SPRQUL HALL LIBRARY DANIEL DERONDA. f^RAND-COURT AND GWENDOLEN IN THE PA RtC. Photogravure, front drawing by Charles Cope land. The Complete Works George Eliot DANIEL DERONDA VOLUME 1 ILLUSTRATED NEW YORK AND LONDON HARPER & BROTHERS PUBLISHERS URII TO MY DEAR HUSBAND GEOKGE HENRY LEWES. but easily missed by spectators who were running their eyes over the " Guardian " or the "Clerical Gazette," and regarded the trivialities of the young ones with scarcely more interpretation than they gave to the actions of lively ants. " Where are you going, Eex ? " said Anna one gray morning when her father had set off in the carriage to the sessions, Mrs. Gascoigne with him, and she had observed that her brother had on his antigropelos, the utmost approach he possessed to a hunting equipment. " Going to see the hounds throw off at the Three Barns." " Are you going to take Gwendolen ? " said Anna, timidly. " She told you, did she ? " "No; but I thought Does papa know you are going ? " " Not that I am aware of. I don't suppose he would trouble himself about the matter." " You are going to use his horse ? " " He knows I do that whenever I can." " Don't let Gwendolen ride after the hounds, Eex," said Anna, whose fears gifted her with second-sight. "Why not?" said Eex, smiling rather pro- vokingly. " Papa and mamma and Aunt Davilow all wish her not to. They think it is not right for her." "Why should you suppose she is going to do what is not right?" " Gwendolen minds nobody sometimes," said Anna, getting bolder by dint of a little anger. " Then she would not mind me," said Eex, per- versely making a joke of poor Anna's anxiety. 86 DANIEL DERONDA. "Oh, Eex, I cannot bear it. You will make yourself very unhappy." Here Anna burst into tears. "Nannie, Nannie, what on earth is the matter with you ? " said Rex, a little impatient at being kept in this way, hat on and whip in hand. " She will not care for you one bit, I know she never will ! " said the poor child in a sobbing whisper. She had lost all control of herself. Bex reddened and hurried away from her out of the hall door, leaving her to the miserable con- sciousness of having made herself disagreeable in vain. He did think of her words as he rode along : they had the unwelcomeness which all unfavourable fortune-telling has, even when laughed at ; but he quickly explained them as springing from little Anna's tenderness, and began to be sorry that he was obliged to come away without soothing her. Every other feeling on the subject, however, was quickly merged in a resistant belief to the contrary of hers, accompanied with a new determination to prove that he was right. This sort of certainty had just enough kinship to doubt and uneasiness to hurry on a confession which an untouched security might have delayed. Gwendolen was already mounted and riding up and down the avenue when Rex appeared at the gate. She had provided herself against disappoint- ment in case he did not appear in time by having the groom ready behind her, for she would not have waited beyond a reasonable time. But now the groom was dismissed, and the two rode away in delightful freedom. Gwendolen was in her highest spirits, and Rex thought that she had never looked THE SPOILED CHILD. 87 so lovely before : her figure, her long white throat, and the curves of her cheek and chin were always set off to perfection by the compact simplicity of her riding-dress. He could not conceive a more per- fect girl ; and to a youthful lover like Eex it seems that the fundamental identity of the good, the true, and the beautiful is already extant and manifest in the object of his love. Most observers would have held it more than equally accountable that a girl should have like impressions about Kex, for in his handsome face there was nothing corresponding to the undefinable stinging quality as it were a trace of demon ancestry which made some be- holders hesitate in their admiration of Gwendolen. It was an exquisite January morning, in which there was no threat of rain, but a gray sky making the calmest background for the charms of a inild winter scene, the grassy borders of the lanes, the hedgerows sprinkled with red berries and haunted with low twitterings, the purple bareness of the elms, the rich brown of the furrows. The horses' hoofs made a musical chime, accompanying their young voices. She was laughing at his equip- ment, for he was the reverse of a dandy, and he was enjoying her laughter : the freshness of the morning mingled with the freshness of their youth ; and every sound that came from their clear throats, every glance they gave each other, was the bubbling outflow from a spring of joy. It was all morning to them, within and without. And thinking of them in these moments one is tempted to that futile sort of wishing if only things could have been a little otherwise then, so as to have been greatly other- wise after ! if only these two beautiful young creatures could have pledged themselves to each 88 DANIEL DERONDA. other then and there, and never through life have swerved from that pledge ! For some of the good- ness which Eex believed in was there. Goodness is a large, often a prospective word; like harvest, which at one stage when we talk of it lies all underground, with an indeterminate future : is the germ prospering in the darkness ? at another, it has put forth delicate green blades, and by and by the trembling blossoms are ready to be dashed off by an hour of rough wind or rain. Each stage has its peculiar blight, and may have the healthy life choked out of it by a particular action of the foul land which rears or neighbours it, or by damage brought from foulness afar. " Anna had got it into her head that you would want to ride after the hounds this morning," said Rex, whose secret associations with Anna's words made this speech seem quite perilously near the most momentous of subjects. " Did she ? " said Gwendolen, laughingly. " What a little clairvoyante she is ! " " Shall you ? " said Rex, who had not believed in her intending to do it if the elders objected, but confided in her having good reasons. " I don't know. I can't tell what I shall do till I get there. Clairvoyantes are often wrong: they foresee what is likely. I am not fond of what is likely ; it is always dull. I do what is unlikely." " Ah, there you tell me a secret. When once I knew what people in general would be likely to do, I should know you would do the opposite. So you would have come round to a likelihood of your own sort. I shall be able to calculate on you. You couldn't surprise me." THE SPOILED CHILD. " Yes, I could. I should turn round and do what was likely for people in general," said Gwendolen, with a musical laugh. " You see you can't escape some sort of likeli- hood. And contradictoriness makes the strongest likelihood of all. You must give up a plan." " No, I shall not. My plan is to do what pleases me." (Here should any young lady incline to imi- tate Gwendolen, let her consider the set of her head and neck : if the angle there had been differ- ent, the chin protrusive, and the cervical vertebrae a trifle more curved in their position, ten to one Gwendolen's words would have had a jar in them for the sweet-natured Kex. But everything odd in her speech was humour and pretty banter, which he was only anxious to turn towards one point.) " Can you manage to feel only what pleases you ? " said ha " Of course not ; that comes from what other people do. But if the world were pleasanter, one would only feel what was pleasant. Girls' lives are so stupid : they never do what they like." " I thought that was more the case of the men. They are forced to do hard things, and are often dreadfully bored, and knocked to pieces too. And then, if we love a girl very dearly we want to do as she likes ; so after all you have your own way." " I don't believe it. I never saw a married woman who had her own way." " What should you like to do ? " said Rex, quite guilelessly, and in real anxiety. " Oh, I don't know ! go to the North Pole, or ride steeplechases, or go to be a queen in the East like Lady Hester Stanhope," said Gwendolen, flight- ily. Her words were born on her lips, but she 90 DANIEL DERONDA. would have been at a loss to give an answer of deeper origin. " You don't mean you would never be married ? " " No ; I did n't say that. Only when I married, I should not do as other women do." " You might do just as you liked if you married a man who loved you more dearly than anything else in the world," said Rex, who, poor youth, was moving in themes outside the curriculum in which he had promised to win distinction. " I know one who does." "Don't talk of Mr. Middleton, for heaven's sake," said Gwendolen, hastily, a quick blush spreading over her face and neck ; " that is Anna's chant. I hear the hounds. Let us go on." She put her chestnut to a canter, and Eex had no choice but to follow her. Still he felt encouraged. Gwendolen was perfectly aware that her cousin was in love with her; but she had no idea that the matter was of any consequence, having never had the slightest visitation of painful love herself. She wished the small romance of Rex's devotion to fill up the time of his stay at Pennicote, and to avoid explanations which would bring it to an untimely end. Besides, she objected, with a sort of physical repulsion, to being directly made love to. With all her imaginative delight in being adored, there vras a certain fierceness of maidenhood in her. But all other thoughts were soon lost for her in the excitement of the scene at the Three Barns. Several gentlemen of the hunt knew her, and she exchanged pleasant greetings. Rex could not get another word with her. The colour, the stir of the field had taken possession of Gwendolen with a strength which was not due to habitual associa- THE SPOILED CHILD. 91 tion, for she had never yet ridden after the hounds, only said she should like to do it, and so drawn forth a prohibition ; her mamma dreading the danger, and her uncle declaring that for his part he held that kind of violent exercise unseemly in a woman, and that whatever might be done in other parts of the country, no lady of good position followed the Wessex hunt : no one but Mrs. Gads- by, the yeomanry captain's wife, who had been a kitchen-maid, and still spoke like one. This last argument had some effect on Gwendolen, and had kept her halting between her desire to assert her freedom and her horror of being classed with Mrs. Gadsby. Some of the most unexceptionable women in the neighbourhood occasionally went to see the hounds throw off ; but it happened that none of them were present this morning to abstain from following, while Mrs. Gadsby, with her doubtful antecedents, grammatical and otherwise, was not visible to make following seem unbecoming. Thus Gwendolen felt no check on the animal stimulus that came from the stir and tongue of the hounds, the pawing of the horses, the varying voices of men, the move- ment hither and thither of vivid colour on the back- ground of green and gray stillness, that utmost excitement of the coming chase which consists in feeling something like a combination of dog and horse, with the superadded thrill of social vanities and consciousness of centaur-power which belong to humankind. Rex would have felt more of the same enjoyment if he could have kept nearer to Gwendolen, and not seen her constantly occupied with acquaintances, or looked at by would-be acquaintances, all on lively 9* DANIEL DERONDA. horses which veered about and swept the surround- ing space as effectually as a revolving lever. " Glad to see you here this fine morning, Miss Har- leth," said Lord Brackenshaw, a middle-aged peer of aristocratic seediness in stained pink, with easy-going manners which would have made the threatened Deluge seem of no consequence. "We shall have a first-rate run. A pity you don't go with us. Have you ever tried your little chestnut at a ditch ? You wouldn't be afraid, eh?" "Not the least in the world," said Gwendolen. And this was true ; she was never fearful in action and companionship. "I have often taken him at some rails and a ditch too, near " Ah, by Jove ! " said his lordship, quietly, in notation that something was happening which must break off the dialogue ; and as he reined off his horse, Hex was bringing his sober hackney up to Gwen- dolen's side when the hounds gave tongue, and the whole field was in motion as if the whirl of the earth were carrying it : Gwendolen along with every- thing else ; no word of notice to Rex, who without a second thought followed too. Could he let Gwen- dolen go alone ? Under other circumstances he would have enjoyed the run, but he was just now perturbed by the check which had been put on the impetus to utter his love, and get utterance in return, an im- petus which could not at once resolve itself into a totally different sort of chase, at least with the con- sciousness of being on his father's gray nag, a good horse enough in his way, but of sober years and ecclesiastical habits. Gwendolen on her spirited little chestnut was up with the best, and felt as secure as an immortal goddess, having, if she had thought of risk, a core of confidence that no ill luck THE SPOILED CHILD. 93 would happen to her. But she thought of no such thing, and certainly not of any risk there might be for her cousin. If she had thought of him, it would have struck her as a droll picture that he should be gradually falling behind, and looking round in search of gates : a fine lithe youth, whose heart must be panting with all the spirit of a beagle, stuck as if under a wizard's spell on a stiff clerical hackney, would have made her laugh with a sense of fun much too strong for her to reflect on his mortifica- tion. But Gwendolen was apt to think rather of those who saw her than of those whom she could not see ; and Rex was soon so far behind that if she had looked she would not have seen him. For I grieve to say that in the search for a gate, along a lane lately mended, Primrose fell, broke his knees, and undesignedly threw Rex over his head. Fortunately a blacksmith's son who also followed the hounds under disadvantages, namely, on foot (a loose way of hunting which had struck some even frivolous minds as immoral), was naturally also in the rear, and happened to be within sight of Rex's misfortune. He ran to give help which was greatly needed, for Rex was a good deal stunned, and the complete recovery of sensation came in the form of pain. Joel Dagge on this occasion showed himself that most useful of personages, whose knowledge is of a kind suited to the immediate occasion : he not only knew perfectly well what was the matter with the horse, how far they were both from the nearest public-house and from Pennicote Rectory, and could certify to Rex that his shoulder was only a bit out of joint, but also offered experienced surgical aid. " Lord, sir, let me shove it in again for you ! I 's see Nash the bone-setter do it, and done it myself 94 DANIEL DERONDA. for our little Sally twice over. It 's all one and the same, shoulders is. If you '11 trusten to me and tighten your mind up a bit, I '11 do it for you in no time." "Come then, old fellow," said Rex, who could tighten his mind better than his seat in the saddle. And Joel managed the operation, though not with- out considerable expense of pain to his patient, who turned so pitiably pale while tightening his mind, that Joel remarked : " Ah, sir, you are n't used to it, that 's how it is. I 's see lots and lots o' joints out. I see a man with his eye pushed out once, that was a rum go as ever I see. You can't have a bit o' fun wi'out such a sort o' things. But it went in again. I's swallowed three teeth mysen, as sure as I'm alive. Now, sirrey " (this was addressed to Primrose), " come alonk, you must n't make believe as you can't" Joel being clearly a low character, it is happily not necessary to say more of him to the refined reader than that he helped Eex to get home with as little delay as possible. There was no alternative but to get home, though all the while he was in anxiety about Gwendolen, and more miserable in the thought that she too might have had an accident, than in the pain of his own bruises and the annoyance he was about to cause his father. He comforted himself about her by reflecting that every one would be anxious to take care of her, and that some ac- quaintance would be sure to conduct her home. Mr. Gascoigne was already at home, and was writing letters in his study, when he was interrupted by seeing poor Rex come in with a face which was not the less handsome and ingratiating for being pale and a little distressed. He was secretly the favourite THE SPOILED CHILD. 95 son, and a young portrait of the father ; who, how- ever, never treated him with any partiality, rather, with an extra rigour. Mr. Gascoigne, having inquired of Anna, knew that Rex had gone with Gwendolen to the meet at the Three Barns. " What 's the matter ? " he said hastily, not laying down his pen. "I'm very sorry, sir; Primrose has fallen down and broken his knees." " Where have you been with him ? " said Mr. Gascoigne, with a touch of severity. He rarely gave way to temper. " To the Three Barns to see the hounds throw off." " And you were fool enough to follow ? " "Yes, sir. I didn't go at any fences, but the horse got his leg into a hole." " And you got hurt yourself, I hope, eh ? " " I got my shoulder put out, but a young black- smith put it in again for me. I 'm just a little battered, that 's all." " Well, sit down." " I 'm very sorry about the horse, sir. I knew it would be a vexation to you." " And what has become of Gwendolen ? " said Mr. Gascoigne, abruptly. Rex, who did not imagine that his father had made any inquiries about him, answered at first with a blush which was the more remarkable for his previous paleness. Then he said nervously, " I am anxious to know I should like to go or send at once to Offendene but she rides so well, and I think she would keep up there would most likely be many round her." " I suppose it was she who led you on, eh ? " said Mr. Gascoigne, laying down his pen, leaning back 96 DANIEL DERONDA. in his chair, and looking at Rex with more marked examination. "It was natural for her to want to go ; she didn't intend it beforehand, she was led away by the spirit of the thing. And of course I went when she went." Mr. Gascoigne left a brief interval of silence, and then said with quiet irony : " But now you observe, young gentleman, that you are not furnished with a horse which will enable you to play the squire to your cousin. You must give up that amusement. You have spoiled my nag for me, and that is enough mischief for one vacation. I shall beg you to get ready to start for Southampton to-morrow and join Stilfox, till you go up to Oxford with him. That will be good for your bruises as well as your studies." Poor Rex felt his heart swelling and comporting itself as if it had been no better than a girl's. " I hope you will not insist on my going imme- diately, sir." " Do you feel too ill ? " " No, not that but Here Rex bit his lips and felt the tears starting, to his great vexation ; then he rallied and tried to say more firmly, " I want to go to Offendene but I can go this evening." "I am going there myself. I can bring word about Gwendolen, if that is what you want." Rex broke down. He thought he discerned an intention fatal to his happiness, nay, his life. He was accustomed to believe in his father's pene- tration, and to expect firmness. "Father, I can't go away without telling her that I love her, and knowing that she loves me." THE SPOILED CHILD. 97 Mr. Gascoigne was inwardly going through some self-rebuke for not being more wary, and was now really sorry for the lad; but every consideration was subordinate to that of using the wisest tactics in the case. He had quickly made up his mind, and could answer the more quietly, " My dear boy, you are too young to be taking momentous, decisive steps of that sort. This is a fancy which you have got into your head during an idle week or two : you must set to work at some- thing and dismiss it. There is every reason against it. An engagement at your age would be totally rash and unjustifiable ; and moreover, alliances between first cousins are undesirable. Make up your mind to a brief disappointment. Life is full of them. We have all got to be broken in ; and this is a mild beginning for you." " No, not mild. I can't bear it. I shall be good for nothing. I should n't mind anything, if it were settled between us. I could do anything then," said Eex, impetuously. " But it 's of no use to pre- tend that I will obey you. I can't do it. If I said I would, I should be sure to break my word. I should see Gwendolen again." " Well, wait till to-morrow morning, that we may talk of the matter again, you will promise me that," said Mr. Gascoigne, quietly ; and Rex did not, could not refuse. The Rector did not even tell his wife that he had any other reason for going to Offendene that even- ing than his desire to ascertain that Gwendolen had got home safely. He found her more than safe, elated. Mr. Quallon, who had won the brush, had delivered the trophy to her, and she had brought it before her, fastened on the saddle ; more than that, VOL. I. 7 98 DANIEL DERONDA. Lord Brackenshaw had conducted her home, and had shown himself delighted with her spirited rid- ing. All this was told at once to her uncle, that he might see how well justified she had been in acting against his advice ; and the prudential Rector did feel himself in a slight difficulty, for at that moment he was particularly sensible that it was his niece's serious interest to be well regarded by the Bracken- shaws, and their opinion as to her following the hounds really touched the essence of his objection. However, he was not obliged to say anything immediately, for Mrs. Davilow followed up Gwen- dolen's brief triumphant phrases with, " Still, I do hope you will not do it again, Gwen- dolen. I should never have a moment's quiet. Her father died by an accident, you know." Here Mrs. Davilow had turned away from Gwen- dolen, and looked at Mr. Gascoigne. " Mamma dear," said Gwendolen, kissing her mer- rily, and passing over the question of the fears which Mrs. Davilow had meant to account for, " children don't take after their parents in broken legs." Not one word had yet been said about Rex. In fact, there had been no anxiety about him at Offendene. Gwendolen had observed to her mamma, " Oh, he must have been left far behind, and gone home in despair," and it could not be denied that this was fortunate so far as it made way for Lord Brackenshaw's bringing her home. But now Mr. Gascoigne said, with some emphasis, looking at Gwendolen, " Well, the exploit has ended better for you than for Rex." "Yes, I dare say he had to make a terrible THE SPOILED CHILD. 99 round. You have not taught Primrose to take the fences, uncle," said Gwendolen, without the faintest shade of alarm in her looks and tone. " Rex has had a fall," said Mr. Gascoigne, curtly, throwing himself into an arm-chair, resting his elbows and fitting his palms and fingers together, while he closed his lips and looked at Gwendolen, who said, " Oh, poor fellow ! he is not hurt, I hope ? " with a correct look of anxiety such as elated mortals try to superinduce when their pulses are all the while quick with triumph ; and Mrs. Davilow, in the same moment, uttered a low " Good heavens ! There ! " Mr. Gascoigne went on : " He put his shoulder out, and got some bruises, I believe." Here he made another little pause of observation; but Gwendolen, instead of any such symptoms as pallor and silence, had only deepened the compassionate- ness of her brow and eyes, and said again, " Oh, poor fellow ! it is nothing serious, then ? " and Mr. Gascoigne held his diagnosis complete. But he wished to make assurance doubly sure, and went on still with a purpose. " He got his arm set again rather oddly. Some blacksmith not a parishioner of mine was on the field, a loose fish, I suppose, but handy, and set the arm for him immediately. So after all, I believe, I and Primrose come off worst. The horse's knees are cut to pieces. He came down in a hole, it seems, and pitched Rex over his head." Gwendolen's face had allowably become contented again, since Rex's arm had been reset ; and now, at the descriptive suggestions in the latter part of her uncle's speech, her elated spirits made her features ioo DANIEL DERONDA. less manageable than usual ; the smiles broke forth, and finally a descending scale of laughter. " You are a pretty young lady to laugh at other people's calamities," said Mr. Gascoigne, with a milder sense of disapprobation than if he had not had counteracting reasons to be glad that Gwendo- len showed no deep feeling on the occasion. " Pray forgive me, uncle. Now Rex is safe, it is so droll to fancy the figure he and Primrose would cut in a lane all by themselves only a black- smith running up. It would make a capital cari- cature of ' Following the hounds.' " Gwendolen rather valued herself on her superior freedom in laughing where others might only see matter for seriousness. Indeed, the laughter became her person so well that her opinion of its graceful- ness was often shared by others ; and it even entered into her uncle's course of thought at this moment, that it was no wonder a boy should be fascinated by this young witch, who, however, was more mischievous than could be desired. " How can you laugh at broken bones, child ? " said Mrs. Davilow, still under her dominant anxiety. " I wish we had never allowed you to have the horse. You will see that we were wrong," she added, look- ing with a grave nod at Mr. Gascoigne, " at least I was, to encourage her in asking for it." " Yes, seriously, Gwendolen," said Mr. Gascoigne, in a judicious tone of rational advice to a person understood to be altogether rational, " I strongly recommend you I shall ask you to oblige me so far not to repeat your adventure of to-day. Lord Brackenshaw is very kind, but I feel sure that he would concur with me in what I say. To be spoken of as ' the young lady who hunts ' by way of excep- THE SPOILED CHILD. 