IT was only two days after this eventful meeting that Vincent, idling and meditative as was natural in such a condition of mind, strayed into Masters’s shop to buy some books. It would have been difficult for him to have explained why he went there, except, perhaps, because it was the last place in the world which his masters at the chapel would have advised him to enter. For there was another bookseller in the town, an evangelical man, patronised by Mr. Bury, the whilom rector, where all the Tract Society’s publications were to be had, not to speak of a general range of literature quite wide enough for the minister of Salem. Masters’s was a branch of the London Master's, and, as might be supposed, was equally amazed and indignant at the intrusion of a Dissenter among its consecrated book-shelves. He was allowed to turn over all the varieties of the ‘Christian Year’ on a side-table before any of the attendants condescended to notice his presence; and it proved so difficult to find the books he wanted, and so much more difficult to find anybody who would take the trouble of looking for them, that the young Nonconformist, who was sufficiently ready to take offence, began to get hot and impatient, and had all but strode out of the shop, with a new mortification to record to the disadvantage of Carlingford. But just as he began to get very angry, the door swung softly open, and a voice became audible, lingering, talking to somebody before entering. Vincent stopped speaking, and stared in the shopman’s astonished face when these tones came to his ear. He fell back instantly upon the side-table and the ‘Christian Year,’ forgetting his own business, and what he had been saying—forgetting everything except that She was there, and that in another moment they would stand again within the same walls. He bent over the much-multiplied volume with a beating heart, poising in one hand a tiny miniature copy just made to slip within the pocket of an Anglican waistcoat, and in the other the big red-leaved and morocco-bound edition, as if weighing their respective merits—put beside himself, in fact, if the truth must be told, oblivious of his errand, his position—of everything but the fact that She was at the door. She came in with a sweet flutter and rustle of sound, a perfumed air entering with her, as the unsuspected enthusiast thought, and began to lavish smiles, for which he would have given half his life, upon the people of the place, who flew to serve her. She had her tablets in her hand, with a list of what she wanted, and held up a dainty forefinger as she stood reading the items. As one thing after another was mentioned, Masters and his men darted off in search of it. There were fortunately enough to give each of them a separate errand, and the principal ranged his shining wares upon the counter before her, and bathed in her smiles, while all his satellites kept close at hand, listening with all their ears for another commission. Blessed Masters! happy shopmen! that one who looked so blank when Vincent stopped short at the sound of her voice and stared at him, had forgotten all about Vincent. She was there; and if a little impromptu litany would have pleased her ladyship, it is probable that it could have been got up on the spot after the best models, and that even the Nonconformist would have waived his objections to liturgical worship and led the responses. But Masters’s establishment offered practical homage—only the poor Dissenting minister, divided between eagerness and fear, stood silent, flushed with excitement, turning wistful looks upon her, waiting till perhaps she might turn round and see him, and letting fall out of his trembling fingers those unregarded editions of the Anglican lyre.
“And two copies of the ‘Christian Year,’” said Lady Western, suddenly. “Oh, thank you so much! but I know they are all on the side-table, and I shall go and look at them. Not the very smallest copy, Mr. Masters, and not that solemn one with the red edges; something pretty, with a little ornament and gilding: they are for two little protegées of mine. Oh, here is exactly what I want! another one like this, please. How very obliging all your people are,” said her ladyship, benignly, as the nearest man dashed off headlong to bring what she wanted—“but I think it is universal in Carlingford; and indeed the manners of our country people in general have improved very much of late. Don’t you think so? oh, there can’t be a question about it!”
“I beg your ladyship’s pardon, I am sure; but perhaps, my lady, it is not safe to judge the general question from your ladyship’s point of view,” said the polite bookseller, with a bow.
“Oh, pray don’t say so; I should be wretched if I thought you took more trouble for me than for other people,” said the young Dowager, with a sweetness which filled Vincent’s heart with jealous pangs. She was close by his side—so close that those sacred robes rustled in his very ear, and her shawl brushed his sleeve. The poor young man took off his hat in a kind of ecstasy. If she did not notice him, what did it matter?—silent adoration, speechless homage, could not affront a queen.
And it was happily very far from affronting Lady Western. She turned round with a little curiosity, and looked up in his face. “Oh, Mr.—Mr. Vincent,” cried the beautiful creature, brightening in recognition. “How do you do? I suppose you are a resident in Carlingford now, are not you? Pardon me, that I did not see you when I came in. How very, very good it is of you to go and see my—my friend! Did you ever see anything so dreadful as the place where she lives? and isn’t she an extraordinary creature? Thank you, Mr. Masters; that’s exactly what I want. I do believe she might have been Lord Chancellor, or something, if she had not been a woman,” said the enchantress, once more lifting her lovely eyes with an expression of awe to Vincent’s face.
“She seems a very remarkable person,” said Vincent. “To see her where she is, makes one feel how insignificant are the circumstances of life.”
