The Castle Inn: Chapter 15

Chapter 15

AMORIS INTEGRATIO

During the early days of the Minister's illness, when, as we have seen,
all the political world of England were turning their coaches and six
towards the Castle Inn, it came to be the custom for Julia to go every
morning to the little bridge over the Kennet, thence to watch the
panorama of departures and arrivals; and for Sir George to join her
there without excuse or explanation, and as if, indeed, nothing in the
world were more natural. As the Earl's illness continued to detain all
who desired to see him--from the Duke of Grafton's parliamentary
secretary to the humblest aspirant to a tide-waitership--Soane was not
the only one who had time on his hands and sought to while it away in
the company of the fair. The shades of Preshute churchyard, which lies
in the bosom of the trees, not three bowshots from the Castle Inn and
hard by the Kennet, formed the chosen haunt of one couple. A second pair
favoured a seat situate on the west side of the Castle Mound, and well
protected by shrubs from the gaze of the vulgar. And there were others.

These Corydons, however, were at ease; they basked free from care in the
smiles of their Celias. But Soane, in his philandering, had to do with
black care that would be ever at his elbow; black care, that always when
he was not with Julia, and sometimes while he talked to her, would jog
his thoughts, and draw a veil before the future. The prospect of losing
Estcombe, of seeing the family Lares broken and cast out, and the
family stem, tender and young, yet not ungracious, snapped off short,
wrung a heart that belied his cold exterior. Moreover, when all these
had been sacrificed, he was his own judge how far he could without means
pursue the life which he was living. Suspense, anxiety, sordid
calculation were ever twitching his sleeve, and would have his
attention. Was the claim a valid claim, and must it prevail? If it
prevailed, how was he to live; and where, and on what? Would the
Minister grant his suit for a place or a pension? Should he prefer that
suit, or might he still by one deep night and one great hand at hazard
win back the thirty thousand guineas he had lost in five years?

Such questions, troubling him whether he would or no, and forcing
themselves on his attention when they were least welcome, ruffled at
last the outward composure on which as a man of fashion he plumed
himself. He would fall silent in Julia's company, and turning his eyes
from her, in unworthy forgetfulness, would trace patterns in the dust
with his cane, or stare by the minute together at the quiet stream that
moved sluggishly beneath them.

On these occasions she made no attempt to rouse him. But when he again
awoke to the world, to the coach passing in its cloud of dust, or the
gaping urchin, or the clang of the distant dinner-bell, he would find
her considering him with an enigmatical smile, that lay in the region
between amusement and pity; her shapely chin resting on her hand, and
the lace falling from the whitest wrist in the world. One day the smile
lasted so long, was so strange and dubious, and so full of a weird
intelligence, that it chilled him; it crept to his bones, disconcerted
him, and set him wondering. The uneasy questions that had haunted him at
the first, recurred. Why was this girl so facile, who had seemed so
proud, and whose full lips curved so naturally? Was she really won, or
was she with some hidden motive only playing with him? The notion was
not flattering to a fine gentleman's vanity; and in any other case he
would have given himself credit for conquest. But he had discovered that
this girl was not as other girls; and then there was that puzzling
smile. He had surprised it half a dozen times before.

'What is it?' he said abruptly, holding her eyes with his. This time he
was determined to clear up the matter.

'What?' she asked in apparent innocence. But she coloured, and he saw
that she understood.

'What does your smile mean, Pulcherrima?'

'Only--that I was reading your thoughts, Sir George,' she answered. 'And
they were not of me.'

'Impossible!' he said. I vow, Julia--'

'Don't vow,' she answered quickly, 'or when you vow--some other time--I
may not be able to believe you! You were not thinking of me, Sir George,
but of your home, and the avenue of which you told me, and the elms in
which the rooks lived, and the river in which you used to fish. You were
wondering to whom they would go, and who would possess them, and who
would be born in the room in which you were born, and who would die in
the room in which your father died.'

'You are a witch!' he said, a spasm of pain crossing his face.

'Thank you,' she answered, looking at him over her fan. 'Last time you
said, "D--n the girl!" It is clear I am improving your manners, Sir
George. You are now so polite, that presently you will consult me.'

So she could read his very thoughts! Could set him on the rack! Could
perceive when pain and not irritation underlay the oath or the
compliment. He was always discovering something new in her; something
that piqued his curiosity, and kept him amused. 'Suppose I consult you
now?' he said.

She swung her fan to and fro, playing with it childishly, looking at the
light through it, and again dropping it until it hung from her wrist by
a ribbon. 'As your highness pleases,' she said at last. 'Only I warn
you, that I am not the Bottle Conjuror.'

'No, for you are here, and he was not there,' Sir George answered,
affecting to speak in jest. 'But tell me; what shall I do in this case?
A claim is made against me.'

'It's the bomb,' she said, 'that burst, Sir George, is it not?'

'The same. The point is, shall I resist the claim, or shall I yield to
it? What do you say, ma'am?'

