CLARE was standing by the table with her hands clasped tightly, her mouth shut fast, her tall figure towering taller than usual, when Edgar, all unconscious, returned to her. She assailed him in a moment, without warning. “Edgar, how can you—how could you?” she said, with an impatient movement, which, had she been less fair, less delicate, less young, would have been a stamp of her foot. Her tone and look and gesture were so passionate that the young man stood aghast.
“What have I done?” he asked.
“What have you done? You know as well as I do. Oh, Edgar, you have given me such a blow! I thought when you came home, and we were together, that all would be well; but to see you the very first day—the very first opportunity—throw yourself into the arms of people like these—people that never should have entered this house——”
“Who are they? What are they? Have they done us any harm?” said the astonished Edgar. “If they are enemies you should have told me. How was I to know?”
“Enemies!” said Clare, with increasing indignation; “how could such people be our enemies? They are a great deal worse—they are the vulgar rich, whom I hate; they are trying to force themselves in among us because they are rich; they are trades-people, pretending to be our equals, venturing to ask you to dinner! Oh, Edgar, could not you see by my manner that they were not people to know?”
“I saw you were very rude to them, certainly,” he said. “But, Clare, that goes against me; even—may I say it?—it disappointed me. I do not understand how a lady can be rude.”
Once more she repeated his last word with a certain contempt. “Rude! The man is a tradesman. They have thrust themselves into the village; and now they have seized an opportunity—which was in reality no opportunity—to thrust themselves into the house. Edgar, I have no patience; I ought not to have patience. They have been impertinent. And you as civil as if they were the best people in the county—and going to dine with them! I did not expect this.”
“I am sorry, Clare, if it hurts you,” he said. “They seemed very kind; and how could I help it? Besides, you made them very uncomfortable, and I owed them amends. And you know I am but an indifferent Arden; I have not any horror of trade.”
“You told them so!” said Clare—“you took people like these into your confidence, and confessed to them that you were not an Arden like the rest of us! Oh, please, Edgar, don’t! you might think how unhappy it makes me. As if it was not enough——”
“What, Clare?”
“Oh, can’t you understand?” she cried. “Is it not enough to see that you are not a thorough Arden; that you don’t care for the things we care for, nor hate the things we hate. But to have to hear you say so as if it did not matter!—it is the grief of my life.”
And she threw herself into a chair, and cried—weeping a sudden shower of passionate tears, which were so hot and rapid that they seemed to scorch her, yet dried as they fell. Her brother came and stood by her chair, putting his hand softly on her bent head. Edgar was sorry, but not only because she wept. He was grieved, and perplexed, and disappointed. A half smile came over his serious face at her last words. “My poor Clare—my poor Clare,” he repeated softly, smoothing the dark glossy locks of her hair. When the thunder shower was over he spoke, with a voice that sounded more manly and mature and grave than anything Clare had heard from him before.
“You must take my character and my training a little into consideration,” he said. “If I had been brought up like you I might have thought with you. But, Clare, though I love you more than anything in the world, and would not vex you for all Arden, still I cannot change my nature. Arden is only a very small spot in England, dear, not to speak of the world; and I can’t look at the big world through Arden spectacles. You must not ask it of me; anything else I will do to please you. I will give up dining with these people if you wish it. Of course I don’t care for their dinner; but they looked as if they wanted to be kind——”
“They wanted to come to Arden, to know you and me, and get admittance among the county families,” said Clare in one breath.
“Well, perhaps. I suppose we are all mean wretches more or less,” he said. “Suppose we give up the Pimpernels; but you must not ask me to avoid everybody who has anything to do, or to content myself with the old groove. For instance, I like pictures, though you say the Ardens don’t——”
“That is not what I meant,” said Clare, with a blush; “I meant——”
“You meant opposition, and to snub that fat, good-tempered man; and you only made me uncomfortable—he did not feel it. But I like pictures, Clare, and the people who paint them. I have known a great many in my life; and when I like any man I cannot pause to ask what is his pedigree, or what is his occupation. Putting aside the Pimpernels, you must still make up your mind to that.”