101 tion, would give a tone to the language about you which I am sure you would not like. Depend upon it, his lordship would not choose that Lady Beatrice or Lady Maria should hunt in this part of the country, if they were old enough to do so. When you are married, it will be different : you may do whatever your husband sanctions. But if you intend to hunt, you must marry a man who can keep horses." " I don't know why I should do anything so hor- rible as to marry without that prospect, at least," said Gwendolen, pettishly. Her uncle's speech had given her annoyance, which she could not show more directly ; but she felt that she was committing her- self, and after moving carelessly to another part of the room, went out. " She always speaks in that way about marriage," said Mrs. Davilow ; " but it will be different when she has seen the right person." " Her heart has never been in the least touched, that you know of ? " said Mr. Gascoigne. Mrs. Davilow shook her head silently. " It was only last night she said to me, ' Mamma, I wonder how girls manage to fall in love. It is easy to make them do it in books. But men are too ridiculous.' " Mr. Gascoigne laughed a little, and made no further remark on the subject. The next morning at breakfast he said, " How are your bruises, Rex ? " " Oh, not very mellow yet, sir ; only beginning to turn a little." "You don't feel quite ready for a journey to Southampton ? " " Not quite," answered Rex, with his heart meta- phorically in his mouth. 102 DANIEL DERONDA. " Well, you can wait till to-morrow, and go to say good-by to them at Offendene." Mrs. Gascoigne, who now knew the whole affair, looked steadily at her coffee lest she also should begin to cry, as Anna was doing already. Mr. Gascoigne felt that he was applying a sharp remedy to poor Rex's acute attack, but he believed it to be in the end the kindest. To let him know the hopelessness of his love from Gwendolen's own lips might be curative in more ways than one. "I can only be thankful that she doesn't care about him," said Mrs. Gascoigne, when she joined her husband in his study. " There are things in Gwendolen I cannot reconcile myself to. My Anna is worth two of her, with all her beauty and talent. It looks so very ill in her that she will not help in the schools with Anna, not even in the Sunday-school. What you or I advise is of no consequence to her ; and poor Fanny is completely under her thumb. But I know you think better of her," Mrs. Gascoigne ended with a deferential hesitation. " Oh, my dear, there is no harm in the girl. It is only that she has a high spirit, and it will not do to hold the reins too tight. The point is, to get her well married. She has a little too much fire in her for her present life with her mother and sisters. It is natural and right that she should be married soon, not to a poor man, but one who can give her a fitting position." Presently Rex, with his arm in a sling, was on his two miles' walk to Offendene. He was rather puzzled by . the unconditional permission to see Gwendolen, but his father's real ground of action could not enter into his conjectures. If it had, he THE SPOILED CHILD. 103 would first have thought it horribly cold-blooded, and then have disbelieved in his father's conclusions. When he got to the house, everybody was there but Gwendolen. The four girls, hearing him speak in the hall, rushed out of the library, which was their schoolroom, and hung round him with compassion- ate inquiries about his arm. Mrs. Davilow wanted to know exactly what had happened, and where the blacksmith lived, that she might make him a pre- sent; while Miss Merry, who took a subdued and melancholy part in all family affairs, doubted whether it would not be giving too much encouragement to that kind of character. Eex had never found the family troublesome before, but just now he wished them all away and Gwendolen there, and he was too uneasy for good-natured feigning. When at last he had said, " Where is Gwendolen ? " and Mrs. Davilow had told Alice to go and see if her sister were come down, adding, " I sent up her break- fast this morning ; she needed a long rest," Eex took the shortest way out of his endurance by say- ing, almost impatiently, " Aunt, I want to speak to Gwendolen, I want to see her alone." "Very well, dear; go into the drawing-room. I will send her there," said Mrs. Davilow, who had observed that he was fond of being with Gwendolen, as was natural, but had not thought of this as hav- ing any bearing on the realities of life : it seemed merely part of the Christmas holidays which were spinning themselves out. Eex for his part felt that the realities of life were all hanging on this interview. He had to walk up and down the drawing-room in expectation for nearly ten minutes, ample space for all imaginative fluc- tuations ; yet, strange to say, he was unvaryingly 104 DANIEL DERONDA. occupied in thinking what and how much he could do, when Gwendolen had accepted him, to satisfy his father that the engagement was the most pru- dent thing in the world, since it inspired him with double energy for work. He was to be a lawyer, and what reason was there why he should not rise as high as Eldon did ? He was forced to look at life in the light of his father's mind. But when the door opened and she whose pre- sence he was longing for entered, there came over him suddenly and mysteriously a state of tremor and distrust which he had never felt before. Miss Gwendolen, simple as she stood there, in her black silk, cut square about the round white pillar of her throat, a black band fastening her hair which streamed backwards in smooth silky abundance, seemed more queenly than usual. Perhaps it was that there was none of the latent fun and tricksi- ness which had always pierced in her greeting of Rex. How much of this was due to her presenti- ment from what he had said yesterday that he was going to talk of love ? How much from her desire to show regret about his accident ? Something of both. But the wisdom of ages has hinted that there is a side of the bed which has a malign influence if you happen to get out on it ; and this accident befalls some charming persons rather frequently. Perhaps it had befallen Gwendolen this morning. The hast- ening of her toilet, the way in which Bugle used the brush, the quality of the shilling serial mis- takenly written for her amusement, the probabilities of the coming day, and, in short, social institutions generally, were all objectionable to her. It was not that she was out of temper, but that the world was not equal to the demands of her fine organism. THE SPOILED CHILD. 105 However it might be, Eex saw an awful majesty about her as she entered and put out her hand to him, without the least approach to a smile in eyes or mouth. The fun which had moved her in the evening had quite evaporated from the image of his accident, and the whole affair seemed stupid to her. But she said with perfect propriety, " I hope you are not much hurt, Rex ; I deserve that you should re- proach me for your accident." " Not at all," said Eex, feeling the soul within him spreading itself like an attack of illness. "There is hardly anything the matter with me. I am so glad you had the pleasure : I would willingly pay for it by a tumble, only I was sorry to break the horse's knees." Gwendolen walked to the hearth, and stood look- ing at the fire in the most inconvenient way for con- versation, so that he could only get a side view of her face. " My father wants me to go to Southampton for the rest of the vacation," said Rex, his barytone trembling a little. " Southampton ! That 's a stupid place to go to, is n't it ? " said Gwendolen, chilly. " It would be to me, because you would not be there." Silence. " Should you mind about my going away, Gwendolen ? " " Of course. Every one is of consequence in this dreary country," said Gwendolen, curtly. The per- ception that poor Rex wanted to be tender made her curl up and harden like a sea-anemone at the touch of a finger. " Are you angry with me, Gwendolen ? Why do io6 DANIEL DERONDA. you treat me in this way all at once ? " said Rex, flushing, and with more spirit in his voice, as if he too were capable of being angry. Gwendolen looked round at him and smiled. " Treat you ? Nonsense I I am only rather cross. Why did you come so very early ? You must ex- pect to find tempers in dishabille." " Be as cross with me as you like, only don't treat me with indifference," said Rex, imploringly. " All the happiness of my life depends on your lov- ing me if only a little better than any one else." He tried to take her hand, but she hastily eluded his grasp, and moved to the other end of the hearth, facing him, " Pray don't make love to me ! I hate it." She looked at him fiercely. Rex turned pale and was silent, but could not take his eyes off her, and the impetus was not yet exhausted that made hers dart death at him. Gwen- dolen herself could not have foreseen that she should feel in this way. It was all a sudden, new experi- ence to her. The day before she had been quite aware that her cousin was in love with her, she did not mind how much, so that he said nothing about it; and if any one had asked her why she objected to love-making speeches, she would have said laughingly, " Oh, I am tired of them all in the books." But now the life of passion had begun negatively in her. She felt passionately averse to this volunteered love. To Rex at twenty the joy of life seemed at an end more absolutely than it can do to a man at forty. But before they had ceased to look at each other, he did speak again. THE SPOILED CHILD. 107 "Is that the last word you have to say to me, Gwendolen ? Will it always be so ? " She could not help seeing his wretchedness and feeling a little regret for the old Rex who had not offended her. Decisively, but yet with some return of kindliness, she said, " About making love ? Yes. But I don't dislike you for anything else/' There was just a perceptible pause before he said a low " good-by," and passed out of the room. Almost immediately after, she heard the heavy hall-door bang behind him. Mrs. Davilow, too, had heard Rex's hasty depar- ture, and presently came into the drawing-room, where she found Gwendolen seated on the low couch, her face buried, and her hair falling over her figure like a garment. She was sobbing bitterly. " My child, my child, what is it ? " cried the mother, who had never before seen her darling struck down in this way, and felt something of the alarmed anguish that women feel at the sight of overpower- ing sorrow in a strong man ; for this child had been her ruler. Sitting down by her with circling arms, she pressed her cheek against Gwendolen's head, and then tried to draw it upward. Gwendolen gave way, and letting her head rest against her mother, cried out sobbingly, " Oh, mamma, what can become of my life ? there is nothing worth living for ! " " Why, dear ? " said Mrs Davilow. Usually she herself had been rebuked by her daughter for involuntary signs of despair. "I shall never love anybody. I can't love people. I hate them." " The time will come, dear, the time will come," Gwendolen was more and more convulsed with io8 DANIEL DERONDA. sobbing ; but, putting her arms round her mother's neck with an almost painful clinging, she said brokenly, " I can't bear any one to be very near me but you." Then the mother began to sob, for this spoiled child had never shown such dependence on her before; and so they clung to each other. CHAPTER VIII. " What name doth Joy most borrow When life is fair? 'To-morrow.' " What name doth best fit Sorrow In young despair? 'To-morrow.' " THERE was a much more lasting trouble at the Rec- tory. Rex arrived there only to throw himself on his bed in a state of apparent apathy, unbroken till the next day, when it began to be interrupted by more positive signs of illness. Nothing could be said about his going to Southampton : instead of that the chief thought of his mother and Anna was how to tend this patient who did not want to be well, and from being the brightest, most grateful spirit in the household, was metamorphosed into an irresponsive, dull-eyed creature who met all affectionate attempts with a murmur of "Let me alone." His father looked beyond the crisis, and believed it to be the shortest way out of an unlucky affair ; but he was sorry for the inevitable suffering, and went now and then to sit by him in silence for a few minutes, parting with a gentle pressure of his hand on Rex's blank brow, and a " God bless you, my boy." Warham and the younger children used to peep round the edge of the door to see this incredible thing of their lively brother being laid low ; but fingers were immediately shaken at them to drive them back. The guardian who was always there was Anna, and her little hand was allowed to no DANIEL DERONDA. rest within her brother's, though he never gave it a welcoming pressure. Her soul was divided between anguish for Rex and reproach of Gwendolen. " Perhaps it is wicked of me, but I think I never can love her again," came as the recurrent burthen of poor little Anna's inward monody. And even Mrs. Gascoigne had an angry feeling towards her niece which she could not refrain from expressing (apologetically) to her husband. " I know of course it is better, and we ought to be thankful that she is not in love with the poor boy ; but, really, Henry, I think she is hard : she has the heart of a coquette. I cannot help think- ing that she must have made him believe something, or the disappointment would not haye taken hold of him in that way. And some blame attaches to poor Fanny ; she is quite blind about that girl. " Mr. Gascoigne answered imperatively : " The less said on that point the better, Nancy. I ought to have been more awake myself. As to the boy, be thankful if nothing worse ever happens to him. Let the thing die out as quickly as possible ; and especially with regard to Gwendolen, let it be as if it had never been." The Rector's dominant feeling was that there had been a great escape. Gwendolen in love with Rex in return would have made a much harder problem, the solution of which might have been taken out of his hands. But he had to go through some further difficulty. One fine morning Rex asked for his bath, and made his toilet as usual. Anna, full of excitement at this change, could do nothing but listen for his coming down, and at last hearing his step, ran to the foot of the stairs to meet him. For the first THE SPOILED CHILD. in time he gave her a faint smile, but it looked so melancholy on his pale face that she could hardly help crying. " Nannie ! " he said gently, taking her hand and leading her slowly along with him to the drawing- room. His mother was there ; and when she came to kiss him, he said, " What a plague I am ! " Then he sat still and looked out of the bow- window on the lawn and shrubs covered with hoar- frost, across which the sun was sending faint occasional gleams, something like that sad smile on Eex's face, Anna thought. He felt as if he had had a resurrection into a new world, and did not know what to do with himself there, the old interests being left behind. Anna sat near him, pretending to work, but really watching him with yearning looks. Beyond the garden hedge there was a road where wagons and carts sometimes went on field-work : a railed opening was made in the hedge, because the upland with its bordering wood and clump of ash-trees against the sky was a pretty sight. Presently there came along a wagon laden with timber ; the horses were straining their grand muscles, and the driver, having cracked his whip, ran along anxiously to guide the leader's head, fearing a swerve. Rex seemed to be shaken into attention, rose and looked till the last quivering trunk of the timber had disappeared, and then walked once or twice along the room. Mrs. Gasr coigne was no longer there, and when he came to sit down again, Anna, seeing a return of speech in her brother's eyes, could not resist the impulse to bring a little stool and seat herself against his knee, looking up at him with an expression which seemed to say, " Do speak to me." And he spoke. ii2 DANIEL DERONDA. " I '11 tell you what I 'm thinking of. Nannie. I will go to Canada, or somewhere of that sort." (Rex had not studied the character of our colonial possessions.) " Oh, Rex, not for always ! " " Yes, to get my bread there. I should like to build a hut, and work hard at clearing, and have everything wild about me, and a great wide quiet." "And not take me with you?" said Anna, the big tears coming fast. " How could I ? " " I should like it better than anything ; and settlers go with their families. I would sooner go there than stay here in England. I could make the fires, and mend the clothes, and cook the food ; and I could learn how to make the bread before we went. It would be nicer than anything like playing at life over again, as we used to do when we made our tent with the drugget, and had our little plates and dishes." " Father and mother would not let you go." " Yes, I think they would, when I explained every- thing. It would save money ; and papa would have more to bring up the boys with." There was further talk of the same practical kind at intervals, and it ended in Rex's being obliged to consent that Anna should go with him when he spoke to his father on the subject. Of course it was when the Rector was alone in his study. Their mother would become reconciled to whatever he decided on ; but mentioned to her first, the question would have distressed her. " Well, my children ! " said Mr. Gascoigne, cheer- fully, as they entered. It was a comfort to see Rex about again. THE SPOILED CHILD. 113 " May we sit down with you a little, papa ? * said Anna. " Eex has something to say." " With all my heart." It was a noticeable group that these three crea- tures made, each of them with a face of the same structural type, the straight brow, the nose sud- denly straightened from an intention of being aquiline, the short upper, lip, the short but strong and well-hung chin : there was even the same tone of complexion and set of the eye. The gray-haired father was at once massive and keen-looking ; there was a perpendicular line in his brow which when he spoke with any force of interest deepened; and the habit of ruling gave him an air of reserved authoritativeness. Kex would have seemed a vision of the father's youth, if it had been possible to imagine Mr. Gascoigne without distinct plans and without command, smitten with a heart sorrow, and having no more notion of concealment than a sick animal; and Anna was a tiny copy of Eex, with hair drawn back and knotted, her face following his in its changes of expression, as if they had one soul between them. " You know all about what has upset me, father," Eex began ; and Mr. Gascoigne nodded. " I am quite done up for life in this part of the world. I am sure it will be no use my going back to Oxford. I could n't do any reading. I should fail, and cause you expense for nothing. I want to have your consent to take another course, sir." Mr. Gascoigne nodded more slowly, the perpen- dicular line on his brow deepened, and Anna's trembling increased. " If you would allow me a small outfit, I should like to go to the colonies and work on the. land VOL. I. 8 114 DANIEL DERONDA. there." Rex thought the vagueness of the phrase prudential ; " the colonies " necessarily embracing more advantages, and being less capable of being rebutted on a single ground than any particular settlement " Oh, and with me, papa," said Anna, not bearing to be left out from the proposal even temporarily. " Rex would want some one to take care of him, you know, some one to keep house. And we shall never, either of us, be married. And I should cost nothing, and I should be so happy. I know it would be hard to leave you and mamma ; but there are all the others to bring up, and we two should be no trouble to you any more." Anna had risen from her seat, and used the femi- nine argument of going closer to her papa as she spoke. He did not smile, but he drew her on his knee and held her there, as if to put her gently out of the question while he spoke to Rex. "You will admit that my experience gives me some power of judging for you, and that I can prob- ably guide you in practical matters better than you can guide yourself ? " Rex was obliged to say, " Yes, sir." "And perhaps you will admit though I don't wish to press that point that you are bound in duty to consider my judgment and wishes?" " I have never yet placed myself in opposition to you, sir." Rex in his secret soul could not feel that he was bound not to go to the colonies, but to go to Oxford again, which was the point in question. " But you will do so if you persist in setting your mind towards a rash and foolish procedure, and deafening yourself to considerations which my expe- rience of life assures me of. You think, I suppose, THE SPOILED CHILD. 115 that you have had a shock which has changed all your inclinations, stupefied your brains, unfitted you for anything but manual labour, and given you a dislike to society ? Is that what you believe ? " " Something like that, I shall never be up to the sort of work I must do to live in this part of the world. I have not the spirit for it. I shall never be the same again. And without any disrespect to you, father, I think a young fellow should be allowed to choose his way of life, if he does nobody any harm. There are plenty to stay at home, and those who like might be allowed to go where there are empty places." " But suppose I am convinced on good evidence as I am that this state of mind of yours is tran- sient, and that if you went off as you propose, you would by and by repent, and feel that you had let yourself slip back from the point you have been gaining by your education till now ? Have you not strength of mind enough to see that you had better act on my assurance for a time, and test it ? In my opinion, so far from agreeing with you that you should be free to turn yourself into a colonist and work in your shirt-sleeves with spade and hatchet in my opinion you have no right whatever to expatriate yourself until you have honestly endeav- oured to turn to account the education you have received here. I say nothing of the grief to your mother and me." "I'm very sorry; but what can I do? I can't study, that 's certain," said Hex. " Not just now, perhaps. You will have to miss a term. I have made arrangements for you, how you are to spend the next two months. But I con- fess I am disappointed in you, Eex. I thought you n6 DANIEL DERONDA. had more sense than to take up such ideas ; to suppose that because you have fallen into a very common trouble, such as most men have to go through, you are loosened from all bonds of duty, just as if your brain had softened and you were no longer a responsible being." What could Hex say ? Inwardly he was in a state of rebellion, but he had no arguments to meet his father's ; and while he was feeling, in spite of anything that might be said, that he should like to go off to " the colonies " to-morrow, it lay in a deep fold of his consciousness that he ought to feel if he had been a better fellow he would have felt more about his old ties. This is the sort of faith we live by in our soul-sicknesses. Eex got up from his seat, as if he held the con- ference to be at an end. " You assent to my arrangement, then ? " said Mr. Gascoigne, with that distinct resolution of tone which seems to hold one in a vice. There was a little pause before Rex answered, " I '11 try what I can do, sir. I can't promise." His thought was that trying would be of no use. Her father kept Anna, holding her fast, though she wanted to follow Rex. " Oh, papa," she said, the tears coming with her words when the door had closed; "it is very hard for him. Does n't he look ill?" " Yes, but he will soon be better ; it will all blow over. And now, Anna, be as quiet as a mouse about it all. Never let it be mentioned when he is gone." " No, papa. But I would not be like Gwendolen for anything, to have people fall in love with me so. It is very dreadful." Anna dared not say that she was disappointed at THE SPOILED CHILD. 