She tossed up her fan and caught it deftly, and looked to him for
admiration. Then, 'It depends,' she said. 'Is it a large claim?'

'It is a claim--for all I have,' he answered slowly. It was the first
time he had confessed that to any one, except to himself in the
night watches.

If he thought to touch her, he succeeded. If he had fancied her
unfeeling before, he did so no longer. She was red one minute and pale
the next, and the tears came into her eyes. 'Oh,' she cried, her breast
heaving, 'you should not have told me! Oh, why did you tell me?' And she
rose hurriedly as if to leave him; and then sat down again, the fan
quivering in her hand.

'But you said you would advise me!' he answered in surprise.

'I! Oh, no! no!' she cried.

'But you must!' he persisted, more deeply moved than he would show. 'I
want your advice. I want to know how the case looks to another. It is a
simple question. Shall I fight, Julia, or shall I yield to the claim?'

'Fight or yield?' she said, her voice broken by agitation. 'Shall you
fight or yield? You ask me?'

'Yes.'

'Then fight! Fight!' she answered, with surprising emotion: and she rose
again to her feet. And again sat down. 'Fight them to the last, Sir
George!' she cried breathlessly. 'Let the creatures have nothing! Not a
penny! Not an acre!'

'But--if it is a righteous claim?' he said, amazed at her excitement.

'Righteous?' she answered passionately. 'How can a claim be righteous
that takes all that a man has?'

He nodded, and studied the road awhile, thinking less of her advice than
of the strange fervour with which she had given it. At the end of a
minute he was surprised to hear her laugh. He felt hurt, and looked up
to learn the reason; and was astounded to find her smiling at him as
lightly and gaily as if nothing had occurred to interrupt her most
whimsical mood; as if the question he had put to her had not been put,
or were a farce, a jest, a mere pastime!

'Sho, Sir George,' she said, 'how silly you must think me to proffer you
advice; and with an air as if the sky were falling? Do you forgive me?'

'I forgive you _that_,' Sir George answered. But, poor fellow, he winced
under her sudden change of tone.

'That is well,' she said confidently. 'And there again, do you know you
are changed; you would not have said that a week ago. I have most
certainly improved your manners.'

Sir George made an effort to answer her in the same strain. 'Well, I
should improve,' he said. 'I come very regularly to school. Do you know
how many days we have sat here, _ma belle_?'

A faint colour tinged her cheek. 'If I do not, that dreadful Mr.
Thomasson does,' she answered. 'I believe he never lets me go out of his
sight. And for what you say about days--what are days, or even weeks,
when it is a question of reforming a rake, Sir George? Who was it you
named to me yesterday,' she continued archly, but with her eyes on the
toe of her shoe which projected from her dress, 'who carried the
gentleman into the country when he had lost I don't know how many
thousand pounds? And kept him there out of harm's way?'

'It was Lady Carlisle,' Sir George answered drily; 'and the gentleman
was her husband.'

It was Julia's turn to draw figures in the dust of the roadway, which
she did very industriously; and the two were silent for quite a long
time, while some one's heart bumped as if it would choke her. At
length--'He was not quite ruined, was he?' she said, with elaborate
carelessness; her voice was a little thick--perhaps by reason of
the bumping.

'Lord, no!' said Sir George. 'And I am, you see.'

'While I am not your wife!' she answered; and flashed her eyes on him in
sudden petulance; and then, 'Well, perhaps if my lady had her choice--to
be wife to a rake can be no bed of roses, Sir George! While to be wife
to a ruined rake--perhaps to be wife to a man who, if he were not
ruined, would treat you as the dirt beneath his feet, beneath his
notice, beneath--'

She did not seem to be able to finish the sentence, but rose choking,
her face scarlet. He rose more slowly. 'Lord!' he said humbly, looking
at her in astonishment, 'what has come to you suddenly? What has made
you angry with me, child?'

'Child?' she exclaimed. 'Am I a child? You play with me as if I were!'

'Play with you?' Sir George said, dumfounded; he was quite taken aback
by her sudden vehemence. 'My dear girl, I cannot understand you. I am
not playing with you. If any one is playing, it is you. Sometimes--I
wonder whether you hate me or love me. Sometimes I am happy enough to
think the one; sometimes--I think the other--'

'It has never struck you,' she said, speaking with her head high, and in
her harshest and most scornful tone, 'that I may do neither the one nor
the other, but be pleased to kill my time with you--since I must stay
here until my lawyer has done his business?'

'Oh!' said Soane, staring helplessly at the angry beauty, 'if that be
all--'

'That is all!' she cried. 'Do you understand? That is all.'

He bowed gravely. 'Then I am glad that I have been of use to you. That
at least,' he said.

'Thank you,' she said drily. 'I am going into the house now. I need not
trouble you farther.'