“But you will put aside the Pimpernels?” said Clare, with pleading looks.
“I will see about it,” said Edgar. It was the first time he had not yielded, and Clare felt it. She felt too that a shade of real difference had stolen between them—almost of separation. She had been unreasonable, and had put herself in the wrong; and he had set up a principle of action, erected as it were his standard, and made it clearly apparent what he would and what he would not do. She went away to her own room with a certain soreness in her heart. She had committed herself. Certain words of her own and certain words of his came back to her with the poignant shame of youth—what she had said about the pictures, and what Edgar had said of her rudeness, and of the antagonism which only made him uncomfortable. She had made herself ridiculous, she thought—that worst of all offences against one’s self. It seemed to the proud Clare as if neither she nor any one else could forget how ridiculous she had made herself; and more than ever with tenfold force of enmity she hated those unlucky Pimpernels.
It was brilliant daylight, the sun was setting, and the air full of light and sweetness, when they set off upon their drive to Thorne. Clare was all black, as her mourning demanded—black ornaments, black gloves—everything about her as sable as the night—a dress, which was not perhaps so becoming to her dark hair and pale complexion as it would have been to pretty Alice Pimpernel, or the fair-haired Gussy, whom Edgar was going (though he did not know it) expressly to see. Probably Clare did not waste a thought on the subject, for she was young and entirely fancy free, a condition of things which frees a girl from any keen anxiety in respect to her appearance. She was wrapped in a large white cloak, however, which relieved the blackness, and brought out the delicate pale tints of her face as only white can do; and Edgar, as he took his place by her side, found himself admiring her as if he had seen her for the first time. The high, proud features, so finely cut, the perfect roundness of youth in the cheek, the large, lovely blue eyes, were of a kind of beauty which you may like or dislike as you please, but which it is impossible to ignore. Clare was beautiful, there was no other word for it. Not pretty, like that pretty Alice; and her proud looks and air of reserve enhanced her beauty, just as the sweet wistful frankness of the simpler girl added a charm to hers. “I don’t suppose I shall see any one like my sister where we are going,” Edgar said, with that admiring affection which is so pleasant in a brother.
“No, indeed, they are all quite a different style,” Clare answered with a laugh, turning aside the compliment, which nevertheless pleased her. This did much to restore the former delightful balance of affairs between them. About half-a-mile from the village they came upon a house, just visible through the trees, a very old solid mass of red brick, shining with a subdued glow in the midst of the green wealth of foliage, which looked the greener for its redness, and heightened its native depth of colour. There was a fine cedar on the lawn, and many great old trees within the enclosure, which was so arranged that it might be taken for a park. Edgar gave an inquiring glance at his sister, who answered him by shaking her head, and putting up her hands as if to shut out the hateful vision.
“So that is the Red House?” said Edgar. “I had forgotten all about it. It is a nice house enough. If I should ever happen to be turned out of Arden, I should like to live there.”
“What nonsense you do talk!” said Clare. “Who can turn you out of Arden, unless there was a revolution, as some people think?”
“I don’t think there will be a revolution. But have we no cousins who might do one that good turn?” he said, laughing. “How? Oh, I can’t tell how. It is impossible, I suppose.”
“Simply impossible,” said Clare with energy. “We are the elder branch. The Ardens of Warwickshire were quite a late offshoot. You are the head of the name.”
“I am glad to hear it,” said Edgar; “and I am sure it is a very proud position. Does that Red House belong to us, Clare? But if it had belonged to us, I suppose you would not have let it to those respectable—I mean objectionable—Pimpernels?”
“Don’t speak of the Pimpernels,” she said. “Oh, Edgar, if you only knew how much I dislike those sort of people—not because they are common people—on the contrary, I am very fond of the poor; but those presumptuous pushing nouveaux riches—don’t let us speak of them! We have got a cousin—only one; and if you were not to have any children, I suppose the estates would go to his son. But I hope they never will.”