117 not being allowed to go to the colonies with Eex ; but that was her secret feeling, and she often after- wards went inwardly over the whole affair, saying to herself, " I should have done with going out, and gloves, and crinoline, and having to talk when I am taken to dinner and all that ! " I like to mark the time, and connect the course of individual lives with the historic stream, for all classes of thinkers. This was the period when the broadening of gauge in crinolines seemed to demand an agitation for the general enlargement of churches, ball-rooms, and vehicles. But Anna Gascoigne's figure would only allow the size of skirt manufactured for young ladies of fourteen. CHAPTER IX. -I'll tell thee, Berthold, what men's hopes are liket A silly child that, quiveriug with joy, Would cast its little mimic fishing-line Baited with loadstone for a bowl of toys jn the salt oceaa " EIGHT months after the arrival of the family at Ofi'endene, that is to say, in the end of the follow- ing June, a rumour was spread in the neighbourhood which to many persons was matter of exciting interest. It had no reference to the results of the American war, but it was one which touched all classes within a certain circuit round Wanches- ter : the corn-factors, the brewers, the horse-dealers, and saddlers, all held it a laudable thing, and one which was to be rejoiced in on abstract grounds, as showing the value of an aristocracy in a free country like England ; the blacksmith in the hamlet of Diplow felt that a good time had come round ; the wives of labouring men hoped their nimble boys of ten or twelve would be taken into employ by the gentlemen in livery ; and the farmers about Diplow admitted, with a tincture of bitterness and reserve, that a man might now again perhaps have an easier market or exchange for a rick of old hay or a wagon- load of straw. If such were the hopes of low persons not in society, it may be easily inferred that their betters had better reasons for satisfaction, probably connected with the pleasures of life rather than its business. Marriage, however, must be considered as coming under both heads ; and just as when a visit THE SPOILED CHILD. 119 of majesty is announced, the dream of knighthood or a baronetcy is to be found under various muni- cipal nightcaps, so the news in question raised a floating indeterminate vision of marriage in several well-bred imaginations. The news was that Diplow Hall, Sir Hugo Mal- linger's place, which had for a couple of years turned its white window- shutters in a painfully wall-eyed manner on its fine elms and beeches, its lilied pool and grassy acres specked with deer, was being prepared for a tenant, and was for the rest of the summer and through the hunting season to be inhabited in a fitting style both as to house and stable. But not by Sir Hugo himself: by his nephew Mr. Mallinger Grandcourt, who was presump- tive heir to the baronetcy, his uncle's marriage having produced nothing but girls. Nor was this the only contingency with which fortune flattered young Grandcourt, as he was pleasantly called ; for while the chance of the baronetcy came through his father, his mother had given a baronial streak to his blood, so that if certain intervening persons slightly painted in the middle distance died, he would become a baron and peer of this realm. It is the uneven allotment of nature that the male bird alone has the tuft, but we have not yet followed the advice of hasty philosophers who would have us copy nature entirely in these matters ; and if Mr. Mallinger Grandcourt became a baronet or a peer, his wife would share the title, which in addition to his actual fortune was certainly a reason why that wife, being at present unchosen, should be thought of by more than one person with sympathetic interest as a woman sure to be well provided for. 120 DANIEL DERONDA. Some readers of this history will doubtless regard it as incredible that people should construct mat- rimonial prospects on the mere report that a bachelor of good fortune and possibilities was coming within reach, and will reject the statement as a mere outflow of gall : they will aver that neither they nor their first cousins have minds so unbridled; and that in fact this is not human nature, which would know that such speculations might turn out to be fallacious, and would therefore not entertain them. But, let it be observed, nothing is here narrated of human nature generally : the history in its present stage concerns only a few people in a corner of Wessex, whose reputation, however, was uniin- peached, and who, I am in the proud position of being able to state, were all on visiting terms with persons of rank. There were the Arrowpoints, for example, in their beautiful place at Quetcham : no one could attribute sordid views in relation to their daughter's marriage to parents who could leave her at least half a mil- lion; but having affectionate anxieties about their Catherine's position (she having resolutely refused Lord Slogan, an unexceptionable Irish peer, whose estate wanted nothing but drainage and popula- tion), they wondered, perhaps from something more than a charitable impulse, whether Mr. Grandcourt was good-looking, of sound constitution, virtuous or at least reformed, and if liberal-conservative, not too liberal-conservative ; and without wishing anybody to die, thought his succession to the title an event to be desired. If the Arrowpoints had such ruminations, it is the less surprising that they were stimulated in Mr. Gascoigne, who for being a clergyman was THE SPOILED CHILD. 121 not the less subject to the anxieties of a parent and guardian ; and we have seen how both he and Mrs. Gascoigne might by this time have come to feel that he was overcharged with the manage- ment of young creatures who were hardly to be held in with bit or bridle, or any sort of metaphor that would stand for judicious advice. Naturally, people did not tell each other all they felt and thought about young Grandcourt's advent : on no subject is this openness found prudentially practicable, not even on the generation of acids or the destination of the fixed stars ; for either your contemporary with a mind turned towards the same subjects may find your ideas ingenious and forestall you in applying them, or he may have other views on acids and fixed stars, and think ill of you in consequence. Mr. Gascoigne did not ask Mr. Arrowpoint if he had any trustworthy source of information about Grandcourt considered as a husband for a charming girl; nor did Mrs. Arrowpoint observe to Mrs. Davilow that if the possible peer sought a wife in the neighbourhood of Diplow, the only reasonable expectation was that he would offer his hand to Catherine, who, however, would not accept him Unless he were in all respects fitted to secure her happiness. Indeed, even to his wife the Rector was silent as to the contemplation of any matrimonial result, from the probability that Mr. Grandcourt would see Gwendolen at the next Archery Meeting ; though Mrs. Gascoigne's mind was very likely still more active in the same direc- tion. She had said interjectionally to her sister, " It would be a mercy, Fanny, if that girl were well married ! " to which Mrs. Davilow, discerning some criticism of her darling in the fervour of that 122 DANIEL DERONDA. wish, had not chosen to make any audible reply, though she had said inwardly, "You will not get her to marry for your pleasure ; " the mild mother becoming rather saucy when she identified her- self with her daughter. To her husband Mrs. Gascoigne said : " I hear Mr. Graudcourt has two places of his own, but he comes to Diplow for the hunting. It is to be hoped he will set a good example in the neighbour- hood. Have you heard what sort of young man he is, Henry?" Mr. Gascoigne had not heard ; at least, if his male acquaintances had gossiped in his hearing, he was not disposed to repeat their gossip, or give it any emphasis in his own mind. He held it futile, even if it had been becoming, to show any curiosity as to the past of a young man whose birth, wealth, and consequent leisure made many habits venial which under other circumstances would have been inexcusable. Whatever Grandcourt had done, he had not ruined himself ; and it is well known that in gambling, for example, whether of the business or holiday sort, a man who has the strength of mind to leave off when he has only ruined others, is a reformed character. This is an illustration merely : Mr. Gascoigne had not heard that Grandcourt had been a gambler ; and we can hardly pronounce him singular in feeling that a landed proprietor with a mixture of noble blood in his veins was not to be an object of suspicious inquiry like a reformed char- acter who offers himself as your butler or footman. Reformation where a man can afford to do without it, can hardly be other than genuine. Moreover, it was not certain on any showing hitherto that Mr. Grandcourt had needed reformation more than THE SPOILED CHILD. 123 other young men in the ripe youth of five-and- thirty; and, at any rate, the significance of what he had been must be determined by what he actu- ally was. Mrs. Davilow, too, although she would not respond to her sister's pregnant remark, could not be inwardly indifferent to an event that might promise a brilliant lot for Gwendolen. A little speculation on "what may be " comes naturally, without encouragement, comes inevitably in the form of images, when unknown persons are mentioned; and Mr. Grand- court's name raised in Mrs. Davilow's mind first of all the picture of a handsome, accomplished, excel- lent young man whom she would be satisfied with as a husband for her daughter ; but then came the further speculation, would Gwendolen be satisfied with him? There was no knowing what would meet that girl's taste or touch her affections, it might be something else than excellence ; and thus the image of the perfect suitor gave way before a fluctuating combination of qualities that might be imagined to win Gwendolen's heart. In the difficulty of arriving at the particular combination which would insure that result, the mother even said to herself, " It would not signify about her being in love, if she would only accept the right person." For whatever marriage had been for herself, how could she the less desire it for her daughter ? The difference her own misfortunes made was, that she never dared to dwell much to Gwendolen on the desirableness of marriage, dread- ing an answer something like that of the future Madame Roland, when her gentle mother urging the acceptance of a suitor, said, " Tu seras heureuse, ma chere." " Oui, maman, comme toi." 124 DANIEL DERONDA. In relation to the problematic Mr. Grandcourt least of all would Mrs. Davilow have willingly let fall a hint of the aerial castle-building which she had the good taste to be ashamed of; for such a hint was likely enough to give an adverse poise to Gwendolen's own thought, and make her detest the desirable husband beforehand. Since that scene after poor Rex's farewell visit, the mother had felt a new sense of peril in touching the mystery of her child's feeling, and in rashly determining what was her welfare : only she could think of welfare in no other shape than marriage. The discussion of the dress that Gwendolen was to wear at the Archery Meeting was a relevant topic, however ; and when it had been decided that as a touch of colour on her white cashmere, nothing, for her complexion, was comparable to pale green, a feather which she was trying in her hat before the looking-glass having settled the question, Mrs. Davilow felt her ears tingle when Gwendolen, suddenly throwing herself into the attitude of draw- ing her bow, said with a look of comic enjoyment, " How I pity all the other girls at the Archery Meeting, all thinking of Mr. Grandcourt ! And they have not a shadow of a chance." Mrs. Davilow had not presence of mind to answer immediately, and Gwendolen turned quickly round towards her, saying wickedly, " Now you know they have not, mamma. You and my uncle and aunt, you all intend him to fall in love with me." Mrs. Davilow, piqued into a little stratagem, said, " Oh, my dear, that is not so certain. Miss Arrow- point has charms which you have not." " I know ; but they demand thought. My arrow THE SPOILED CHILD. 125 will pierce him before he has time for thought. He will declare himself my slave I shall send him round the world to bring me back the wedding- ring of a happy woman in the mean time all the men who are between him and the title will die of different diseases he will come back Lord Grand- court but without the ring and fall at my feet. I shall laugh at him he will rise in resentment I shall laugh more he will call for his steed and ride to Quetcham, where he will find Miss Arrow- point just married to a needy musician, Mrs. Arrowpoint tearing her cap off, and Mr. Arrowpoint standing by. Exit Lord Grandcourt, who returns to Diplow, and, like M. Jabot, change de linge." Was ever any young witch like this ? You thought of hiding things from her, sat upon your secret and looked innocent, and all the while she knew by the corner of your eye that it was exactly five pounds ten you were sitting on ! As well turn the key to keep out the damp ! It was probable that by dint of divination she already knew more than any one else did of Mr. Grandcourt. That idea in Mrs. Davilow's mind prompted the sort of question which often comes without any other apparent reason than the faculty of speech and the not knowing what to do with it. " Why, what kind of man do you imagine him to be, Gwendolen ? " " Let me see I " said the witch, putting her fore- finger to her lips with a little frown, and then stretching out the finger with decision. " Short just above my shoulder trying to make himself tall by turning up his mustache and keeping his beard long a glass in his right eye to give him an air of distinction a strong opinion about his 126 . DANIEL DERONDA. waistcoat, but uncertain and trimming about the weather, on which he will try to draw me out He will stare at me all the while, and the glass in his eye will cause him to make horrible faces, espe- cially when he smiles in a flattering way. I shall cast down my eyes in consequence, and he will per- ceive that I am not indifferent to his attentions. I shall dream that night that I am looking at the extraordinary face of a magnified insect, and the next morning he will make me an offer of his hand ; the sequel as before." "That is a portrait of some one you have seen already, Gwen. Mr Grandcourt may be a delight- ful young man for what you know." " Oh, yes," said Gwendolen, with a high note of careless admission, taking off her best hat and turn- ing it round on her hand contemplatively. "I wonder what sort of behaviour a delightful young man would have ? " Then, with a merry change of face, " I know he would have hunters and racers, and a London house and two country houses, one with battlements and another with a veranda. And I feel sure that with a little murdering he might get a title." The irony of this speech was of the doubtful sort that has some genuine belief mixed up with it. Poor Mrs Davilow felt uncomfortable under it, her own meanings being usually literal and in intention innocent; and she said, with a distressed brow, " Don't talk in that way, child, for heaven's sake ! You do read such books, they give you such ideas of everything. I declare, when your aunt and I were your age we knew nothing about wickedness I think it was better so." THE SPOILED CHILD. 127 " Why did you not "bring me up in that way, mamma ? " said Gwendolen. But immediately per- ceiving in the crushed look and rising sob that she had given a deep wound, she tossed down her hat and knelt at her mother's feet, crying, " Mamma, mamma I I was only speaking in fun. I meant nothing." " How could I, Gwendolen ? " said poor Mrs. Davilow, unable to hear the retractation, and sob- bing violently while she made the effort to speak, " Your will was always too strong for me if everything else had been different." This disjointed logic was intelligible enough to the daughter. "Dear mamma, I don't find fault with you, I love you," said Gwendolen, really compunctious. " How can you help what I am ? Besides, I am very charming. Come now." Here Gwendolen with her handkerchief gently rubbed away her mother's tears. "Eeally I am contented with myself. I like myself better than I should have liked my aunt and you. How dreadfully dull you must have been ! " Such tender cajolery served to quiet the mother, as it had often done before after like collisions. Not that the collisions had often been repeated at the same point; for in the memory of both they left an association of dread with the particular topics which had occasioned them : Gwendolen dreaded the unpleasant sense of compunction to- wards her mother, which was the nearest approach to self-condemnation and self-distrust that she had known ; and Mrs. Davilow's timid maternal con- science dreaded whatever had brought on the slightest hint of reproach. Hence, after this little scene, the two concurred in excluding Mr. Grand- ;ourt from their conversation. 128 DANIEL DERONDA. When Mr. Gascoigne once or twice referred to him, Mrs. Davilow feared lest Gwendolen should betray some of her alarming keen-sightedness about what was probably in her uncle's mind ; but the fear was not justified. Gwendolen knew certain differences in the characters with which she was concerned as birds know climate and weather; and, for the very reason that she was determined to evade her uncle's control, she was determined not to clash with him. The good understanding be- tween them was much fostered by their enjoyment of archery together : Mr. Gascoigne, as one of the best bowmen in Wessex, was gratified to find the elements of like skill in his niece ; and Gwendolen was the more careful not to lose the shelter of his fatherly indulgence, because since the trouble with Rex both Mrs. Gascoigne and Anna had been unable to hide what she felt to be a very unreasonable alienation from her. Towards Anna she took some pains to behave with a regretful affectionateness ; but neither of them dared to mention Rex's name, and Anna, to whom the thought of him was part of the air she breathed, was ill at ease with the lively cousin who had ruined his happiness. She tried dutifully to repress any sign of her changed feeling ; but who in pain can imitate the glance and hand- touch of pleasure ? This unfair resentment had rather a hardening effect on Gwendolen, and threw her into a more defiant temper. Her uncle too might be offended if she refused the next person who fell in love with her ; and one day when that idea was in her mind she said, "Mamma, I see now why girls are glad to be married, to escape being expected to please every- body but themselves." THE SPOILED CHILD. 129 Happily, Mr. Middleton was gone without having made any avowal ; and notwithstanding the admira- tion for the handsome Miss Harleth, extending per- haps over thirty square miles in a part of Wcssex well studded with families whose members included several disengaged young men, each glad to seat him- self by the lively girl with whom it was so easy to get on in conversation, notwithstanding these grounds for arguing that Gwendolen was likely to have other suitors more explicit than the cautious curate, the fact was not so. Care has been taken not only that the trees should not sweep the stars down, but also that every man who admires a fair girl should not be enamoured of her, and even that every man who is enamoured should not necessarily declare himself. There are various refined shapes in which the price of corn, known to be a potent cause in this relation, might, if inquired into, show why a young lady, perfect in person, accomplishments, and costume, has not the trouble of rejecting many offers ; and nature's order is certainly benignant in not obliging us one and all to be desperately in love with the most admirable mortal we have ever seen. Gwen- dolen, we know, was far from holding that supre- macy in the minds of all observers. Besides, it was but a poor eight months since she had come to Offen- dene, and some inclinations become manifest slowly, like the sunward creeping of plants. In face of this fact that not one of the eligible young men already in the neighbourhood had made Gwendolen an offer, why should Mr. Grandcourt be thought of as likely to do what they had left undone ? Perhaps because he was thought of as still more 130 DANIEL DERONDA. eligible ; since a great deal of what passes for like- lihood in the world is simply the reflex of a wish. Mr. and Mrs. Arrowpoint, for example, having no anxiety that Miss Harleth should make a brilliant marriage, had quite a different likelihood in their minds. CHAPTER X. " 1st Gent. What woman should be? Sir, consult the taste Of marriageable men. This planet's store In iron, cotton, wool, or chemicals All matter rendered to our plastic skill, Is wrought in shapes responsive to demand : The market's pulse makes index high or low, By rule sublime. Our daughters must be wives, And to be wives must be what men will choose : Men's taste is women's test. You mark the phrase ? ' T is good, I think ? the sense well winged and poised With t's and s's. 2d Gent. Nay, but turn it round : Give us the test of taste. A fine menu Is it to-day what Roman epicures Insisted that a gentleman must eat To earn the dignity of dining well 1 " BRACKENSHAW PARK, where the Archery Meet- ing was held, looked out from its gentle heights far over the neighbouring valley to the outlying eastern downs and the broad slow rise of culti- vated country hanging like a vast curtain towards the west. The castle, which stood on the highest platform of the clustered hills, was built of rough- hewn limestone, full of lights and shadows made by the dark dust of lichens and the washings of the rain. Masses of beech and fir sheltered it on the north, and spread down here and there along the green slopes like flocks seeking the water which gleamed below. The archery-ground was a carefully kept enclosure on a bit of table-land at the farthest end of the park, protected towards the southwest by tall elms and a thick screen of hollies, which kept 132 DANIEL DERONDA. the gravel walk and the bit of newly mown turf where the targets were placed in agreeable after- noon shade. The Archery Hall with an arcade in front showed like a white temple against the green- ery on the northern side. What could make a better background for the flower-groups of ladies, moving and bowing and turning their necks as it would become the leis- urely lilies to do if they took to locomotion ? The sounds too were very pleasant to hear, even when the military band from Wanchester ceased to play ; musical laughs in all the registers and a harmony of happy friendly speeches, now rising towards mild excitement, now sinking to an agreeable murmur. No open-air amusement could be much freer from those noisy, crowding conditions which spoil most modern pleasures; no Archery Meeting could be more select, the number of friends accompanying the members being restricted by an award of tickets, so as to keep the maximum within the limits of convenience for the dinner and ball to be held in the castle. Within the enclosure no ple- beian spectators were admitted except Lord Brack- enshaw's tenants and their families ; and of these it was chiefly the feminine members who used the privilege, bringing their little boys and girls or younger brothers and sisters. The males among them relieved the insipidity of the entertainment by imaginative betting, in which the stake was " anything you like," on their favourite archers ; but the young maidens, having a different principle of discrimination, were considering which of those sweetly dressed ladies they would choose to be, if the choice were allowed them. Probably the form these rural souls would most have striven for as a THE SPOILED CHILD. 