And sweeping him a curtsey that might have done honour to a duchess, she
turned and sailed away, the picture of disdain. But when her face was
safe from his gaze and he could no longer see them, her eyes filled with
tears of shame and vexation; she had to bite her trembling lip to keep
them back. Presently she slackened her speed and almost stopped--then
hurried on, when she thought that she heard him following. But he did
not overtake her, and Julia's step grew slow again, and slower until she
reached the portico.

Between love and pride, hope and shame, she had a hard fight; happily a
coach was unloading, and she could stand and feign interest in the
passengers. Two young fellows fresh from Bath took fire at her eyes; but
one who stared too markedly she withered with a look, and, if the truth
be told, her fingers tingled for his ears. Her own ears were on the
alert, directed backwards like a hare's. Would he never come? Was he
really so simple, so abominably stupid, so little versed in woman's
ways? Or was he playing with her? Perhaps, he had gone into the town? Or
trudged up the Salisbury road; if so, and if she did not see him now,
she might not meet him until the next morning; and who could say what
might happen in the interval? True, he had promised that he would not
leave Marlborough without seeing her; but things had altered between
them since then.

At last--at last, when she felt that her pride would allow her to stay
no longer, and she was on the point of going in, the sound of his step
cut short her misery. She waited, her heart beating quickly, to hear his
voice at her elbow. Presently she heard it, but he was speaking to
another; to a coarse rough man, half servant half loafer, who had joined
him, and was in the act of giving him a note. Julia, outwardly cool,
inwardly on tenterhooks, saw so much out of the corner of her eye, and
that the two, while they spoke, were looking at her. Then the man fell
back, and Sir George, purposely averting his gaze and walking like a man
heavy in thought, went by her; he passed through the little crowd about
the coach, and was on the point of disappearing through the entrance,
when she hurried after him and called his name.

He turned, between the pillars, and saw her. 'A word with you, if you
please,' she said. Her tone was icy, her manner freezing.

Sir George bowed. 'This way, if you please,' she continued imperiously;
and preceded him across the hall and through the opposite door and down
the steps to the gardens, that had once been Lady Hertford's delight.
Nor did she pause or look at him until they were halfway across the
lawn; then she turned, and with a perfect change of face and manner,
smiling divinely in the sunlight,

'Easy her motion seemed, serene her air,'

she held out her hand.

'You have come--to beg my pardon, I hope?' she said.

The smile she bestowed on him was an April smile, the brighter for the
tears that lurked behind it; but Soane did not know that, nor, had he
known it, would it have availed him. He was utterly dazzled, conquered,
subjugated by her beauty. 'Willingly,' he said. 'But for what?'

'Oh, for--everything!' she answered with supreme assurance.

'I ask your divinity's pardon for everything,' he said obediently.

'It is granted,' she answered. 'And--I shall see you to-morrow, Sir
George?'

'To-morrow?' he said. 'Alas, no; I shall be away to-morrow.'

He had eyes; and the startling fashion in which the light died out of
her face, and left it grey and colourless, was not lost on him. But her
voice remained steady, almost indifferent. 'Oh!' she said, 'you are
going?' And she raised her eyebrows.

'Yes,' he answered; 'I have to go to Estcombe.'

She tried to force a laugh, but failed. 'And you do not return? We shall
not see you again?' she said.

'It lies with you,' he answered slowly. 'I am returning to-morrow
evening by the Bath road. Will you come and meet me, Julia--say, as far
as the Manton turning? It's on your favourite road. I know you stroll
there every evening. I shall be there a little after five. If you come
to-morrow, I shall know that, notwithstanding your hard words, you will
take in hand the reforming of a rake--and a ruined rake, Julia. If you
do not come--'

He hesitated. She had to turn away her head that he might not see the
light that had returned to her eyes. 'Well, what then?' she said softly.

'I do not know.'

'But Lady Carlisle was his wife,' she whispered, with a swift sidelong
shot from eyes instantly averted. 'And--you remember what you said to
me--at Oxford? That if I were a lady, you would make me your wife. I am
not a lady, Sir George.'

'I did not say that,' Sir George answered quickly.

'No! What then?'

'You know very well,' he retorted with malice.

All of her cheek and neck that he could see turned scarlet. 'Well, at
any rate,' she said, 'let us be sure now that you are talking not to
Clarissa but to Pamela?'

'I am talking to neither,' he answered manfully. And he stood erect, his
hat in his hand; they were almost of a height. 'I am talking to the most
beautiful woman in the world,' he said, 'whom I also believe to be the
most virtuous--and whom I hope to make my wife. Shall it be so, Julia?'

She was trembling excessively; she used her fan that he might not see
how her hand shook. 'I--I will tell you to-morrow,' she murmured
breathlessly. 'At Manton Corner.'

'Now! Now!' he said.

But she cried 'No, to-morrow,' and fled from him into the house, deaf,
as she passed through the hall, to the clatter of dishes and the cries
of the waiters and the rattle of orders; for she had the singing of
larks in her ears, and her heart rose on the throb of the song, rose
until she felt that she must either cry or die--of very happiness.

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