“Really! now, how do you make out that?” said Lady Western; “for, to tell the truth, I think, when I see her, oh, how important they are! and that I’d a great deal rather die than live so. But you clever people take such strange views of things. Now tell me how you make that out?”
“Nay,” said Vincent, lowering his voice with a delicious sense of having a subject to be confidential upon, “you know what conditions of existence all her surroundings imply; yet the most ignorant could not doubt for a moment her perfect superiority to them—a superiority so perfect,” he added, with a sudden insight which puzzled even himself, “that it is not necessary to assert it.”
“Oh, to be sure,” said Lady Western, colouring a little, and with a momentary hauteur, “of course a Russell—— I mean a gentlewoman—must always look the same to a certain extent; but, alas! I am only a very commonplace little woman,” continued the beauty, brightening into those smiles which perhaps might be distributed too liberally, but which intoxicated for the moment every man on whom they fell. “I think those circumstances which you speak of so disrespectfully are everything! I have not a great soul to triumph over them. I should break down, or they would overcome me—oh, you need not shake your head! I know I am right so far as I myself am concerned.”
“Indeed I cannot think so,” said the intoxicated young man; “you would make any circumstances—”
“What?”
But the bewildered youth made no direct reply. He only gazed at her, grew very red, and said, suddenly, “I beg your pardon,” stepping back in confusion, like the guilty man he was. The lady blushed, too, as her inquiring eyes met that unexpected response. Used as she was to adoration, she felt the silent force of the compliment withheld—it was a thousand times sweeter in its delicate suggestiveness and reserve of incense than any effusion of words. They were both a little confused for the moment, poor Vincent’s momentary betrayal of himself having somehow suddenly dissipated the array of circumstances which surrounded and separated two persons so far apart from each other in every conventional aspect. The first to regain her place and composure was of course Lady Western, who made him a pretty playful curtsy, and broke into a low, sweet ring of laughter.
“Now I shall never know whether you meant to be complimentary or contemptuous,” cried the young Dowager, “which is hard upon a creature with such a love of approbation as our friend says I have. However, I forgive you, if you meant to be very cutting, for her sake. It is so very kind of you to go to see her, and I am sure she enjoys your visits. Thank you, Mr. Masters, that is all. Have you got the two copies of the ‘Christian Year’? Put them into the carriage, please. Mr. Vincent, I am going to have the last of my summer-parties next Thursday—twelve o’clock; will you come?—only a cup of coffee, you know, or tea if you prefer it, and talk au discretion. I shall be happy to see you, and I have some nice friends, and one or two good pictures; so there you have an account of all the attractions my house can boast of. Do come: it will be my last party this season, and I rather want it to be a great success,” said the syren, looking up with her sweet eyes.
Vincent could not tell what answer he made in his rapture; but the next thing he was properly conscious of was the light touch of her hand upon his arm as he led her to her carriage, some sudden courageous impulse having prompted him to secure for himself that momentary blessedness. He walked forth in a dream, conducting that heavenly vision: and there, outside, stood the celestial chariot with those pawing horses, and the children standing round with open mouth to watch the lovely lady’s progress. It was he who put her in with such pride and humbleness as perhaps only a generous but inexperienced young man, suddenly surprised into passion, could be capable of—ready to kiss the hem of her garment, or do any other preposterous act of homage—and just as apt to blaze up into violent self-assertion should any man attempt to humble him who had been thus honoured. While he stood watching the carriage out of sight, Masters himself came out to tell the young Nonconformist, whose presence that dignified tradesman had been loftily unconscious of a few minutes before, that they had found the book he wanted; and Vincent, thrilling in every pulse with the unlooked-for blessedness which had befallen him, was not sorry, when he dropped out of the clouds at the bookseller’s accost, to re-enter that place where this enchantment still hovered, by way of calming himself down ere he returned to those prose regions which were his own lawful habitation. He saw vaguely the books that were placed on the counter before him—heard vaguely the polite purling of Masters’s voice, all-solicitous to make up for the momentary incivility with which he had treated a friend of Lady Western’s—and was conscious of taking out his purse and paying something for the volume, which he carried away with him. But the book might have been Sanscrit for anything Mr. Vincent cared—and he would have paid any fabulous price for it with the meekest resignation. His attempt to appear moderately interested, and to conduct this common transaction as if he had all his wits about him, was sufficient occupation just at this moment. His head was turned. There should have been roses blossoming all along the bare pavement of George Street to account for the sweet gleams of light which warmed the entire atmosphere as he traversed that commonplace way. Not only the interview just passed, but the meeting to come, bewildered him with an intoxicating delight. Here, then, was the society he had dreamed of, opening its perfumed doors to receive him. From Mrs. Tozer’s supper-table to the bowery gates of Grange Lane was a jump which, ten days ago, would of itself have made the young minister giddy with satisfaction and pleasure. Now these calm emotions had ceased to move him; for not society, but a sweeter syren, had thrown chains of gold round the unsuspecting Nonconformist. With Her, Back Grove Street was Paradise. Where her habitation was, or what he should see there, was indifferent to Vincent. He was again to meet Herself.