133 tabernacle was some other than Gwendolen's, one with more pink in her cheeks and hair of the most fashionable yellow ; but among the male judges in the ranks immediately surrounding her there was unusual unanimity in pronouncing her the finest girl present. No wonder she enjoyed her existence on that July day. Pre-eminence is sweet to those who love it, even under mediocre circumstances: per- haps it is not quite mythical that a slave has been proud to be bought first ; and probably a barn-door fowl on sale, though he may not have understood himself to be called the best of a bad lot, may have a self-informed consciousness of his relative impor- tance, and strut consoled. But for complete enjoy- ment the outward and the inward must concur; and that concurrence was happening to Gwendolen. Who can deny that bows and arrows are among the prettiest weapons in the world for feminine forms to play with ? They prompt attitudes full of grace and power, where that fine concentration of energy seen in all marksmanship is freed from asso- ciations of bloodshed. The time-honoured British resource of "killing something" is no longer carried on with bow and quiver; bands defending their passes against an invading nation fight under another sort of shade than a cloud of arrows ; arid poisoned darts are harmless survivals either in rhetoric or in regions comfortably remote. Archery has no ugly smell of brimstone, breaks nobody's shins, breeds no athletic monsters ; its only danger is that of failing, which for generous blood is enough to mould skilful action. And among the Brackenshaw archers the prizes were all of the nobler symbolic kind : not property to be carried off 1 in a parcel, degrading honour into gain ; 134 DANIEL DERONDA. but the gold arrow and the silver, the gold star and the silver, to be worn for a time in sign of achieve- ment and then transferred to the next who did ex- cellently. These signs of pre-eminence had the virtue of wreaths without their inconveniences, which might have produced a melancholy effect in the heat of the ball-room. Altogether the Bracken- shaw Archery Club was an institution framed with good taste, so as not to have by necessity any ridicu- lous incidents. And to-day all incalculable elements were in its favour. There was mild warmth, and no wind to disturb either hair or drapery or the course of the arrow ; all skilful preparation had fair play, and when there was a general march to extract the arrows, the promenade of joyous young creatures in light speech and laughter, the graceful movement in com- mon towards a common object, was a show worth looking at. Here Gwendolen seemed a Calypso among her nymphs. It was in her attitudes and movements that every one was obliged to admit her surpassing charm. " That girl is like a high-mettled racer," said Lord Brackenshaw to young Clintock, one of the invited spectators. " First chop ! tremendously pretty too," said the elegant Grecian, who had been paying her assiduous attention ; " I never saw her look better." Perhaps she had never looked so well. Her face was beaming with young pleasure in which there were no malign rays of discontent ; for being satis- fied with her own chances, she felt kindly towards everybody, and was satisfied with the universe. Not to have the highest distinction in rank, not to be marked out as an heiress, like Miss Arrowpoint, THE SPOILED CHILD. 135 gave an added triumph in eclipsing those advantages. For personal recommendation she would not have cared to change the family group accompanying her for any other : her mamma's appearance would have suited an amiable duchess ; her uncle and aunt Gascoigne with Anna made equally gratifying figures in their way ; and Gwendolen was too full of joyous belief in herself to feel in the least jeal- ous, though Miss Arrowpoint was one of the best archeresses. Even the reappearance of the formidable Herr Klesmer, which caused some surprise in the rest of the company, seemed only to fall in with Gwendo- len's inclination to be amused. Short of Apollo himself, what great musical maestro could make a good figure at an archery meeting ? There was a very satirical light in Gwendolen's eyes as she looked towards the Arrowpoint party on their first entrance, when the contrast between Klesmer and the average group of English country people seemed at its utmost intensity in the close neighbourhood of his hosts or patrons, as Mrs. Arrowpoint would have liked to hear them called, that she might deny the possibility of any longer patronizing genius, its royalty being universally acknowledged. The contrast might have amused a graver personage than Gwendolen. We English are a miscellaneous people, and any chance fifty of us will present many varieties of animal architecture or facial orna- ment ; but it must be admitted that our prevailing expression is not that of a lively, impassioned race, preoccupied with the ideal and carrying the real as a mere make-weight. The strong point of the English gentleman pure is the easy style of his figure and clothing ; he objects to marked ins and 136 DANIEL DERONDA. outs in his costume, and he also objects to looking inspired. Fancy an assemblage where the men had all that ordinary stamp of the well-bred Englishman, watch- ing the entrance of Herr Klesmer, his mane of hair floating backward in massive inconsistency with the chimney-pot hat, which had the look of having been put on for a joke above his pronounced but well-modelled features and powerful clear-shaven mouth and chin ; his tall thin figure clad in a way which, not being strictly English, was all the worse for its apparent emphasis of intention. Draped in a loose garment with a Florentine berretta on his head, he would have been fit to stand by the side of Leonardo da Vinci ; but how when he presented himself in trousers which were not what English feeling demanded about the knees ? and when the fire that showed itself in his glances and the move- ments of his head, as he looked round him with curiosity, was turned into comedy by a hat which ruled that mankind should have well-cropped hair and a staid demeanour, such, for example, as Mr. Arrowpoint's, whose nullity of face and perfect tailoring might pass everywhere without ridicule ? One sees why it is often better for greatness to be dead, and to have got rid of the outward man. Many present knew Klesmer, or knew of him ; but they had only seen him on candle-light occa- sions when he appeared simply as a musician, and he had not yet that supreme, world-wide celebrity which makes an artist great to the most ordinary people by their knowledge of his great expensive- ness. It was literally a new light for them to see him in, presented unexpectedly on this July afternoon in an exclusive society : some were inclined THE SPOILED CHILD. 137 to laugh, others felt a little disgust at the want of judgment shown by the Arrowpoints in this use of an introductory card. "What extreme guys those artistic fellows usually are ! " said young Clintock to Gwendolen. "Do look at the figure he cuts, bowing with his hand on his heart to Lady Brackenshaw and Mrs. Arrowpoint's feather just reaching his shoulder." " You are one of the profane," said Gwendolen. " You are blind to the majesty of genius. Herr Klesmer smites me with awe ; I feel crushed in his presence ; my courage all oozes from me." "Ah, you understand all about his music." " No, indeed," said Gwendolen, with a light laugh ; " it is he who understands all about mine, and thinks it pitiable." Klesmer's verdict on her singing had been an easier joke to her since he had been struck by her plastik. " It is not addressed to the ears of the future, I suppose. I 'm glad of that : it suits mine." " Oh, you are very kind. But how remarkably well Miss Arrowpoint looks to-day ! She would make quite a fine picture in that gold-coloured dress." " Too splendid, don't you think ? " "Well, perhaps a little too symbolical, too much like the figure of Wealth in an allegory." This speech of Gwendolen's had rather a mali- cious sound, but it was not really more than a bubble of fun. She did not wish Miss Arrowpoint or any one else to be out of the way, believing in her own good fortune even more than in her skill. The belief in both naturally grew stronger as the shooting went on, for she promised to achieve one 138 DANIEL DERONDA. of the best scores, a success which astonished every one in a new member; and to Gwendolen's temperament one success determined another. She trod on air, and all things pleasant seemed possible. The hour was enough for her, and she was not obliged to think what she should do next to keep her life at the due pitch. " How does the scoring stand> I wonder ? " said Lady Brackenshaw, a gracious personage who, , adorned with two fair little girls and a boy of stout make, sat as lady paramount. Her lord had come up to her in one of the intervals of shooting. " It seems to me that Miss Harleth is likely to win the gold arrow." " Gad, I think she will, if she carries it on ! she is running Juliet Fenn hard. It is wonderful for one in her first year. Catherine is not up to her usual mark," continued his lordship, turning to the heiress's mother, who sat near. " But she got the gold arrow last time. And there 's a luck even in these games of skill. That 's better. It gives the hinder ones a chance." " Catherine will be very glad for others to win," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, " she is so magnanimous. It was entirely her considerateness that made us bring Herr Klesiner instead of Canon Stopley, who had expressed a wish to come. For her own plea- sure, I am sure she would rather have brought the Canon; but she is always thinking of others. I told her it was not quite en rtylc to bring one so far out of our own set ; but she said, ' Genius itself is not en regie ; it comes into the world to make new rules.' And one must admit that." " Ay, to be sure," said Lord Brackenshaw, in a tone of careless dismissal, adding quickly, "For my THE SPOILED CHILD. 139 part, I am not magnanimous ; I should like to win. But, confound itl I never have the chance now. I 'm getting old and idle. The young ones beat me. As old Nestor says the gods don't give us everything at one time : I was a young fellow once, and now I am getting an old and wise one. Old, at any rate ; which is a gift that comes to everybody if they live long enough, so it raises no jealousy." The Earl smiled comfortably at his wife. " Oh, my lord, people who have been neighbours twenty years must not talk to each other about age," said Mrs. Arrowpoint. " Years, as the Tus- cans say, are made for the letting of houses. But where is our new neighbour ? I thought Mr. Graudcourt was to be here to-day." " Ah, by the way, so he was. The time 's getting on too," said his lordship, looking at his watch*. "But he only got to Diplow the other day. He came to us on Tuesday, and said he had been a lit- tle bothered. He may have been pulled in another direction. Why, Gascoigne 1 " the Rector was just then crossing at a little distance with Gwen- dolen on his arm, and turned in compliance with the call, " this is a little too bad ; you not only beat us yourself, but you bring up your niece to beat all the archeresses." " It is rather scandalous in her to get the better of elder members," said Mr. Gascoigne, with much inward satisfaction curling his short upper lip. " But it is not my doing, my lord. I only meant her to make a tolerable figure, without surpassing any one." " It is not my fault, either," said Gwendolen, with pretty archness. "If I am to aim, I can't help hitting." 140 DANIEL DERONDA. " Ay, ay, that may be a fatal business for some people," said Lord Brackenshaw, good-humouredly ; then taking out his watch and looking at Mrs. Arrowpoint again : "The time's getting on, as you say. But Grandcourt is always late. I notice in town he 's always late, and he 's no bowman, un- derstands nothing about it. But I told him he must come ; he would see the flower of the neigh- bourhood here. He asked about you, had seen Arrowpoint's card. I think you had not made his acquaintance in town. He has been a good deal abroad. People don't know him much." "No; we are strangers," said Mrs. Arrowpoint. " But that is not what might have been expected. For his uncle Sir Hugo Mallinger and I are great friends when we meet." " I don't know ; uncles and nephews are not so likely to be seen together as uncles and nieces," said his lordship, smiling towards the Rector. " But just come with me one instant, Gascoigne, will you ? I want to speak a word about the clout-shooting." Gwendolen chose to go too, and be deposited in the same group with her mamma and aunt until she had to shoot again. That Mr. Grandcourt might after all not appear on the archery-ground, had be- gun to enter into Gwendolen's thought as a possible deduction from the completeness of her pleasure. Under all her saucy satire, provoked chiefly by her divination that her friends thought of him as a desirable match for her, she felt something very far from indifference as to the impression she would make on him. True, he was not to have the slight- est power over her (for Gwendolen had not consid- ered that the desire to conquer is itself a sort of subjection) ; she had made up her mind that he was THE SPOILED CHILD. 141 to be one of those complimentary and assiduously admiring men of whom even her narrow experience had shown her several with various-coloured beards and various styles of bearing ; and the sense that her friends would want her to think him delightful, gave her a resistant inclination to presuppose him ridiculous. But that was no reason why she could spare his presence ; and even a passing prevision of trouble in case she despised and refused him, raised not the shadow of a wish that he should save her that trouble by showing no disposition to make her an offer. Mr. Grandcourt taking hardly any notice of her, and becoming shortly engaged to Miss Arrowpoint, was not a picture which flattered her imagination. Hence Gwendolen had been all ear to Lord Brack- enshaw's mode of accounting for Grandcourt's non-appearance ; and when he did arrive, no con- sciousness not even Mrs. Arrowpoint's or Mr. Gascoigne's was more awake to the fact than hers, although she steadily avoided looking towards any point where he was likely to be. There should be no slightest shifting of angles to betray that it was of any consequence to her whether the much-talked-of Mr. Mallinger Grandcourt presented himself or not. She became again absorbed in the shooting, and so resolutely abstained from looking round observantly that, even supposing him to have taken a conspicu- ous place among the spectators, it might be clear she was not aware of him. And all the while the certainty that he was there made a distinct thread in her consciousness. Perhaps her shooting was the better for it : at any rate, it gained in precision, and she at last raised a delightful storm of clapping and applause by three hits running in the gold, a feat which among the Brackenshaw archers had not the 142 DANIEL DERONDA. vulgar reward of a shilling poll-tax, but that of a special gold star to be worn on the breast. That moment was not only a happy one to herself, it was just what her mamma and her uncle would have chosen for her. There was a general falling into ranks to give her space that she might advance conspicuously to receive the gold star from the hands of Lady Brackenshaw ; and the perfect move- ment of her fine form was certainly a pleasant thing to behold in the clear afternoon light, when the shadows were long and still. She was the central object of that pretty picture, and every one present must gaze at her. That was enough : she herself was determined to see nobody in particular, or to turn her eyes any way except towards Lady Bracken- shaw, but her thoughts undeniably turned in other ways. It entered a little into her pleasure that Herr Klesmer must be observing her at a moment when music was out of the question, and his supe- riority very far in the background ; for vanity is as ill at ease under indifference as tenderness is under a love which it cannot return ; and the unconquered Klesmer threw a trace of his malign power even across her pleasant consciousness that Mr. Grand- court was seeing her to the utmost advantage, and was probably giving her an admiration unmixed with criticism. She did not expect to admire him, but that was not necessary to her peace of mind. Gwendolen met Lady Brackenshaw's gracious smile without blushing (which only came to her when she was taken by surprise), but with a charm- ing gladness of expression, and then bent with easy grace to have the star fixed near her shoulder. That little ceremony had been over long enough for her to have exchanged playful speeches and THE SPOILED CHILD. 143 received congratulations as she moved among the groups who were now interesting themselves in the results of the scoring; but it happened that she stood outside examining the point of an arrow with rather an absent air when Lord Brackenshaw came up to her and said, ' Miss Harleth, here is a gentleman who is not willing to wait any longer for an introduction. He has been getting Mrs. Davilow to send me with him. Will you allow me to introduce Mr. Mallinger Grandcourt ? " BOOK II. MEETING STEEAMS. CHAPTER XL "The beginning of an acquaintance whether with persons 01 things is to get a definite outline for our ignorance." MR. GRANDCOURT'S wish to be introduced had no suddenness for Gwendolen ; but when Lord Bracken- shaw moved aside a little for the prefigured stranger to come forward, and she felt herself face to face with the real man, there was a little shock which flushed her cheeks and vexatiously deepened with her consciousness of it. The shock came from the reversal of her expectations : Grandcourt could hardly have been more unlike all her imaginary portraits of him. He was slightly taller than her- self, and their eyes seemed to be on a level ; there was not the faintest smile on his face as he looked at her, not a trace of self-consciousness or anxiety in his bearing ; when he raised his hat he showed an extensive baldness surrounded with a mere fringe of reddish-blond hair, but he also showed a perfect hand ; the line of feature from brow to chin undis- guised by beard was decidedly handsome, with only moderate departures from the perpendicular, and the slight whisker too was perpendicular. It was not possible for a human aspect to be freer from grimace or solicitous wriggliugs; also it was per- GRANDCOURT AND GWENDOLEN AT THE ARCHERY TOURNAMENT. MEETING STREAMS. 145 haps not possible for a breathing man wide awake to look less animated. The correct Englishman, drawing himself up from his bow into rigidity, as- senting severely, and seeming to be in a state of internal drill, suggests a suppressed vivacity, and may be suspected of letting go with some violence when he is released from parade ; but Gramdcourt's bearing had no rigidity, it inclined rather to be flac- cid. His complexion had a faded fairness resem- bling that of an actress when bare of the artificial white and red ; his long narrow gray eyes expressed nothing but indifference. Attempts at description are stupid : who can all at once describe a human being ? even when he is presented to us we only begin that knowledge of his appearance which must be completed by innumerable impressions under differing circumstances. We recognize the alpha- bet ; we are not sure of the language. I am only mentioning the points that Gwendolen saw by the light of a prepared contrast in the first minutes of her meeting with Grandcourt: they were summed up in the words, " He is not ridiculous." But forth- with Lord Brackenshaw was gone, and what is called conversation had begun, the first and con- stant element in it being that Grandcourt looked at Gwendolen persistently with a slightly exploring gaze, but without change of expression, while she only occasionally looked at him with a flash of ob- servation a little softened by coquetry. Also, after her answers there was a longer or shorter pause before he spoke again. " I used to think archery was a great bore," Grand- court began. He spoke with a fine accent, but with a certain broken drawl, as of a distinguished person- age with a distinguished cold on his chest. VOL. I. 10 146 DANIEL DERONDA. " Are you converted to-day ? " said Gwendolen. (Pause, during which she imagined various degrees and modes of opinion about herself that might be entertained by Grandcourt.) " Yes, since I saw you shooting. In things of this sort one generally sees people missing and simpering." " I suppose you are a first-rate shot with a rifle." (Pause, during which Gwendolen, having taken a rapid observation of Grandcourt, made a brief graphic description of him to an indefinite hearer.) " I have left off shooting." " Oh, then, you are a formidable person. People who have done things once and left them off make one feel very contemptible, as if one were using / cast- off fashions. I hope you have not left off all follies, because I practise a great many." (Pause, during which Gwendolen made several interpretations of her own speech.) " What do you call follies ? " " Well, in general, I think whatever is agreeable is called a folly. But you have not left off hunting, I hear." (Pause, wherein Gwendolen recalled what she had heard about Grandcourt's position, and decided that he was the most aristocratic-looking man she had ever seen.) " One must do something." "And do you care about the turf or is that among the things you have left off?" (Pause, during which Gwendolen thought that a man of extremely calm, cold manners might be less disagreeable as a husband than other men, and not likely to interfere with his wife's preferences.) " I run a horse now and then ; but I don't go in MEETING STREAMS. 147 for the thing as some men do. Are you fond of horses ? " "Yes, indeed: I never like my life so well as when I am on horseback, having a great gallop. I think of nothing. I only feel myself strong and happy." (Pause, wherein Gwendolen wondered whether Grandcourt would like what she said, but assured herself that she was not going to disguise her tastes.) " Do you like danger ? " " I don't know. When I am on horseback I never think of danger. It seems to me that if I broke my bones I should not feel it. I should go at anything that came in my way." (Pause, during which Gwendolen had run through a whole hunting-season with two chosen hunters to ride at will.) " You would, perhaps, like tiger-hunting or pig- sticking. I saw some of that for a season or two in the East. Everything here is poor stuff after that." " You are fond of danger, then ? " (Pause, wherein Gwendolen speculated on the probability that the men of coldest manners were the most adventurous, and felt the strength of her own insight, supposing the question had to be decided.) " One must have something or other. But one gets used to it." " I begin to think I am very fortunate, because everything is new to me: it is only that I can't get enough of it. I am not used to anything except being dull, which I should like to leave off as you have left off shooting." r 4 8 DANIEL DERONDA. (Pause, during which it occurred to Gwendolen that a man of cold and distinguished manners might possibly be a dull companion; but on the other hand, she thought that most persons were dull, that she had not observed husbands to be companions, and that after all she was not going to accept Grandcourt.) " Why are you dull ? w "This is a dreadful neighbourhood. There is nothing to be done in it. That is why I practised my archery." (Pause, during which Gwendolen reflected that the life of an unmarried woman who could not go about and had no command of anything, must necessarily be dull through all the degrees of com- parison as time went on.) " You have made yourself queen of it. I imagine you will carry the first prize." " I don't know that. I have great rivals. Did you not observe how well Miss Arrowpoint shot ? " (Pause, wherein Gwendolen was thinking that men had been known to choose some one else than the woman they most admired, and recalled several experiences of that kind in novels.) " Miss Arrowpoint ? No that is, yes." " Shall we go now and hear what the scoring says ? Every one is going to the other end now ; shall we join them ? I think my uncle is looking towards me. He perhaps wants me." Gwendolen found a relief for herself by thus changing the situation : not that the tete-a-tete was quite disagreeable to her; but while it lasted she apparently could not get rid of the unwonted flush in her cheeks and the sense of surprise which made her feel less mistress of herself than usual. And MEETING STREAMS. 