“Why?” said Edgar. “Is there any reason to suppose that his son would be less satisfactory than mine? I hope he is less problematical. Tell me about him—who is he—where is he? I feel very curious about my heir.”
“And I hate to hear you speak in such a careless way,” said his sister. “Why should you show so much levity on so serious a subject? Arthur Arden is a great deal older than you are. I dislike him very much. Pray, don’t speak of him to me.”
“Another subject I must not speak of!” said Edgar. “Why do you dislike him? Is it because he is my heir? You need not hate a man for that.”
“But I do hate him,” said Clare, with a clouded brow; and the rest of the way to Thorne was gone over in comparative silence. The jars that kept occurring, putting now one string, now another out of tune, vibrated through both with an unceasing thrill of discord. There was no quarrel, and yet each was afraid to touch on any new subject. To be sure, it was Clare who was in the wrong; but then, why was he so light, so easily moved, so free from all natural prejudices, she said to herself? Men ought not to run from one subject to another in this careless way. They ought to be more grave, more stately in their ways of thinking, not moved by freaks of imagination. Such levity was so different from the Arden disposition that it looked almost like something wrong to Clare.
Thorne was a great house, but not like Arden. It stood alone, not shadowed by trees, amid the great green solitude of its park; and already lights were glimmering in the open windows, though it was still day. The servants were closing shutters in the dining-room, and the table gleamed inside under the lamplight, making itself brightly visible, like a picture, with all its ornaments and flowers. It was Lady Augusta’s weakness that she could not bear to dine in daylight. In the very height of summer she had to support the infliction; but as long as she could she shut out the intrusive day. Edgar felt his head swim as he walked into the cool green drawing-room after his sister into the midst of a bevy of ladies. He was fond of ladies, like most well-conditioned men; but the first moment of introducing himself into the midst of a crowd of them fluttered him, as was quite reasonable. There was Ada, the quiet one, on a sofa by herself, knitting. Edgar discriminated her at once. And that, no doubt, was Gussy, with the prettiest tiny figure, and a charming little rose-tinted face, something between an angel and a Dresden shepherdess. “That will be my one,” he said to himself, remembering with natural perversity that Ada was Clare’s favourite. That little indication was enough to raise in the young man’s mind a certain disinclination to Ada. And he did not know that Lady Augusta had already decided upon the advisability of allotting to him her second daughter. He could not see the others, who were busied in different corners with different occupations. It was the first English party of the kind he had ever been at, and he was very curious about it. And then it was so perfectly orthodox a party. There was the nearest squire and his wife, one of the great Blundell family; and there was a younger son of the Earl’s, with his young wife; and the rector of the parish, and a man from London. Such a party is not complete without the man from London, who has all the news at his finger-ends, and under whose manipulation the biggest of cities becomes in reality that “little village” which slang calls it. “Will you take in my daughter, Mr. Arden?” said Lady Augusta; and Edgar, without any thought of his own dignity, was quite happy to find Gussy’s pretty curls brushing his shoulder as they joined the procession into the dining-room. He thought it was kind of his new friends to provide him with such a pleasant companion, while Clare was making herself rather unhappy with the thought that he should have taken in, if not the Honourable Mrs. Everard, at least Mrs. Blundell, or, at the very least, Ada, who was the Princess Royal of the House of Thorne. “I am so glad all the solemn people are at the other end of the table,” Gussy whispered to him, as they took their places. “Mr. Arden, I am sure you are not solemn. You are not a bit like Clare.”
“Is Clare solemn?” asked Edgar, with a half sense of treachery to his sister; but he could not refuse to smile at Gussy’s pretty up-turned face.
“I love her dearly; she is as good as gold,” said Gussy, “but not such fun as I am sure you are. If you will promise never to betray me to mamma, I will tell you who everyone here is.”
“Not if I went to the stake for it,” said Edgar; and so his first alliance was formed.