Whatever he chose to think, it was his doing, and not hers at all.
These sentiments gave great stateliness to Rosalind’s aspect when she went down to dinner. They even influenced her dress, causing her to put aside the pretty toilet she had intended to make, and attire herself in an old and very serious garment which had been appropriated to evenings when the family was alone. Mrs. Lennox stared at her niece in consternation when she saw this visible sign of contrariety and displeasure. It disturbed her beyond measure to see how far Rosalind had gone in her annoyance: whereas the gentlemen, with their usual density, saw nothing at all the matter, but thought her more dazzling than usual in the little black dress, which somehow threw up all her advantages of complexion and the whiteness of her pretty arms and throat. She had put on manners, however, which were more repellent than her dress, and which froze Hamerton altogether, who had a guilty knowledge of what was the matter which Rivers did not share. Roland was frozen externally, but it cannot be denied that in his heart there was a certain guilty pleasure. He thought that the suggestion that she had encouraged Rivers was quite enough to make Rosalind henceforward so much the reverse of encouraging that his rival would see the folly of going on with his suit, and the field would be left free to himself, as before. Rosalind might not be the better inclined, in consequence, to himself: but it was worth something to get that fellow, whom nobody could help looking at, away. There were two or three indifferent people in the company this evening, to whose amusement Rosalind devoted herself, ignoring both the candidates for her favor; and, as is natural in such circumstances, she was more lively, more gay, than usual, and eager to please these indifferent persons. As for Rivers, he thought she was out of sorts, perhaps out of temper (for he was aware that in this point she was not perfect), her usual friendliness and sweetness clouded over. But a man of his age does not jump into despair as youth does, and he waited patiently, believing that the cloud would pass away. Rivers had been very wise in his way of approaching Rosalind. He had not tried openly to appropriate her society, to keep by her side, to make his adoration patent, as foolish Roland did. To-night, however, he, too, adopted a different course. Perhaps her changed aspect stirred him up, and he felt that the moment had come for a bolder stroke. However this might be, whether it was done by accident or on principle, the fact was that his tactics were changed. When Rosalind rose, by Mrs. Lennox’s desire, and went to the writing-table to write an address, Rivers rose too, and followed her, drawing a chair near hers with the air of having something special to say. “I want to ask your advice, if you will permit me, Miss Trevanion,” he said.
“My advice! oh, no!” said Rosalind; “I am not wise enough to be able to advise any one.”
“You are young and generous. I do not want wisdom.”
“Not so very young,” said Rosalind. “And how do you know that I am generous at all? I do not think I am.”
He smiled and went on, without noticing this protest. “My mother,” he said, “wishes to come to London to be near me. I am sometimes sent off to the end of the world, and often in danger. She thinks she would hear of me more easily, be nearer, so to speak, though I might happen to be in India or Zululand.”
Rosalind was taken much by surprise. Her thoughts of him, as of a man occupied above everything else by herself, seemed to come back upon her as if they had been flung in her face. His mother! was she the subject of his anxiety? She felt as though she had been indulging a preposterous vanity and the most unfounded expectations. The color flew to her face; for what had she to do with his mother, if his mother was what he was thinking of? She was irritated by the suggestion, she could scarcely tell why.
“I think it is very natural she should wish it, and you would be at home, I suppose, sometimes,” she replied, with a certain stiffness.
“Do you think so? You know, Miss Trevanion, my family and I are in two different worlds; I should be a fool if I tried to hide it. Would the difference be less, do you think, between St. James’s and Islington, or between London and Clifton? I think the first would tell most. They would not be happy with me, nor I, alas! with them. It is the penalty a man has to pay for getting on, as they call it. I have got on in my small way, and they—are just where they were. How am I to settle it? If you could imagine yourself, if that were possible, in my position, what would you do?”
There was a soft insinuation in his voice which would have gone to any girl’s heart; and his eyes expressed a boundless faith in her opinion which could not be mistaken. The irritation which was entirely without cause died away, and, with the usual rebound of a generous nature, Rosalind, penitent, felt her heart moved to a return of the confidence he showed in her. She answered softly, “I would do what my mother wished.” She was seated still in front of the writing-table where stood the portrait, the little carved door of the frame half closed on it. A sudden impulse seized her. She pointed to it quickly, without waiting to think: “That is the children’s mother,” she said.
He gave her a look of mingled sympathy and pain. “I had heard something.”
“What did you hear, Mr. Rivers? Something that was not true? If you heard that she was not good, the best woman in the world, it was not true. I have always wanted to tell you. She went away not with her will; because she could not help it. The children have almost forgotten her, but I can never forget. She was all the mother I have ever known.”
Rosalind did not know at all why at such a moment she should suddenly have opened her heart to him on this subject, through which he had given her such a wound. She took it up hastily, instinctively, in the quickening impulse of her disturbed thoughts. She added in a low voice, “What you said hurt me—oh, it hurt me, that night; but afterwards, when I came to think of it, the feeling went away.”