149 this Mr. Grandcourt, who seemed to feel his own importance more than he did hers, a sort of unreasonableness few of us can tolerate, must not take for granted that he was of great moment to her, or that because others speculated on him as a desirable match she held herself altogether at his beck. How Grandcourt had filled up the pauses will be more evident hereafter. " You have just missed the gold arrow, Gwendo- len," said Mr. Gascoigne. " Miss Juliet Fenn scores eight above you." " I am very glad to hear it. I should have felt that I was making myself too disagreeable, taking the best of everything," said Gwendolen, quite easily. It was impossible to be jealous of Juliet Fenn, a girl as middling as midday market in everything but her archery and her plainness, in which last she was noticeably like her father : underhung and with receding brow resembling that of the more intelli- gent fishes. (Surely, considering the importance which is given to such an accident in female off- spring, marriageable men, or what the new English calls " intending bridegrooms," should look at them- selves dispassionately in the glass, since their natural selection of a mate prettier than them- selves is not certain to bar the effect of their own ugliness.) There was now a lively movement in the mingling groups, which carried the talk along with it. Every one spoke to every one else by turns ; and Gwendo- len, who chose to see what was going on around her now, observed that Grandcourt was having Klesmer presented to him by some one unknown to her, a middle-aged man with dark full face and fat ISO DANIEL DERONDA. hands, who seemed to be on the easiest terms with both, and presently led the way in joining the Arrowpoints, whose acquaintance had already been made by both him and Grandcourt. Who this stranger was she did not care much to know ; but she wished to observe what was Graridcourt's man- ner towards others than herself. Precisely the same : except that he did not look much at Miss Arrowpoint, but rather at Klesmer, who was speak- ing with animation, now stretching out his long fingers horizontally, now pointing downwards with his forefinger, now folding his arms and tossing his mane, while he addressed himself first to one and then the other, including Grandcourt, who listened with an impassive face and narrow eyes, his left forefinger in his waistcoat pocket, and his right slightly touching his thin whisker. " I wonder which style Miss Arrowpoint admires most, " was a thought that glanced through Gwen- dolen's mind while her eyes and lips gathered rather a mocking expression. But she would not indulge her sense of amusement by watching as if she were curious, and she gave all her animation to those immediately around her, determined not to care whether Mr. Grandcourt came near her again or not. He did come, however, and at a moment when he could propose to conduct Mrs. Davilow to her carriage. " Shall we meet again in the ballroom ? " she said, as he raised his hat at parting. The " yes " in reply had the usual slight drawl and perfect gravity. " You were wrong for once, Gwendolen, " said Mrs. Davilow, during their few minutes' drive to the castle. MEETING STREAMS. 151 " In what, mamma ? " " About Mr. Grandcourt's appearance and man- ners. You can't find anything ridiculous in him. " " I suppose I could if I tried, but I don't want to do it," said Gwendolen, rather pettishly; and her mamma was afraid to say more. It was the rule on these occasions for the ladies and gentlemen to dine apart, so that the dinner might make a time of comparative ease and rest for both. Indeed the gentlemen had a set of archery stories about the epicurism of the ladies, who had somehow been reported to show a revolting mascu- line judgment in venison, even asking for the fat, a proof of the frightful rate at which corruption might go on in women, but for severe social re- straint. And every year the amiable Lord Bracken- shaw, who was something of a gourmet, mentioned Byron's opinion that a woman should never be seen eating, introducing it with a confidential " The fact is " as if he were for the first time admitting his concurrence in that sentiment of the refined poet. In the ladies' dining-room it was evident that Gwendolen was not a general favourite with her own sex; there were no beginnings of intimacy between her and other girls, and in conversation they rather noticed what she said than spoke to her in free exchange. Perhaps it was that she was not much interested in them, and when left alone in their company had a sense of empty benches. Mrs. Vulcany once remarked that Miss Harleth was too fond of the gentlemen ; but we know that she was not in the least fond of them, she was only fond of their homage, and women did not give her homage. The exception to this willing \ 152 DANIEL DERONDA. aloofness from her was Miss Arrowpoint, who often managed unostentatiously to be by her side, and talked to her with quiet friendliness. " She knows, as I do, that our friends are ready to quarrel over a husband for us, " thought Gwen- dolen, " and she is determined not to enter into the quarrel. " " I think Miss Arrowpoint has the best manners I ever saw," said Mrs. Davilow, when she and Gwendolen were in a dressing-room with Mrs. Gascoigne and Anna, but at a distance where they could have their talk apart. " I wish I were like her, " said Gwendolen. " Why ? Are you getting discontented with yourself, Gwen ? " " No ; but I am discontented with things. She seems contented. " " I am sure you ought to be satisfied to-day. You must have enjoyed the shooting. I saw you did. " " Oh, that is over now, and I don't know what will come next, " said Gwendolen, stretching her- self with a sort of moan and throwing up her arms. They were bare now : it was the fashion to dance in the archery dress, throwing off the jacket ; and the simplicity of her white cashmere with its bor- der of pale green set off her form to the utmost. A thin line of gold round her neck, and the gold star on her breast, were her only ornaments. Her smooth soft hair piled up into a grand crown made a clear line about her brow. Sir Joshua would have been glad to take her portrait ; and he would have had an easier task than the historian at least in this, that he would not have had to represent the truth of change, only to give stability to one beautiful moment. MEETING STREAMS. 153 " The dancing will come next, " said Mrs. Davi- low. " You are sure to enjoy that. " " I shall only dance in the quadrille. I told Mr. Clintock so. I shall not waltz or polk with any one." " Why in the world do you say that all on a sudden ? " " I can't bear having ugly people so near me. " " Whom do you mean by ugly people ? " " Oh, plenty. " " Mr. Clintock, for example, is not ugly. " Mrs. Davilow dared not mention Grandcourt. " Well, I hate woollen cloth touching me. " " Fancy ! " said Mrs. Davilow to her sister, who now came up from the other end of the room. " Gwendolen says she will not waltz or polk. " " She is rather given to whims, I think, " said Mrs. Gascoigne, gravely. " It would be more be- coming in her to behave as other young ladies do on such an occasion as this, especially when she has had the advantage of first-rate dancing-lessons. " "Why should I waltz if I don't like it, aunt? It is not in the Catechism. " " My dear ! " said Mrs. Gascoigne, in a tone of severe check ; and Anna looked frightened at Gwen- dolen's daring. But they all passed on without saying mora Apparently something had changed Gwendolen's mood since the hour of exulting enjoyment in the archery -ground. But she did not look the worse under the chandeliers in the ball-room, where the soft splendour of the scene and the pleasant odours from the conservatory could not but be soothing to the temper, when accompanied with the conscious- ness of being pre-eminently sought for. Hardly a 154 DANIEL DERONDA. dancing man but was anxious to have her for a partner, and each whom she accepted was in a state of melancholy remonstrance that she would not waltz or polk. " Are you under a vow, Miss Harleth ? " " Why are you so cruel to us all ? " " You waltzed with me in February." "And you who waltz so perfectly! " were exclamations not without pi- quancy for her. The ladies who waltzed, naturally thought that Miss Harleth only wanted to make herself particular; but her uncle when he over- heard her refusal supported her by saying, - " Gwendolen has usually good reasons. " He thought she was certainly more distinguished in not waltzing, and he wished her to be distin- guished. The archery-ball was intended to be kept at the subdued pitch that suited all dignities, clerical and secular ; it was not an escapement for youthful high spirits, and he himself was of opin- ion that the fashionable dances were too much of a romp. Among the remonstrant dancing men, however, Mr. Grandcourt was not numbered. After stand- ing up for a quadrille with Miss Arrowpoint, it seemed that he meant to ask for no other partner. Gwendolen observed him frequently with the Arrowpoints, but he never took an opportunity of approaching her. Mr. Gascoigne was sometimes speaking to him ; but Mr. Gascoigne was every- where. It was in her mind now that she would probably after all not have the least trouble about him : perhaps he had looked at her without any particular admiration, and was too much used to everything in the world to think of her as more than one of the girls who were invited in that part MEETING STREAMS. 155 of the country. Of course ! It was ridiculous of elders to entertain notions about what a man would do, without having seen him even through a telescope. Probably he meant to marry Miss Arrowpoint. Whatever might come, she, Gwen- dolen, was not going to be disappointed : the affair was a joke whichever way it turned, for she had never committed herself even by a silent confidence in anything Mr. Grandcourt would do. Still, she noticed that he did sometimes quietly and gradu- ally change his position according to hers, so that he could see her whenever she was dancing, and if he did not admire her so much the worse for him. This movement for the sake of being in sight of her was more direct than usual rather late in the evening, when Gwendolen had accepted Klesmer as a partner ; and that wide-glancing personage, who saw everything and nothing by turns, said to her when they were walking, " Mr. Graudcourt is a man of taste. He likes to see you dancing. * " Perhaps he likes to look at what is against his taste, " said Gwendolen, with a light laugh : she was quite courageous with Klesmer now. " He may be so tired of admiring that he likes disgust for a variety. " " Those words are not suitable to your lips, " said Klesmer, quickly, with one of his grand frowns, while he shook his hand as if to banish the discordant sounds. " Are you as critical of words as of music ? " " Certainly I am. I should require your words to be what your face and form are, always among the meanings of a noble music. " " That is a compliment as well as a correction 1 5 6 DANIEL DEBONDA. I am obliged for both. But do you know I am bold enough to wish to correct you, and require you to understand a joke ? " " One may understand jokes without liking them, " said the terrible Klesmer. " I have had opera books sent me full of jokes ; it was just be- cause I understood them that I did not like them. The comic people are ready to challenge a man because he looks grave. ' You don't see the wit- ticism, sir ? ' ' No, sir, but I see what you meant. ' Then I am what we call ticketed as a fellow with- out esprit. But, in fact, " said Klesmer, suddenly dropping from his quick narrative to a reflective tone, with an impressive frown, " I am very sensi- ble to wit and humour. " " I am glad you tell me that, " said Gwen- dolen, not without some wickedness of intention. But Klesmer's thoughts had flown off on the wings of his own statement, as their habit was, and she had the wickedness all to herself. " Pray, who is that standing near the card-room door ? " she went on, seeing there the same stranger with whom Klesmer had been in animated talk on the archery- ground. " He is a friend of yours, I think. " " No, no ; an amateur I have seen in town : Lush, a Mr. Lush, too fond of Meyerbeer and Scribe, too fond of the mechanical-dramatic. " " Thanks. I wanted to know whether you thought his face and form required that his words should be among the meanings of noble music ? " Klesmer was conquered, and flashed at her a de- lightful smile which made them quite friendly until she begged to be deposited by the side of her mamma. Three minutes afterwards her preparations foi MEETING STREAMS. 157 Grandcourt's indifference were all cancelled. Turn- ing her head after some remark to her mother, she found that he had made his way up to her. " May I ask if you are tired of dancing, Miss Harleth ? " he began, looking down with his for- mer unperturbed expression. " Not in the least. " " Will you do me the honour the next or another quadrille ? " " I should have been very happy, " said Gwen- dolen, looking at her card, " but I am engaged for the next to Mr. Clintock and indeed I perceive that I am doomed for every quadrille : I have not one to dispose of. " She was not sorry to punish Mr. Grandcourt's tardiness, yet at the same time she would have liked to dance with him. She gave him a charming smile as she looked up to deliver her answer, and he stood still looking down at her with no smile at all. " I am unfortunate in being too late, " he said, after a moment's pause. " It seemed to me that you did not care for dan- cing, " said Gwendolen. " I thought it might be one of the things you had left off. * " Yes ; but I have not begun to dance with you, " said Grandcourt. Always there was the same pause before he took up his cue. " You make dancing a new thing, as you make archery. " " Is novelty always agreeable ? " a No, no, not always. " " Then I don't know whether to feel flattered or not. When you had once danced with me, there would be no more novelty in it. " " On the contrary, there would probably be much more. " 158 DANIEL DERONDA. " That is deep. I don't understand. " " Is it difficult to make Miss Harleth understand her power ? " Here Grandcourt had turned to Mrs. Davilow, who, smiling gently at her daughter, said, " I think she does not generally strike people as slow to understand. " " Mamma, " said Gwendolen, in a deprecating tone, " I am adorably stupid, and want every- thing explained to me when the meaning is pleasant. " " If you are stupid, I admit that stupidity is adorable," returned Grandcourt, after the usual pause, and without change of tone. But clearly he knew what to say. " I begin to think that my cavalier has forgotten me, " Gwendolen observed after a little while. " I see the quadrille is being formed. " " He deserves to be renounced, " said Grandcourt. " I think he is very pardonable, " said Gwendolen. " There must have been some misunderstand- ing, " said Mrs. Davilow. " Mr. Clintock was too anxious about the engagement to have forgotten it." But now Lady Brackenshaw came up and said, " Miss Harleth, Mr. Clintock has charged me to express to you his deep regret that he was obliged to leave without having the pleasure of dancing with you again. An express came from his father the archdeacon, something important ; he was obliged to go. He was au (Usespoir. " " Oh, he was very good to remember the engage- ment under the circumstances," said Gwendolen. " I am sorry he was called away. " It was easy to be politely sorrowful on so felicitous an occasion. MEETING STREAMS. 159 " Then I can profit by Mr. Clintock's misfor- tune ? " said Grandcourt. " May I hope that you will let me take his place ? " " I shall be very happy to dance the next quad- rille with you. " The appropriateness of the event seemed an augury ; and as Gwendolen stood up for the quad- rille with Grandcourt, there was a revival in her of the exultation, the sense of carrying every- thing before her, which she had felt earlier in the day. No man could have walked through the quadrille with more irreproachable ease than Grandcourt; and the absence of all eagerness in his attention to her suited his partner's taste. She was now convinced that he meant to distin- guish her, to mark his admiration of her in a noticeable way ; and it began to appear probable that she would have it in her power to reject him, whence there was a pleasure in reckoning up the advantages which would make her rejection splen- did, and in giving Mr. Grandcourt his utmost value. It was also agreeable to divine that his exclusive selection of her to dance with, from among all the unmarried ladies present, would attract observation ; though she studiously avoided seeing this, and at the end of the quadrille walked away on Grandcourt 's arm as if she had been one of the shortest-sighted instead of the longest and widest sighted of mortals. They encountered Miss Arrowpoint, who was standing with Lady Brack- enshaw and a group of gentlemen. The heiress looked at Gwendolen invitingly and said, " I hope you will vote with us, Miss Harleth, and Mr. Grandcourt too, though he is not an archer. " Gwendolen and Grandcourt paused to join the i Co DANIEL DERONDA. group, and found that the voting turned on the project of a picnic archery meeting to be held in Cardell Chase, where the evening entertainment would be more poetic than a ball under chande- liers, a feast of sunset lights along the glades and through the branches and over the solemn tree- tops. Gwendolen thought the scheme delightful, - equal to playing Kobin Hood and Maid Marian ; and Mr. Grandcourt, when appealed to a second time, said it was a thing to be done ; whereupon Mr. Lush, who stood behind Lady Brackenshaw's elbow, drew Gwendolen's notice by saying, with a familiar look and tone to Grandcourt, " Diplow would be a good place for the meeting, and more convenient : there 's a fine bit between the oaks towards the north gate. " Impossible to look more unconscious of being addressed than Grandcourt ; but Gwendolen took a new survey of the speaker, deciding, first, that he must be on terms of intimacy with the tenant of Diplow, and secondly, that she would never, if she could help it, let him come within a yard of her. She was subject to physical antipathies ; and Mr. Lush's prominent eyes, fat though not clumsy figure, and strong black gray-besprinkled hair of frizzy thickness, which, with the rest of his pros- perous person, was enviable to many, created one of the strongest of her antipathies. To be safe from his looking at her, she murmured to Grand- court, " I should like to continue walking. " He obeyed immediately ; but when they were thus away from any audience, he spoke no word for several minutes, and she, out of a half-amused, half-serious inclination for experiment, would not MEETING STREAMS. 161 speak first. They turned into the large conserva- tory, beautifully lit up with Chinese lamps. The other couples there were at a distance which would not have interfered with any dialogue, but still they walked in silence until they had reached the farther end, where there was a flush of pink light, and the second wide opening into the ball-room. Grandcourt, when they had half turned round, paused and said languidly, " Do you like this kind of thing ? " If the situation had been described to Gwendo- len half an hour befor'e, she would have laughed heartily at it, and could only have imagined her- self returning a playful, satirical answer. But for some mysterious reason it was a mystery of which she had a faint wondering consciousness she dared not be satirical : she had begun to feel a wand over her that made her afraid of offending Grandcourt. " Yes, " she said quietly, without considering what " kind of thing " was meant, whether the flowers, the scents, the ball in general, or this episode of walking with Mr. Grandcourt in par- ticular. And they returned along the conservatory without farther interpretation. She then proposed to go and sit down in her old place, and they walked among scattered couples preparing for the waltz to the spot where Mrs. Davilow had been seated all the evening. As they approached it, her seat was vacant, but she was coming towards it again, and, to Gwendolen's shuddering annoyance, with Mr. Lush at her elbow. There was no avoid- ing the confrontation: her mamma came close to her before they had reached the seats, and, after a quiet greeting smile, said innocently, " Gwendolen VOL. I. 11 1 62 DANIEL DERONDA. dear, let me present Mr. Lush to you. " Having just made the acquaintance of this personage, as an intimate and constant companion of Mr. Grand- court's, Mrs. Davilow imagined it altogether de- sirable that her daughter also should make the acquaintance. It was hardly a bow that Gwendolen gave, rather, it was the slightest forward sweep of the head away from the physiognomy that inclined itself towards her, and she immediately moved towards her seat, saying, " I want to put on my burnous. " No sooner had she reached it, than Mr. Lush was there, and had the burnous in his hand : to annoy this supercilious young lady, he would incur the offence of forestalling Grandcourt ; and, holding up the garment close to Gwendolen, he said, " Pray, permit me ? " But she, wheeling away from him as if he had been a muddy hound, glided on to the ottoman, saying, " No, thank you." A man who forgave this would have much Chris- tian feeling, supposing he had intended to be agreeable to the young lady ; but before he seized the burnous Mr. Lush had ceased to have that intention. Grandcourt quietly took the drapery from him ; and Mr. Lush, with a slight bow, moved away. " You had perhaps better put it on, " said Mr. Grandcourt, looking down on her without change of expression. " Thanks ; perhaps it would be wise, " said Gwen- dolen, rising and submitting very gracefully to take the burnous on her shoulders. After that, Mr. Grandcourt exchanged a few polite speeches with Mrs. Davilow, and, in taking MEETING STREAMS. 163 leave, asked permission to call at Offendene the next day. He was evidently not offended by the insult directed towards his friend. Certainly, Gwendolen's refusal of the burnous from Mr. Lush was open to the interpretation that she wished to receive it from Mr. Grandcourt. But she, poor child, had had no design on this action, and was simply following her antipathy and inclination, confiding in them as she did in the more reflective judgments into which they entered as sap into leafage. Gwendolen had no sense that these men were dark enigmas to her, or that she needed any help in drawing conclusions about them, Mr. Grandcourt at least. The chief question was, how far his character and ways might answer her wishes; and unless she were satisfied about that, she had said to herself that she would not accept his offer. Could there be a slenderer, more insignificant thread in human history than this consciousness of a girl, busy with her small inferences of the way in which she could make her life pleasant ? - in a time, too, when ideas were with fresh vigour making armies of themselves, and the universal kinship was declaring itself fiercely ; when women on the other side of the world would not mourn for the husbands and sons who died bravely in a common cause, and men stinted of bread on our side of the world heard of that willing loss and were patient : a time when the soul of man was waking to pulses which had for centuries been beating in him unfelt, until their full sum made a new life of terror or of joy. i64 DANIEL DERONDA. What in the midst of that mighty drama are girls and their blind visions ? They are the Yea or Nay of that good for which men are enduring and fighting. In these delicate vessels is borne onward through the ages the treasure of human affections. CHAPTEE XII. O gentlemen, the time of life is short : To spend that shortness basely were too long, If life did ride upon a dial's point, Still ending at the arrival of an hour. SHAKESPEARE : Henry IV. ON the second day after the Archery Meeting, Mr. Henleigh Mallinger Grandcourt was at his break- fast-table with Mr. Lush. Everything around them was agreeable : the summer air through the open windows, at which the dogs could walk in from the old green turf on the lawn ; the soft, purplish colouring of the park beyond, stretching towards a mass of bordering wood ; the still life in the room, which seemed the stiller for its sober antiquated elegance, as if it kept a conscious, well-bred silence unlike the restlessness of vulgar furniture. Whether the gentlemen were agreeable to each other was less evident. Mr. Grandcourt had drawn his chair aside so as to face the lawn, and, with his left leg over another chair, and his right elbow on the table, was smoking a large cigar, while his companion was still eating. The dogs half-a-dozen of various kinds were moving lazily in and out, or taking attitudes of brief attention gave a vacillating preference first to one gentle- man, then to the other; being dogs in such good circumstances that they could play at hunger, and liked to be served with delicacies which they de- clined to put into their mouths ; all except Fetch, 166 DANIEL DERONDA. the beautiful liver-coloured water-spaniel, which sat with its fore-paws firmly planted and its expressive brown face turned upward, watching Grandcourt with unshaken constancy. He held in his lap a tiny Maltese dog with a tiny silver collar and bell, and when he had a hand unused by cigar or coffee-cup, it rested on this small parcel of ani- mal warmth. I fear that Fetch was jealous, and wounded that her master gave her no word or look ; at last it seemed that she could bear this neglect no longer, and she gently put her large silky paw on her master's leg. Grandcourt looked at her with unchanged face for half a minute, and then took the trouble to lay down his cigar while he lifted the unimpassioned Fluff close to his chin and gave it caressing pats, all the while gravely watching Fetch, who, poor thing, whimpered in- terruptedly, as if trying to repress that sign of discontent, and at last rested her head beside the appealing paw, looking up with piteous beseech- ing. So, at least, a lover of dogs must have inter- preted Fetch, and Grandcourt kept so many dogs that he was reputed to love them ; at any rate, his impulse to act just in this way started from such an interpretation. But when the amusing anguish burst forth in a howling bark, Grandcourt pushed Fetch down without speaking, and, depositing Fluff carelessly on the table (where his black nose predominated over a salt-cellar), began to look to his cigar, and found, with some annoyance against Fetch as the cause, that the brute of a cigar re- quired relighting. Fetch, having begun to wail, found, like others of her sex, that it was not easy to leave off; indeed, the second howl was a louder one, and the third was like unto it. MEETING STREAMS. 167 '' Turn out that brute, will you ? " said Grand- court to Lush, without raising his voice or looking at him, as if he counted on attention to the smallest sign. And Lush immediately rose, lifted Fetch, though she was rather heavy and he was not fond of stoop- ing, and carried her out, disposing of her in some way that took him a couple of minutes before he returned. He then lit a cigar, placed himself at an angle where he could see Grandcourt's face without turning, and presently said, " Shall you ride or drive to Quetcham to-day ? " " I am not going to Quetcham. " " You did not go yesterday. " Grandcourt smoked in silence for half a minute, and then said, " I suppose you sent my card and inquiries. " " I went myself at four, and said you were sure to be there shortly. They would suppose some accident prevented you from fulfilling the inten- tion. Especially if you go to-day. " Silence for a couple ~of minutes Then Grand- court said, " What men are invited here with their wives ? " Lush drew out a note-book. " The Captain and Mrs. Torrington come next week. Then there are Mr. Hollis and Lady Flora, and the Cushats, and the Gogoffs." " Bather a ragged lot, " remarked Grandcourt, after a while. " Why did you ask the Gogoffs ? When you write invitations in my name, be good enough to give me a list, instead of bringing down a giantess on me without my knowledge. She spoils the look of the room. " 168 DANIEL DERONDA. " You invited the Gogoffs yourself, when you met them in Paris. " " What has my meeting them in Paris to do with it ? I told you to give me a list. " Grandoourt, like many others, had two remark- ably different voices. Hitherto we have heard him speaking in a superficial interrupted drawl suggestive chiefly of languor and ennui. But this last brief speech was uttered in subdued, inward, yet distinct tones, which Lush had long been used to recognize as the expression of a peremptory will. " Are there any other couples you would like to invite ? " " Yes ; think of some decent people, with a daughter or two. And one of your damned musi- cians. But not a comic fellow. " " I wonder if Klesmer would consent to come to us when he leaves Quetcham. Nothing but first- rate music will go down with Miss Arrowpoint. " Lush spoke carelessly, but he was really seizing an opportunity and fixing an observant look on Grandcourt, who now for the first time turned his eyes towards his companion, but slowly and with- out speaking until he had given two long luxurious puffs, when he said, perhaps in a lower tone than ever, but with a perceptible edge of contempt, " What in the name of nonsense have I to do with Miss Arrowpoint and her music ? " " Well, something," said Lush, jocosely. " You need not give yourself much trouble, perhaps. But some forms must be gone through before a man can marry a million. " " Very likely. But I am not going to marry a million. " MEETING STREAMS. 169 " That 's a pity, to fling away an opportunity of this sort, and knock down your own plans. " " Your plans, I suppose you mean. " " You have some debts, you know, and things may turn out inconveniently after all. The heir- ship is not absolutely certain. " Grandcourt did not answer, and Lush went on. " It really is a fine opportunity. The father and mother ask for nothing better, I can see, and the daughter's looks and manners require no allow- ances, any more than if she hadn't a sixpence. She is not beautiful, but equal to carrying any rank. And she is not likely to refuse such pros- pects as you can offer her. " " Perhaps not. " " The father and mother would let you do any- thing you liked with them. " " But I should not like to do anything with them. " Here it was Lush who made a little pause before speaking again, and then he said in a deep voice of remonstrance, " Good God, Grandcourt ! after your experience, will you let a whim interfere with your comfortable settlement in life ? " " Spare your oratory. I know what I am going to do. " " What ? " Lush put down his cigar and thrust his hands into his side pockets, as if he had to face something exasperating, but meant to keep his temper. " I am going to marry the other girl. " " Have you fallen in love ? " This question carried a strong sneer. " I am going to marry her. " " You have made her an offer already, then ? " i;o DANIEL DE110NDA. " No. " " She is a young lady with a will of her own, 1 fancy. Extremely well fitted to make a rumpus. She would know what she liked. " "She doesn't like you," said Grandcourt, with the ghost of a smila " Perfectly true, " said Lush, adding again in a markedly sneering tone, " However, if you and she are devoted to each other, that will be enough. " Grandcourt took no notice of this speech, but sipped his coffee, rose, and strolled out on the lawn, all the dogs following him. Lush glanced after him a moment, then resumed his cigar and lit it, but smoked slowly, consult- ing his beard with inspecting eyes and fingers, till he finally stroked it with an air of having arrived at some conclusion, and said, in a subdued voice, " Check, old boy 1 " Lush, being a man of some ability, had not known Grandcourt for fifteen years without learn- ing what sort of measures were useless with him, though what sort might be useful remained often dubious. In the beginning of his career he held a fellowship, and was near taking orders for the sake of a college living ; but not being fond of that pros- pect, accepted instead the office of travelling com- panion to a marquess, and afterwards to young Grandcourt, who had lost his father early, and who found Lush so convenient that he had allowed him to become prime minister in all his more per- sonal affairs. The habit of fifteen years had made Grandcourt more and more in need of Lush's handi- ness, and Lush more and more in need of the lazy MEETING STREAMS. 171 luxury to which his transactions on behalf of Grandcourt made no interruption worth reckoning. I cannot say that the same lengthened habit had intensified Grandcourt 's want of respect for his companion, since that want had been absolute from the beginning, but it had confirmed his sense that he might kick Lush if he chose, only he never did choose to kick any animal, because the act of kicking is a compromising attitude, and a gentle- man's dogs should be kicked for him. He only said things which might have exposed himself to be kicked if his confidant had been a man of inde- pendent spirit. But what son of a vicar who has stinted his wife and daughters of calico in order to send his male offspring to Oxford, can keep an independent spirit when he is bent on dining with high discrimination, riding good horses, living generally in the most luxuriant honey-blossomed clover, and all without working ? Mr. Lush had passed for a scholar once, and had still a sense of scholarship when he was not trying to remember much of it ; but the bachelors' and other arts which soften manners are a time-honoured prepa- ration for sinecures; and Lush's present comfort- able provision was as good as a sinecure in not requiring more than the odour of departed learning. He was not unconscious of being held kickable, but he preferred counting that estimate among the peculiarities of Grandcourt's character, which made one of his incalculable moods or judgments as good as another. Since in his own opinion he had never done a bad action, it did not seem necessary to consider whether he should be likely to commit one if his love of ease required it. Lush's love of ease was well satisfied at present, and if his pud- 172 DANIEL DERONDA. dings were rolled towards him in the dust, he took the inside bits and found them relishing. This morning, for example, though he had en- countered more annoyance than usual, he went to his private sitting-room and played a good hour on the violoncello. CHAPTER XIII. " Philistia, be thou glad of me ! " GRANDCOURT having made up his mind to marry Miss Harleth showed a power of adapting means to ends. During the next fortnight there was hardly a day on which by some arrangement or other he did not see her, or prove by emphatic attentions that she occupied his thoughts. His cousin Mrs. Torrington was now doing the honours of his house, so that Mrs. Davilow and Gwendolen could be invited to a large party at Diplow in which there were many witnesses how the host distin- guished the dowerless beauty, and showed no solicitude about the heiress. The world I mean Mr. Gascoigue and all the families worth speaking of within visiting distance of Pennicote felt an assurance on the subject which in the Sector's mind converted itself into a resolution to do his duty by his niece and see that the settlements were adequate. Indeed the wonder to him and Mrs. Davilow was that the offer for which so many suitable occasions presented themselves had not been already made ; and in this wonder Grandcourt himself was not without a share. When he had told his resolution to Lush, he had thought that the affair would be concluded more quickly, and to his own surprise he had repeatedly promised himself in a morning that he would to-day give 174 DANIEL DERONDA. Gwendolen the opportunity of accepting him, and had found in the evening that the necessary for- mality was still unaccomplished. This remarkable fact served to heighten his determination on an- other day. He had never admitted to himself that Gwendolen might refuse him, but heaven help us all ! we are often unable to act on our certain- ties ; our objection to a contrary issue (were it possible) is so strong that it rises like a spectral illusion between us and our certainty : we are rationally sure that the blind-worm cannot bite us mortally, but it would be so intolerable to be bitten, and the creature has a biting look, we decline to handle it He had asked leave to have a beautiful horse of his brought for Gwendolen to ride. Mrs. Davilow was to accompany her in the carriage, and they were to go to Diplow to lunch, Grandcourt con- ducting them. It was a fine mid-harvest time, not too warm for a noonday ride of five miles to be delightful : the poppies glowed on the borders of the fields, there was enough breeze to move gently like a social spirit among the ears of uncut corn, and to wing the shadow of a cloud across the soft gray downs ; here the sheaves were standing, there the horses were straining their muscles under the last load from a wide space of stubble, but every- where the green pastures made a broader setting for the cornfields, and the cattle took their rest under wide branches. The road lay through a bit of country where the dairy-farms looked much as they did in the days of our forefathers, where peace and permanence seemed to find a home away from the busy change that sent the railway train flying in the distance. MEETING STREAMS. 175 But the spirit of peace and permanence did not penetrate poor Mrs. Davilow's mind so as to over- come her habit of uneasy foreboding. Gwendolen and Grandcourt cantering in front of her, and then slackening their pace to a conversational walk till the carriage came up with them again, made a gratifying sight; but it served chiefly to keep up the conflict of hopes and fears about her daughter's lot. Here was an irresistible opportunity for a lover to speak and put an end to all uncertainties, and Mrs. Davilow could only hope with trembling that Gwendolen's decision would be favourable. Certainly if Kex's love had been repugnant to her, Mr. Grandcourt had the advantage of being in complete contrast with Eex ; and that he had pro- duced some quite novel impression on her seemed evident in her marked abstinence from satirical observations, nay, her total silence about his char- acteristics, a silence which Mrs. Davilow did not dare to break. " Is he a man she would be happy with ? " was a question that inevitably arose in the mother's mind. "Well, perhaps as happy as she would be with any one else or as most other women are " was the answer with which she tried to quiet herself; for she could not ima- gine Gwendolen under the influence of any feeling which would make her satisfied in what we tradi- tionally call " mean circumstances." Grandcourt's own thought was looking in the same direction : he wanted to have done with the uncertainty that belonged to his not having spoken. As to any further uncertainty well, it was some- thing without any reasonable basis, some quality in the air which acted as an irritant to his wishes. Gwendolen enjoyed the riding, but her pleasure 1 7 6 DANIEL DERONDA. did not break forth in girlish unpremeditated chat and laughter as it did on that morning with Rex. She spoke a little, and even laughed, but with a lightness as of a far-off echo : for her too there waa some peculiar quality in the air, not, she was sure, any subjugation of her will by Mr. Grandcourt, and the splendid prospects he meant to offer her; for Gwendolen desired every one, that dignified gen- tleman himself included, to understand that she was going to do just as she liked, and that they had better not calculate on her pleasing them. If she chose to take this husband, she would have him know that she was not going to renounce her freedom, or, according to her favourite formula, " not going to do as other women did. " Grandcourt's speeches this morning were, as usual, all of that brief sort which never fails to make a conversational figure when the speaker is held important in his circle. Stopping so soon, they give signs of a suppressed and formidable ability to say more, and have also the meritorious quality of allowing lengthiness to others. " How do you like Criterion's paces? " he said, after they had entered the park and were slacken- ing from a canter to a walk. " He is delightful to ride. I should like to have a leap with him, if it would not frighten mamma. There was a good wide channel we passed five minutes ago. I should like to have a gallop back and take it " " Pray do. We can take it together. " " No, thanks. Mamma is so timid, if she saw me it might make her ill. " " Let me go and explain. Criterion would take it without fail. " MEETING STREAMS. 177 " No indeed you are very kind but it would alarm her too much. I dare take any leap when she is not by; but I do it and don't tell her about it. " " We can let the carriage pass, and then set off. " "No, no, pray don't think of it any more; I spoke quite randomly," said Gwendolen; she be- gan to feel a new objection to carrying out her own proposition. " But Mrs. Davilow knows I shall take care of you. " " Yes, but she would think of you as having to take care of my broken neck. " There was a considerable pause before Grand- court said, looking towards her, " I should like to have the right always to take care of you. " Gwendolen did not turn her eyes on him : it seemed to her a long while that she was first blush- ing, and then turning pale, but to Grandcourt's rate of judgment she answered soon enough, with the lightest flute-tone and a careless movement of the head, " Oh, I am not sure that I want to be taken care of : if I chose to risk breaking my neck, I should like to be at liberty to do it. " She checked her horse as she spoke, and turned in her saddle, looking towards the advancing car- riage. Her eyes swept across Grandcourt as she made this movement, but there was no language in them to correct the carelessness of her reply. At that very moment she was aware that she was risk- ing something, not her neck, but the possibility of finally checking Grandcourt's advances, and she did not feel contented with the possibility. " Damn her ! " thought Grandcourt, as he too checked his horse. He was not a wordy thinker; VOL. I. 12 1 78 DANIEL DERONDA. and this explosive phrase stood for mixed impres- sions which eloquent interpreters might have ex- panded into some sentences full of an irritated sense that he was being mystified, and a determi- nation that this girl should not make a fool of him. Did she want him to throw himself at her feet and declare that he was dying for her? It was not by that gate that she would enter on the privileges he could give her. Or did she expect him to write his proposals? Equally a delusion. He would not make his offer in any way that could place him definitely in the position of being re- jected. But as to her accepting him, she had done it already in accepting his marked attentions ; and anything which happened to break them off would be understood to her disadvantage. She was merely coquetting, then ? However, the carriage came up, and no further tete-d-tete could well occur before their arrival at the house, where there was abundant company, to whom Gwendolen, clad in riding-dress with her hat laid aside, clad also in the repute of being chosen by Mr. Grandcourt, was naturally a centre of observation ; and since the objectionable Mr. Lush was not there to look at her, this stimulus of admiring attention heightened her spirits, and dispersed, for the time, the uneasy consciousness of divided impulses which threatened her with repentance of her own acts. Whether Grandcourt had been offended or not there was no judging : his manners were unchanged, but Gwendolen's acute ness had not gone deeper than to discern that his manners were no clew for her, and because these were unchanged she was not the less afraid of him. MEETING STREAMS. 179 She had not been at Diplow before except to dine; and since certain points of view from the windows and the garden were worth showing, Lady Flora Hollis proposed after luncheon, when some of the guests had dispersed, and the sun was slop- ing towards four o'clock, that the remaining party should make a little exploration. Here came fre- quent opportunities when Grandcourt might have retained Gwendolen apart, and have spoken to her unheard. But no! He indeed spoke to no one else, but what he said was nothing more eager or intimate than it had been in their first interview. He looked at her not less than usual ; and some of her defiant spirit having come back, she looked full at him in return, not caring rather preferring that his eyes had no expression in them. But at last it seemed as if he entertained some contrivance. After they had nearly made the tour of the grounds, the whole party paused by the pool to be amused with Fetch's accomplishment of bringing a water-lily to the bank like Cowper's spaniel Beau, and having been disappointed in his first attempt insisted on his trying again. Here Grandcourt, who stood with Gwendolen outside the group, turned deliberately, and fixing his eyes on a knoll planted with American shrubs, and having a winding path up it, said languidly, " This is a bore. Shall we go up there ? " " Oh, certainly since we are exploring, " said Gwendolen. She was rather pleased, and yet afraid. The path was too narrow for him to offer his arm, and they walked up in silence. When they were on the bit of platform at the summit, Grand- court said, i8o DANIEL DERONDA. " There is nothing to be seen here : the thing was not worth climbing. " How was it that Gwendolen did not laugh ? She was perfectly silent, holding up the folds of her robe like a statue, and giving a harder grasp to the handle of her whip, which she had snatched up automatically with her hat when they had first set off. " What sort of place do you like ? " said Grandcourt. " Different places are agreeable in their way. On the whole, I think I prefer places that are open and cheerful. I am not fond of anything sombre. " " Your place at Offendene is too sombre. " " It is, rather. " " You will not remain there long, I hope. " " Oh, yes, I think so. Mamma likes to be near her sister. " Silence for a short space. " It is not to be supposed that you will always live there, though Mrs. Davilow may. " " I don't know. We women can't go in search of adventures, to find out the Northwest Passage or the source of the Nile, or to hunt tigers in the East. We must stay where we grow, or where the gardeners like to transplant us. We are brought up like the flowers, to look as pretty as we can, and be dull without complaining. That is my notion about the plants : they are often bored, and that is the reason why some of them have got poisonous. What do you think ? " Gwendolen had run on rather nervously, lightly whipping the rhododendron bush in front of her. " I quite agree. Most things are bores, " said Grandcourt, his mind having been pushed into an MEETING STREAMS. 181 easy current, away from its intended track. But after a moment's pause he continued in his broken, refined drawl, " But a woman can be married. " " Some women can. " " You certainly, unless you are obstinately cruel. " " I am not sure that I am not both cruel and obstinate. " Here Gwendolen suddenly turned her head and looked full at Grandcourt, whose eyes she had felt to be upon her throughout their con- versation. She was wondering what the effect of looking at him would be on herself rather than on him. He stood perfectly still, half a yard or more away from her ; and it flashed through her thought that a sort of lotos-eater's stupor had begun in him and was taking possession of her. Then he said, " Are you as uncertain about yourself as you make others about you ? " "I am quite uncertain about myself; I don't know how uncertain others may be. " " And you wish them to understand that you don't care ? " said Grandcourt, with a touch of new hardness in his tone. " I did not say that, " Gwendolen replied, hesi- tatingly, and turning her eyes away whipped the rhododendron bush again. She wished she were on horseback that she might set off on a canter. It was impossible to set off running down the knoll. " You do care, then, " said Grandcourt, not more quickly, but with a softened drawl. " Ha ! my whip ! " said Gwendolen, in a little scream of distress. She had let it go what could 1 82 DANIEL DERONDA. be more natural in a slight agitation? and but this seemed less natural in a gold-handled whip which had been left altogether to itself it had gone with some force over the immediate shrubs, and had lodged itself in the branches of an azalea half-way down the knoll. She could run down now, laughing prettily, and Grandcourt was obliged to follow ; but she was beforehand with him in rescuing the whip, and continued on her way to the level ground, when she paused and looked at Grandcourt with an exasperating brightness in her glance and a heightened colour, as if she had car- ried a triumph ; and these indications were still noticeable to Mrs. Davilow when Gwendolen and Grandcourt joined the rest of the party. " It is all coquetting, " thought Grandcourt ; " the next time I beckon she will come down. " It seemed to him likely that this final beckon- ing might happen the very next day, when there was to be a picnic archery meeting in Cardell Chase, according to the plan projected on the even- ing of the ball. Even in Gwendolen's mind that result was one of two likelihoods that presented themselves alter- nately, one of two decisions towards which she was being precipitated, as if they were two sides of a boundary-line, and she did not know on which she should fall. This subjection to a possible self, a self not to be absolutely predicted about, caused her some astonishment and terror: her favourite key of life doing as she liked seemed to fail her, and she could not foresee what at a given moment she might like to do. The prospect of marrying Grandcourt really seemed more attractive to her than she had believed beforehand that any mar- MEETING STREAMS. 