“There was nothing to hurt you,” said Rivers, hastily. “I saw it was so, but I could not explain. Besides, I was a stranger, and understood nothing. Don’t you think I might be of use to you perhaps, if you were to trust me?” He looked at her with eyes so full of sympathy that Rosalind’s heart was altogether melted. “I saw,” he added quietly, “that there was a whole history in her face.”
“Tell me all you saw—if you spoke to her—what she said. Oh! if she had only known you were coming here! But life seems like that—we meet people as it were in the dark, and we never know how much we may have to do with them. I could not let you go away without asking you. Tell me, before you go away.”
“I will tell you. But I am not going away, Miss Trevanion.”
“Oh!” cried Rosalind. She felt confused, as if she had gone through a world of conflicting experience since she first spoke. “I thought you must be going, and that this was why you asked me.”
“About my mother? It was with a very different view I spoke. I wished you to know something more about me. I wished you to understand in what position I am, and to make you aware of her existence, and to find out what you thought about it; what would appear to you the better way.” He was more excited and tremulous than became his years; and she was softened by the emotion more than by the highest eloquence.
“It must be always best to make her happy,” Rosalind said.
“Shall I tell you what would make her happy? To see me sitting here by your side, to hear you counselling me so sweetly; to know that was your opinion, to hope perhaps—”
“Mr. Rivers, do not say any more about this. You make so much more than is necessary of a few simple words. What I want you to tell me is about her.”
“I will tell you as much as I know,” he said, with a pause and visible effort of self-restraint. “She was travelling by unusual routes, but without any mystery. She had a maid with her, a tall, thin, anxious woman.”
“Oh, Jane!” cried Rosalind, clasping her hands together with a little cry of recognition and pleasure; this seemed to give such reality to the tale. She knew very well that the faithful maid had gone with Mrs. Trevanion; but to see her in this picture gave comfort to her heart.
“You knew her? She seemed to be very anxious about her mistress, very careful of her. Miss Trevanion, it may very well be that in my wanderings I may meet with them again. Shall I say anything? Shall I carry a message?”
Rosalind found her voice choked with tears. She made him a sign of assent, unable to do more.
“What shall I tell her? That you trust me—that I am a messenger from you? I would rather be your ambassador than the queen’s. Shall I say that I have been so happy as to gain your confidence—or even perhaps—”
“Oh, a little thing will do,” cried the girl; “she will understand you as soon as you say that Rosalind—”
He was leaning forward, his eyes fixed upon hers, his face full of emotion. He put out his hand and touched hers, which was leaning on the table. “Yes,” he said, “I will say that Rosalind—so long as you give me an excuse for using that name.”
Rosalind came to herself with a little shock. She withdrew her hand hastily. “Perhaps I am saying too much,” she said. “It is only a dream, and you may never see her. But I could not bear that you should imagine we did not speak of her, or that I did not love her, and trust her,” she added, drawing a long breath. “This is a great deal too much about me, and you had begun to tell me of your own arrangements,” Rosalind said, drawing her chair aside a little in instinctive alarm. It was the sound she made in doing so which called the attention of John Trevanion—or, rather, which moved him to turn his steps that way, his attention having been already attracted by the fixed and jealous gaze of Roland, who had sat with his face towards the group by the writing-table ever since his rival had followed Rosalind there.
Rivers saw that his chance was over, with a sigh, yet not perhaps with all the vehement disappointment of a youth. He had made a beginning, and perhaps he was not yet ready to go any further, though his feelings might have hurried him on too hastily, injudiciously, had no interruption occurred. But he had half frightened without displeasing her, which, as he was an experienced man, was a condition of things he did not think undesirable. There is a kind of fright which, to be plunged into yet escape from, to understand without being forced to come to any conclusion, suits the high, fantastical character of a young maiden’s awakening feelings. And then before he, who was of a race so different, could actually venture to ask a Miss Trevanion of Highcourt to marry him, a great many calculations and arrangements were necessary. He thought John Trevanion, who was a man of the world, looked at him with a certain surprise and disapproval, asking himself, perhaps, what such a man could have to offer, what settlements he could make, what establishment he could keep up.
“Are not you cold in this corner,” John said, “so far from the fire, Rosalind?—and you are a chilly creature. Run away and get yourself warm.” He took her chair as she rose, and sat down with an evident intention of continuing the conversation. As a matter of fact, John Trevanion was not asking himself what settlements a newspaper correspondent could make. He was thinking of other things. He gave a nod of his head towards the portrait, and said in a low tone, “She has been talking to you of her.”
Rivers was half disappointed, half relieved. It proved to him, he thought, that he was too insignificant a pretender to arouse any alarm in Rosalind’s relations, which was a galling thought. At the same time it was better that he should have made up his mind more completely what he was to say, before he exposed himself to any questioning on the subject. So he answered with a simple “Yes.”
“We cannot make up our minds to think any harm of her,” said Trevanion, leaning his head on his hand. “The circumstances are very strange, too strange for me to attempt to explain. And what you said seemed damaging enough. But I want you to know that I share somehow that instinctive confidence of Rosalind’s. I believe there must be some explanation, even of the—companion—”
Rivers could not but smile a little, but he kept the smile carefully to himself. He was not so much interested in the woman he did not know as he was in the young creature who, he hoped, might yet make a revolution in his life.