183 riage could be : the dignities, the luxuries, the power of doing a great deal of what she liked to do, which had now come close to her, and within her choice to secure or to lose, took hold of her nature as if it had been the strong odour of what she had only imagined and longed for before. And Graudcourt himself ? He seemed as little of a flaw in his fortunes as a lover and husband could possi- bly be. Gwendolen wished to mount the chariot and drive the plunging horses herself, with a spouse by her side who would fold his arms and give her his countenance without looking ridicu- lous. Certainly, with all her perspicacity, and all the reading which seemed to her mamma dan- gerously instructive, her judgment was consciously a little at fault before Grandcourt. He was ador- ably quiet and free from absurdities, he would be a husband to suit with the best appearance a woman could make. But what else was he ? He had been everywhere, and seen everything. That was desirable, and especially gratifying as a preamble to his supreme preference for Gwendolen Harleth. He did not appear to enjoy anything much. That was not necessary ; and the less he had of particu- lar tastes or desires, the more freedom his wife was likely to have in following hers. Gwendolen conceived that after marriage she would most prob- ably be able to manage him thoroughly. How was it that he caused her unusual con- straint now ? that she was less daring and play- ful in her talk with him than with any other admirer she had known ? That absence of demon- strativeness which she was glad of, acted as a charm in more senses than one, and was slightly benumbing. Grandcourt after all was formidable. 1 84 DANIEL DERONDA. a handsome lizard of a hitherto unknown spe- cies, not of the lively, darting kind. But Gwen- dolen knew hardly anything about lizards, and ignorance gives one a large range of probabilities. This splendid specimen was probably gentle, suit- able as a boudoir pet : what may not a lizard be, if you know nothing to the contrary ? Her ac- quaintance with Grandcourt was such that no accomplishment suddenly revealed in him would have surprised her. And he was so little sugges- tive of drama, that it hardly occurred to her to think with any detail how his life of thirty-six years had been passed : in general, she imagined him always cold and dignified, not likely ever to have committed himself. He had hunted the tiger, had he ever been in love or made love ? The one experience and the other seemed alike remote in Gwendolen's fancy from the Mr. Grand- court who had come to Diplow in order apparently to make a chief epoch in her destiny, perhaps by introducing her to that state of marriage which she had resolved to make a state of greater free- dom than her girlhood. And on the whole she wished to marry him ; he suited her purpose ; her prevailing, deliberate intention was to accept him. But was she going to fulfil her deliberate inten- tion ? She began to be afraid of herself, and to find out a certain difficulty in doing as she liked. Already her assertion of independence in evading his advances had been carried farther than was necessary, and she was thinking with some anxiety what she might do on the next occasion. Seated according to her habit with her back to the horses on their drive homewards, she was completely under the observation of her mamma, MEETING STREAMS. 185 who took the excitement and changefulness in the expression of her eyes, her unwonted absence of mind and total silence, as unmistakable signs that something unprecedented had occurred between her and Grandcourt. Mrs. Davilow's uneasiness determined her to risk some speech on the subject ; the Gascoignes were to dine at Offendene, and in what had occurred this morning there might be some reason for consulting the Rector ; not that she expected him any more than herself to influence Gwendolen, but that her anxious mind wanted to be disburthened. " Something has happened, dear ? " she began, in a tender tone of question. Gwendolen looked round, and seeming to be roused to the consciousness of her physical self, took off her gloves and then her hat, that the soft breeze might blow on her head. They were in a retired bit of the road, where the long afternoon shadows from the bordering trees fell across it, and no observers were within sight. Her eyes continued to meet her mother's, but she did not speak. " Mr. Grandcourt has been saying something ? Tell me, dear. " The last words were uttered beseechingly. " What am I to tell you, mamma ? " was the perverse answer. " I am sure something has agitated you. You ought to confide in me, G-wen. You ought not to leave me in doubt and anxiety. " Mrs. Davilow's eyes filled with tears. " Mamma dear, please don't be miserable, " said Gwendolen, with pettish remonstrance. " It only makes me more so. I am in doubt myself. " :86 DANIEL DERONDA. " About Mr. Grandcourt's intentions ? " said Mrs. Davilow, gathering determination from her alarms. " No ; not at all, " said Gwendolen, with some curtness, and a pretty little toss of the head as she put on her hat again. " About whether you will accept him, then ? " " Precisely. " " Have you given him a doubtful answer ? " " I have given him no answer at all. " " He has spoken so that you could not misunder- stand him ? " " As far as I would let him speak. " " You expect him to persevere ? " Mrs. Davilow put this question rather anxiously, and receiving no answer, asked another. " You don't consider that you have discouraged him ? " " I dare say not. " " I thought you liked him, dear, " said Mrs. Davilow, timidly. " So I do, mamma, as liking goes. There is less to dislike about him than about most men. He is quiet and distingue. " Gwendolen so far spoke with a pouting sort of gravity ; but suddenly she recovered some of her mischievousness, and her face broke into a smile as she added, " Indeed he has all the qualities that would make a husband tolerable, battlement, veranda, stables, &c., no grins, and no glass in his eye. " " Do be serious with me for a moment, dear. Am I to understand that you mean to accept him ? " " Oh, pray, mamma, leave me to myself, " said Gwendolen, with a pettish distress in her voice. And Mrs. Davilow said no more. When they got home, Gwendolen declared that she would not dine. She was tired, and would MEETING STREAMS. 187 come down in the evening after she had taken some rest. The probability that her uncle would hear what had passed did not trouble her. She was convinced that whatever he might say would be on the side of her accepting Grandcourt, and she wished to accept him if she could. At this moment she would willingly have had weights hung on her own caprice. Mr. Gascoigne did hear not Gwendolen's an- swers repeated verbatim, but a softened generalized account of them. The mother conveyed as vaguely as the keen Rector's questions would let her the impression that Gwendolen was in some uncer- tainty about her own mind, but inclined on the whole to acceptance. The result was that the uncle felt himself called on to interfere : he did not conceive that he should do his duty in with- holding direction from his niece in a momentous crisis of this kind. Mrs. Davilow ventured a hesitating opinion that perhaps it would be safer to say nothing, Gwendolen was so sensitive (she did not like to say wilful). But the Eector's was a firm mind, grasping its first judgments tena- ciously and acting on them promptly, whence counter- judgments were no more for him than shadows fleeting across the solid ground to which he adjusted himself. This match with Grandcourt presented itself to him as a sort of public affair ; perhaps there were ways in which it might even strengthen the Estab- lishment. To the Eector, whose father (nobody would have suspected it, and nobody was told) had risen to be a provincial corn-dealer, aristocratic heirship resembled regal heirship in excepting its possessor from the ordinary standard of moral r88 DANIEL DERONDA. judgments, Grandcourt, the almost certain baronet, the probable peer, was to be ranged with public personages, and was a match to be accepted on broad general grounds, national and ecclesiastical. Such public personages, it is true, are often in the nature of giants which an ancient community may have felt pride and safety in possessing, though, regarded privately, these born eminences must often have been inconvenient and even noisome. But of the future husband personally Mr. Gas- coigne was disposed to think the best. Gossip is a sort of smoke that comes from the dirty tobacco- pipes of those who diffuse it: it proves nothing but the bad taste of the smoker. But if Grand- court had really made any deeper or more unfortu- nate experiments in folly than were common in young men of high prospects, he was of an age to have finished them. All accounts can be suitably wound up when a man has not ruined himself, and the expense may be taken as an insurance against future error. This was the view of practical wis- dom; with reference to higher views, repentance had a supreme moral and religious value. There was every reason to believe that a woman of well- regulated mind would be happy with Grandcourt. It was no surprise to Gwendolen on coming down to tea to be told that her uncle wished to see her in the dining-room. He threw aside the paper as she entered, and greeted her with his usual kind- ness. As his wife had remarked, he always " made much " of Gwendolen, and her importance had risen of late. " My dear, " he said, in a fatherly way, moving a chair for her as he held her hand, " I want to speak to you on a subject which is more momentous than any other with regard to MEETING STREAMS. 189 your welfare. You will guess what I mean. But I shall speak to you with perfect directness : in such matters I consider myself bound to act as your father. You have no objection, I hope ? " " Oh dear, no, uncle. You have always been very kind to me, " said Gwendolen, frankly. This evening she was willing, if it were possible, to be a little fortified against her troublesome self, and her resistant temper was in abeyance. The Hec- tor's mode of speech always conveyed a thrill of authority, as of a word of command : it seemed to take for granted that there could be no wavering in the audience, and that every one was going to be rationally obedient. " It is naturally a satisfaction to me that the prospect of a marriage for you advantageous in the highest degree has presented itself so early. I do not know exactly what has passed between you and Mr. Grandcourt, but I presume there can be little doubt, from the way in which he has dis- tinguished you, that he desires to make you his wife. " Gwendolen did not speak immediately, and her uncle said with more emphasis, " Have you any doubt of that yourself, my dear ? " " I suppose that is what he has been thinking of. But he may have changed his mind to-mor- row, " said Gwendolen. " Why to-morrow ? Has he made advances which you have discouraged ? " " I think he meant he began to make advances but I did not encourage them. I turned the conversation. " " Will you confide in me so far as to tell me your reasons ? " 190 DANIEL DERONDA. " I am not sure that I had any reasons, uncle. " Gwendolen laughed rather artificially. " You are quite capable of reflecting, Gwendolen. You are aware that this is not a trivial occasion, and it concerns your establishment for life under circumstances which may not occur again. You have a duty here both to yourself and your family. I wish to understand whether you have any ground for hesitating as to your acceptance of Mr. Grandcourt. " " I suppose I hesitate without grounds. " Gwen- dolen spoke rather poutingly, and her uncle grew suspicious. " Is he disagreeable to you personally ? " "No." " Have you heard anything of him which has affected you disagreeably ? " The Hector thought it impossible that Gwendolen could have heard the gossip he had heard, but in any case he must endeavour to put all things in the right light for her. " I have heard nothing about him except that he is a great match," said Gwendolen, with some sauciness ; " and that affects me very agreeably. " " Then, my dear Gwendolen, I have nothing further to say than this : you hold your fortune in your own hands, a fortune such as rarely hap- pens to a girl in your circumstances, a fortune in fact which almost takes the question out of the range of mere personal feeling, and makes your acceptance of it a duty. If Providence offers you power and position, especially when unclogged by any conditions that are repugnant to you, your course is one of responsibility, into which caprice must not enter. A man does not like to have his MEETING STREAMS. 191 attachment trifled with : he may not be at once repelled, these things are matters of individual disposition. But the trifling may be carried too far. And I must point out to you that in case Mr. Grandcourt were repelled without your having re- fused him, without your having intended ulti- mately to refuse him, your situation would be a humiliating and painful one. I, for my part, should regard you with severe disapprobation, as the victim of nothing else than your own coquetry and folly." Gwendolen became pallid as she listened to this admonitory speech. The ideas it raised had the force of sensations. Her resistant courage would not help her here, because her uncle was not urg- ing her against her own resolve ; he was pressing upon her the motives of dread which she already felt; he was making her more conscious of the risks that lay within herself. She was silent, and the Eector observed that he had produced some strong effect. " I mean this in kindness, my dear. " His tone had softened. " I am aware of that, uncle, " said Gwendolen, rising and shaking her head back, as if to rouse herself out of painful passivity. " I am not fool- ish. I know that I must be married some time before it is too late. And I don't see how I could do better than marry Mr. Grandcourt. I mean to accept him, if possible. " She felt as if she were reinforcing herself by speaking with this decisiveness to her uncle. But the Eector was a little startled by so bare a version of his own meaning from those young lips. He wished that in her mind his advice should be i 9 2 DANIEL DERONDA. taken in an infusion of sentiments proper to a girl, and such as are presupposed in the advice of a clergyman, although he may not consider them always appropriate to be put forward. He wished his niece parks, carriages, a title, everything that would make this world a pleasant abode ; but he wished her not to be cynical, to be, on the contrary, religiously dutiful, and have warm domestic affections. " My dear Gwendolen, " he said, rising also, and speaking with benignant gravity, " I trust that you will find in marriage a new fountain of duty and affection. Marriage is the only true and satisfac- tory sphere of a woman, and if your marriage with Mr. Grandcourt should be happily decided upon, you will have probably an increasing power, both of rank and wealth, which may be used for the benefit of others. These considerations are some- thing higher than romance. You are fitted by natural gifts for a position which, considering your birth and early prospects, could hardly be looked forward to as in the ordinary course of things ; and I trust that you will grace it not only by those personal gifts, but by a good and consistent life. " " I hope mamma will be the happier, " said Gwendolen, in a more cheerful way, lifting her hands backward to her neck and moving towards the door. She wanted to waive those higher considerations. Mr. Gascoigne felt that he had come to a satis- factory understanding with his niece, and had furthered her happy settlement in life by further- ing her engagement to Grandcourt. Meanwhile there was another person to whom the contempla- tion of that issue had been a motive for some MEETING STREAMS. 193 activity, and who believed that he too on this particular day had done something towards bring- ing about a favourable decision in his sense, which happened to be the reverse of the Eector's. Mr. Lush's absence from Diplow during Gwen- dolen's visit had been due not to any fear on his part of meeting that supercilious young lady, or of being abashed by her frank dislike, but to an engagement from which he expected important consequences. He was gone in fact to the Wan- chester Station to meet a lady accompanied by a maid and two children, whom he put into a fly, and afterwards followed to the hotel of the Golden Keys in that town. An impressive woman, whom many would turn to look at again in passing ; her figure was slim and sufficiently tall, her face rather emaciated, so that its sculpturesque beauty was the more pronounced, her crisp hair perfectly black, and her large anxious eyes also what we call black. Her dress was soberly correct, her age perhaps physically more advanced than the number of years would imply, but hardly less than seven-and-thirty. An uneasy-looking woman: her glance 'seemed to presuppose that people and things were going to be unfavourable to her, while she was nevertheless ready to meet them with resolution. The children were lovely, a dark -haired girl of six or more, a fairer boy of five. "When Lush incautiously ex- pressed some surprise at her having brought the children, she said, with a sharp-edged intonation, " Did you suppose I should come wandering about here by myself? Why should I not bring all four if I liked?" " Oh, certainly, " said Lush, with his usual fluent nonchalance. VOL. I. 13 194 DANIEL DERONDA. He stayed an hour or so in conference with her, and rode back to Diplow in a state of mind that was at once hopeful and busily anxious as to the execution of the little plan on which his hopeful- ness was based. Grandcourt's marriage to Gwen- dolen Harleth would not, he believed, be much of a good to either of them, and it would plainly be fraught with disagreeables to himself. But now he felt confident enough to say inwardly, " I will take, nay, I will lay odds that the marriage will never happen. " CHAPTER XIV. " I will not clothe myself in wreck, wear gems Sawed from cramped finger-bones of women drowned ; Feel chilly vaporous haiids of ireful ghosts Clutching my necklace ; trick my maiden breast With orphans' heritage. Let your dead love Marry its dead." GWENDOLEN looked lovely and vigorous as a tall, newly opened lily the next morning : there was a reaction of young energy in her, and yesterday's self-distrust seemed no more than the transient shiver on the surface of a full stream. The roving archery match in Cardell Chase was a delightful prospect for the sport's sake: she felt herself beforehand moving about like a wood-nymph under the beeches (in appreciative company), and the imagined scene lent a charm to further advances on the part of Grandcourt, not an impassioned lyrical Daphnis for the wood-nymph, certainly ; but so much the better. To-day Gwendolen foresaw him making slow conversational approaches to a declaration, and foresaw herself awaiting and encour- aging it according to the rational conclusion which she had expressed to her uncle. When she came down to breakfast (after every one had left the table except Mrs. Davilow) there were letters on her plate. One of them she read with a gathering smile, and then handed it to her mamma, who, on returning it, smiled also, finding new cheerfulness in the good spirits her daughter had shown ever since waking, and said, 196 DANIEL DERONDA. " You don't feel inclined to go a thousand miles away ? " " Not exactly so far." " It was a sad omission not to have written again before this. Can't you write now before we set out this morning ? " " It is not so pressing. To-morrow will do. You see they leave town to-day. I must write to Dover. They will be there till Monday." " Shall I write for you, dear, if it teases you ? " Gwendolen did not speak immediately, but after sipping her coffee answered brusquely, " Oh, no, let it be ; I will write to-morrow." Then, feeling a touch of compunction, she looked up and said with playful tenderness, " Dear, old, beautiful mamma ! " " Old, child, truly." " Please don't, mamma ! I meant old for darling. You are hardly twenty-five years older than I am. When you talk in that way, my life shrivels up before me." " One can have a great deal of happiness in twenty-five years, my dear." " I must lose no time in beginning," said Gwen- dolen, merrily. " The sooner I get my palaces and coaches the better." "And a good husband who adores you, Gwen," said Mrs. Davilow, encouragingly. Gwendolen put out her lips saucily, and said nothing. It was a slight drawback on her pleasure in starting that the Eector was detained by magis- trate's business, and would probably not be able to get to Cardell Chase at all that day. She cared little that Mrs. Gascoigne and Anna chose not to go without him, but her uncle's presence would MEETING STREAMS. 197 have seemed to make it a matter of course that the decision taken would be acted on. For decision in itself began to be formidable. Having come close to accepting Grandcourt, Gwendolen felt this lot of unhoped-for fulness rounding itself too definitely : when we take to wishing a great deal for ourselves, whatever we get soon turns into mere limitation and exclusion. Still there was the reassuring thought that marriage would be the gate into a larger freedom. The place of meeting was a grassy spot called Green Arbour, where a bit of hanging wood made a sheltering amphitheatre. It was here that the coachful of servants with provisions had to prepare the picnic meal ; and the warden of the Chase was to guide the roving archers so as to keep them within the due distance from this centre, and hinder them from wandering beyond the limit which had been fixed on, a curve that might be drawn through certain well-known points, such as the Double Oak, the Whispering Stones, and the High Cross. The plan was, to take only a preliminary stroll before lun- cheon, keeping the main roving expedition for the more exquisite lights of the afternoon. The mus- ter was rapid enough to save every one from dull moments of waiting ; and when the groups began to scatter themselves through the light and shadow made here by closely neighbouring beeches and there by rarer oaks, one may suppose that a painter would have been glad to look on. This roving archery was far prettier than the stationary game ; but success in shooting at variable marks was less favoured by practice, and the hits were distributed among the volunteer archers otherwise than they would have been in target-shooting. From this 198 DANIEL DERONDA. cause, perhaps, as well as from the twofold distrac- tion of being preoccupied and wishing not to betray her preoccupation, Gwendolen did not greatly dis- tinguish herself in these first experiments, unless it were by the lively grace with which she took her comparative failure. She was in her white and green as on the day of the former archery meeting, when it made an epoch for her that she was intro- duced to Grandcourt ; he was continually by her side now, yet it would have been hard to tell from mere looks and manners that their relation to each other had at all changed since their first conversa- tion. Still there were other grounds that made most persons conclude them to be, if not engaged already, on the eve of being so. And she believed this herself. As they were all returning towards Green Arbour in divergent groups, not thinking at all of taking aim but merely chattering, words passed which seemed really the beginning of that end, the beginning of her acceptance. Grandcourt said, " Do you know how long it is since I first saw you in this dress ? " " The archery meeting was on the 25th, and this is the 13th," said Gwendolen, laughingly. " I am not good at calculating, but I will venture to say that it must be nearly three weeks." A little pause, and then he said, "That is a great loss of time." " That your knowing me has caused you ? Pray don't be uncomplimentary : I don't like it." Pause again. " It is because of the gain that I feel the loss." Here Gwendolen herself left a pause. She was thinking, " He is really very ingenious. He never speaks stupidly." Her silence was so unusual that MEETING STREAMS. 199 it seemed the strongest of favourable answers, and he continued, " The gain of knowing you makes me feel the time I lose in uncertainty. Do you like uncer- tainty ? " " I think I do, rather," said Gwendolen, suddenly beaming on him with a playful smile. " There is more in it." Grandcourt met her laughing eyes with a slow, steady look right into them, which seemed like vision in the abstract, and said, " Do you mean more torment for me ? " There was something so strange to Gwendolen in this moment that she was quite shaken out of her usual self-consciousness. Blushing and turning away her eyes, she said, " No, that would make me sorry." Grandcourt would have followed up this answer, which the change in her manner made apparently decisive of her favourable intention ; but he was not in any way overcome so as to be unaware that they were now, within sight of everybody, descending the slope into Green Arbour, and descending it at an ill- chosen point where it began to be inconveniently steep. This was a reason for offering his hand in the literal sense to help her ; she took it, and they came down in silence, much observed by those already on the level, among others by Mrs. Arrowpoint, who happened to be standing with Mrs. Davilow. That lady had now made up her mind that Grandcourt's merits were not such as would have induced Catherine to accept him, Catherine having so high a standard as to have refused Lord Slogan. Hence she looked at the tenant of Diplow with dispassionate eyes. 200 DANIEL DERONDA. "Mr. Grandcourt is not equal as a man to his uncle, Sir Hugo Mallinger, too languid. To be sure, Mr. Grandcourt is a much younger man, but I shouldn't wonder if Sir Hugo were to outlive him, notwithstanding the difference of years. It is ill calculating on successions," concluded Mrs. Arrow- point, rather too loudly. " It is indeed," said Mrs. Davilow, able to assent with quiet cheerfulness, for she was so well satisfied with the actual situation of affairs that her habitual melancholy in their general unsatisfactoriness was altogether in abeyance. I am not concerned to tell of the food that was eaten in that green refectory, or even to dwell on the glories of the forest scenery that spread them- selves out beyond the level front of the hollow; being just now bound to tell a story of life at a stage when the blissful beauty of earth and sky entered only by narrow and oblique inlets into the consciousness, which was busy with a small social drama almost as little penetrated by a feeling of wider relations as if it had been a puppet-show. It will be understood that the food and champagne were of the best, the talk and laughter, too, in the sense of belonging to the best society, where no one makes an invidious display of anything in particular, and the advantages of the world are taken with that high-bred depreciation which fol- lows from being accustomed to them. Some of the gentlemen strolled a little and indulged in a cigar, there being a sufficient interval before four o'clock, the time for beginning to rove again. Among these, strange to say, was Grandcourt ; but not Mr. Lush, who seemed to be taking his pleasure quite generously to-day by making himself particularly MEETING STREAMS. 201 serviceable, ordering everything for everybody, and by this activity becoming more than ever a blot on the scene to Gwendolen, though he kept himself amiably aloof from her, and never even looked at her obviously. When there was a general move to prepare for starting, it appeared that the bows had all been put under the charge of Lord Brackenshaw's valet, and Mr. Lush was concerned to save ladies the trouble of fetching theirs from the carriage where they were propped. He did not intend to bring Gwendolen's ; but she, fearful lest he should do so, hurried to fetch it herself. The valet, seeing her approach, met her with it, and in giving it into her hand gave also a letter addressed to her. She asked no question about it, perceived at a glance that the address was in a lady's handwriting (of the delicate kind which used to be esteemed feminine before the present uncial period), and moving away with her bow in her hand, saw Mr. Lush coming to fetch other bows. To avoid meeting him she turned aside and walked with her back towards the stand of carriages, opening the letter. It contained these words : "If Miss Harleth is in doubt whether she should accept Mr. Grandcourt, let her break from her party after they have passed the Whispering Stones and return to that spot. She will then hear something to decide her, but she can only hear it by keeping this letter a strict secret from every one. If she does not act according to this letter, she will repent, as the woman who writes it has repented. The secrecy Miss Harleth will feel herself bound in honour to guard." Gwendolen felt an inward shock, but her imme- diate thought was, " It is come in time." It lay in 302 DANIEL DERONDA. her youthfulness that she was absorbed by the idea of the revelation to be made, and had not even a momen- tary suspicion of contrivance that could justify her in showing the letter. Her mind gathered itself up at once into the resolution that she would manage to go unobserved to the Whispering Stones ; and thrust- ing the letter into her pocket, she turned back to rejoin the company, with that sense of having something to conceal which to her nature had a bracing quality and helped her to be mistress of herself. It was a surprise to every one that Grandcourt was not, like the other smokers, on the spot in time to set out roving with the rest. " We shall alight on him by and by," said Lord Brackenshaw ; " he can't be gone far." At any rate, no man could be waited for. This apparent forgetfulness might be taken for the distraction of a lover so absorbed in thinking of the beloved object as to forget an appointment which would bring him into her actual presence. And the good-natured Earl gave Gwendo- len a distant jocose hint to that effect, which she took with suitable quietude. But the thought in her own mind was, " Can he, too, be starting away from a decision ? " It was not exactly a pleasant thought to her ; but it was near the truth. " Start- ing away," however, was not the right expression for the languor of intention that came over Grand- court, like a fit of diseased numbness, when an end seemed within easy reach : to desist then, when all expectation was to the contrary, became another gratification of mere will, sublimely independent of definite motive. At that moment he had begun a second large cigar in a vague, hazy obstinacy, which, if Lush or any other mortal who might be insulted MEETING STREAMS. 203 with impunity had interrupted by overtaking him with a request for his return, would have expressed itself by a slow removal of his cigar to say, in an undertone, " You '11 be kind enough to go to the devil, will you ? " But he was not interrupted, and the rovers set off without any visible depression of spirits, leaving behind only a few of the less vigorous ladies, including Mrs. Davilow, who preferred a quiet stroll free from obligation to keep up with others. The enjoyment of the day was soon at its highest pitch, the archery getting more spirited and the changing scenes of the forest from roofed grove to open glade growing lovelier with the lengthening shadows, and the deeply felt but undefinable grada- tions of the mellowing afternoon. It was agreed that they were playing an extemporized " As you like it ; " and when a pretty compliment had been turned to Gwendolen about her having the part of Eosalind, she felt the more compelled to be sur- passing in liveliness. This was not very difficult to her, for the effect of what had happened to-day was an excitement which needed a vent, a sense of adventure rather than alarm, and a straining towards the management of her retreat so as not to be impeded. The roving had been lasting nearly an hour before the arrival at the Whispering Stones, two tall con- ical blocks that leaned towards each other like gigantic gray-mantled figures. They were soon surveyed and passed by with the remark that they would be good ghosts on a starlit night. But a soft sunlight was on them now, and Gwendolen felt dar- ing. The stones were near a fine grove of beeches where the archers found plenty of marks. 204 DANIEL DERONDA. " How far are we from Green Arbour now ? " said Gwendolen, having got in front by the side of the warden. " Oh, not more than half a mile, taking along the avenue we 're going to cross up there : but I shall take round a couple of miles, by the High Cross." She was falling back among the rest, when suddenly they seemed all to be hurrying obliquely forward under the guidance of Mr. Lush, and, lingering a little where she was, she perceived her opportunity of slipping away. Soon she was out of sight, and without running she seemed to herself to fly along the ground and count the moments nothing till she found herself back again at the Whispering Stones. They turned their blank gray sides to her ; what was there on the other side ? If there were nothing after all ? That was her only dread now, to have to turn back again in mystification; and walking round the right-hand stone without pause, she found herself in front of some one whose large dark eyes met hers at a foot's distance. In spite of expectation she was startled and shrank back, but in doing so she could take in the whole figure of this stranger and perceive that she was unmistakably a lady, and one who must once have been exceedingly handsome. She per- ceived, also, that a few yards from her were two children seated on the grass. " Miss Harleth ? " said the lady. "Yes." All Gwendolen's consciousness was wonder. " Have you accepted Mr. Grandcourt ? " "No." "I have promised to tell you something. And you will promise to keep my secret. However MEETING STREAMS. 205 you may decide, you will not tell Mr. Grandcourt, or any one else, that you have seen me ? " " I promise." "My name is Lydia Glasher. Mr. Grandcourt ought not to marry any one but me. I left my husband and child for him nine years ago. Those two children are his, and we have two others girls who are older. My husband is dead now, and Mr. Grandcourt ought to marry me. He ought to make that boy his heir." . She looked towards the boy as she spoke, and Gwendolen's eyes followed hers. The handsome little fellow was puffing out his cheeks in trying to blow a tiny trumpet which remained dumb. His hat hung backward by a string, and his brown curls caught the sun-rays. He was a cherub. The two women's eyes met again, and Gwendolen said proudly, " I will not interfere with your wishes." She looked as if she were shivering, and her lips were pale. "You are very attractive, Miss Harleth. But when he first knew me, I too was young. Since then my life has been broken up and embittered. It is not fair that he should be happy and I miser- able, and my boy thrust out of sight for another." These words were uttered with a biting accent, but with a determined abstinence from anything violent in tone or manner. Gwendolen, watching Mrs. Glasher's face while she spoke, felt a sort of terror : it was as if some ghastly vision had come to her in a dream and said, " I am a woman's life." " Have you anything more to say to me ? " she asked in a low tone, but still proudly and coldly. The revulsion within her was not tending to soften her. Every one seemed hateful. 206 DANIEL DERONDA. "Nothing. You know what I wished you to know. You can inquire about me if you like. My husband was Colonel Glasher." " Then I will go," said Gwendolen, moving away with a ceremonious inclination which was returned with equal grace. In a few minutes Gwendolen was in the beech grove again, but her party had gone out of sight and apparently had not sent in search of her, for all was solitude till she had reached the avenue pointed out by the warden. She determined to take this way back to Green Arbour, which she reached quickly ; rapid movements seeming to her just now a means of suspending the thoughts which might prevent her from behaving with due calm. She had already made up her mind what step she would take. Mrs. Davilow was of course astonished to see Gwendolen returning alone, and was not without some uneasiness which the presence of other ladies hindered her from showing. In answer to her words of surprise Gwendolen said, " Oh, I have been rather silly. I lingered behind to look at the Whispering Stones, and the rest hurried on after something, so I lost sight of them. I thought it best to come home by the short way, the avenue that the warden had told me of. I 'm not sorry after all. I had had enough walking." " Your party did not meet Mr. Graudcourt, I pre- sume," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, not without intention. " No," said Gwendolen, with a little flash of defi- ance and a light laugh. " And we did n't see any carvings on the trees either. Where can he be ? I should think he has fallen into the pool or had an apoplectic fit." MEETING STREAMS. 207 With all Gwendolen's resolve not to betray any agitation, she could not help it that her tone was unusually high and hard, and her mother felt sure that something unpropitious had happened. Mrs. Arrowpoint thought that the self-confident young lady was much piqued, and that Mr. Grand- court was probably seeing reason to change his mind. " If you have no objection, mamma, I will order the carriage," said Gwendolen. " I am tired ; and every one will be going soon." Mrs. Davilow assented ; but by the time the car- riage was announced as ready the horses having to be fetched from the stables on the warden's premises the roving party reappeared, and with them Mr. Grandcourt. ".Ah, there you are ! " said Lord Brackenshaw, going up to Gwendolen, who was arranging her mamma's shawl for the drive. "We thought at first you had alighted on Grandcourt and he had taken you home. Lush said so. But after that we met Grandcourt. However, we did n't suppose you could be in any danger. The warden said he had told you a near way back." " You are going ? " said Grandcourt, coming up with his usual air, as if he did not conceive that there had been any omission on his part. Lord Brackenshaw gave place to him and moved away. "Yes, we are going," said Gwendolen, looking busily at her scarf, which she was arranging across her shoulders Scotch fashion. " May I call at Offendene to-morrow ? " " Oh, yes, if you like," said Gwendolen, sweeping him from a distance with her eyelashes. Her voice was light and sharp as the first touch of frost. Mrs. Davilow accepted his arm to lead her to the 208 DANIEL DERONDA. carriage ; but while that was happening, Gwendolen with incredible swiftness had got in advance of them, and had sprung into the carriage. " I got in, mamma, because I wished to be on this side," she said apologetically. But she had avoided Grandcourt's touch : he only lifted his hat and walked away, with the not unsatisfactory impres- sion that she meant to show herself offended by his neglect. The mother and daughter drove for five minutes in silence. Then Gwendolen said, " I intend to join the Langens at Dover, mamma. I shall pack up immediately on getting home, and set off by the early train. I shall be at Dover almost as soon as they are ; we can let them know by telegraph." " Good heavens, child ! what can be your reason for saying so?" " My reason for saying it, mamma, is that I mean to do it" " But why do you mean to do it ? " " I wish to go away." " Is it because you are offended with Mr. Grand- court's odd behaviour in walking off to-day?" " It is useless to enter into such questions. I am not going in any case to marry Mr. Grandcourt. Don't interest yourself further about him." " What can I say to your uncle, Gwendolen ? Consider the position you place me in. You led him to believe only last night that you had made up your mind in favour of Mr. Grandcourt." " I am very sorry to cause you annoyance, mamma dear, but I can't help it," said Gwendolen, with still harder resistance in her tone. "Whatever you or my uncle may think or do, I shall not alter my resolve, and I shall not tell my reason. I don't care MEETING STREAMS. 209 what comes of it. I don't care if I never marry any one. There is nothing worth caring for. I believe all men are bad, and I hate them." " But need you set off in this way, Gwendolen ? " said Mrs. Davilow, miserable and helpless. "Now, mamma, don't interfere with me. If you have ever had any trouble in your own life, remem- ber it and don't interfere with me. If I am to be miserable, let it be by my own choice." The mother was reduced to trembling silence. She began to see that the difficulty would be lessened if Gwendolen went away. And she did go. The packing was all carefully done that evening, and not long after dawn the next day Mrs. Davilow accompanied her daughter to the railway station. The sweet dews of morning, the cows and horses looking over the hedges without any particular reason, the early travellers on foot with their bundles, seemed all very melancholy and purposeless to them both. The dingy torpor of the railway station, before the ticket could be taken, was still worse. Gwendolen had certainly hardened in the last twenty-four hours : her mother's trouble evidently counted for little in her present state of mind, which did not essentially differ from the mood that makes men take to worse conduct when their belief in persons or things is upset. Gwendolen's uncontrolled reading, though consisting chiefly in what are called pictures of life, had somehow not prepared her for this encounter with reality. Is that surprising ? It is to be believed that attend- ance at the opera houffe in the present day would not leave men's minds entirely without shock, if the manners observed there with some applause were suddenly to start up in their own families, Perspec- VOL. I. 14 210 DANIEL DERONDA. tive, as its inventor remarked, is a beautiful thing. What horrors of damp huts, where human beings languish, may not become picturesque through aerial distance ! What hymning of cancerous vices may we not languish over as sublimest art in the safe remoteness of a strange language and artificial phrase ! Yet we keep a repugnance to rheumatism and other painful effects when presented in our personal experience. Mrs. Davilow felt Gwendolen's new phase of indifference keenly ; and as she drove back alone, the brightening morning was sadder to her than before. Mr. Grandcourt called that day at Offendene, but nobody was at home. CHAPTEE XV. Festina lente celerity should be contempered with cunctation. SIR THOMAS BROWNE. GWENDOLEN, we have seen, passed her time abroad in the new excitement of gambling, and in imagining herself an empress of luck, having brought from her late experience a vague impres- sion that in this confused world it signified nothing what any one did, so that they amused themselves. We have seen, too, that certain persons, mysteri- ously symbolized as Grapnell and Co., having also thought of reigning in the realm of luck, and being also bent on amusing themselves, no matter how, had brought about a painful change in her family circumstances ; whence she had returned home carrying with her, against her inclination, a neck- lace which she had pawned and some one else had redeemed. While she was going back to England, Grand- court was coming to find her ; coming, that is, after his own manner, not in haste by express straight from Diplow to Leubronn, where she was under- stood to be ; but so entirely without hurry that he was induced by the presence of some Eussian ac- quaintances to linger at Baden-Baden and make various appointments with them, which, however, his desire to be at Leubronn ultimately caused him to break. Grandcourt's passions were of the inter- mittent, flickering kind: never flaming out strongly. But a great deal of life goes on without strong pas- 212 DANIEL DERONDA. sion : myriads of cravats are carefully tied, dinners attended, even speeches made proposing the health of august personages, without the zest arising from a strong desire. And a man may make a good appearance in high social positions, may be sup- posed to know the classics, to have his reserves on science, a strong though repressed opinion on poli- tics, and all the sentiments of the English gentle- man, at a small expense of vital energy. Also, he may be obstinate or persistent at the same low rate, and may even show sudden impulses which have a false air of daemonic strength because they seem in- explicable, though perhaps their secret lies merely in the want of regulated channels for the soul to move in, good and sufficient ducts of habit with- out which our nature easily turns to mere ooze and mud, and at any pressure yields nothing but a spurt or a puddle. Grandcourt had not been altogether displeased by Gwendolen's running away from the splendid chance he was holding out to her. The act had some piquancy for him. He liked to think that it was due to resentment of his careless behaviour in Cardell Chase, which, when he came to consider it, did appear rather cool. To have brought her so near a tender admission, and then to have walked headlong away from further opportunities of win- ning the consent which he had made her under- stand him to be asking for, was enough to provoke a girl of spirit ; and to be worth his mastering it was proper that she should have some spirit Doubtless she meant him to follow her, and it was what he meant too. But for a whole week he took no measures towards starting, and did not even inquire where Miss Harleth was gone. Mr. Lush MEETING STREAMS. iij felt a triumph that was mingled with much dis- trust ; for Grandcourt had said no word to him about her, and looked as neutral as an alligator : there was no telling what might turn up in the slowly churning chances of his mind. Still to have put off a decision was to have made room for the waste of Grandcourt's energy. The guests at Diplow felt more curiosity than their host. How was it that nothing more was heard of Miss Harleth ? Was it credible that she had refused Mr. Grandcourt ? Lady Flora Hollis, a lively middle-aged woman, well endowed with curiosity, felt a sudden interest in making a round of calls with Mrs. Torrington, including the Kec- tory, Offendene, and Quetcham, and thus not only got twice over, but also discussed with the Arrow- points, the information that Miss Harleth was gone to Leubronn, with some old friends, the Baron and Baroness von Langen ; for the immediate agi- tation and disappointment of Mrs. Davilow and the Gascoignes had resolved itself into a wish that Gwendolen's disappearance should not be inter- preted as anything eccentric or needful to be kept secret. The Hector's mind, indeed, entertained the possibility that the marriage was only a little deferred, for Mrs. Davilow had not dared to tell him of the bitter determination with which Gwen- dolen had spoken. And in spite of his practical ability, some of his experience had petrified into maxims and quotations. Amaryllis fleeing desired that her hiding-place should be known ; and that love will find out the way " over the mountain and over the wave " may be said without hyperbole in this age of steam. Gwendolen, he conceived, was an Amaryllis of excellent sense but coquettish 214 DANIEL DERONDA. daring; the question was whether she had dared too much. Lady Flora, coining back charged with news about Miss Harleth, saw no good reason why she should not try whether she could electrify Mr. Grandcourt by mentioning it to him at table ; and in doing so shot a few hints of a notion having got abroad that he was a disappointed adorer. Grand- court heard with quietude, but with attention ; and the next day he ordered Lush to bring about a decent reason for breaking up the party at Diplow by the end of another week, as he meant to go yachting to the Baltic or somewhere, it being impossible to stay at Diplow as if he were a pris- oner on parole, with a set of people whom he had never wanted. Lush needed no clearer announce- ment that Grandcourt was going to Leubronn ; but he might go after the manner of a creeping billiard- ball and stick on the way. What Mr. Lush in- tended was to make himself indispensable so that he might go too, and he succeeded ; Gwendolen's repulsion for him being a fact that only amused his patron, and made him none the less willing to have Lush always at hand. This was how it happened that Grandcourt arrived at the Czarina on the fifth day after Gwendolen had left Leubronn, and found there his uncle, Sir Hugo Mallinger, with his family, includ- ing Deronda. It is not necessarily a pleasure either to the reigning power or the heir presumptive when their separate affairs a touch of gout, say, in the one and a touch of wilfulness in the other happen to bring them to the same spot. Sir Hugo was an easy-tempered man, tolerant both of differences and defects ; but a point of view different from his own MEETING STREAMS. 215 concerning the settlement of the family estates fretted him rather more than if it had concerned Church discipline or the ballot, and faults were the less venial for belonging to a person whose existence was inconvenient to him. In no case could Grand- court have been a nephew after his own heart ; but as the presumptive heir to the Mallinger estates he was the sign and embodiment of a chief grievance in the baronet's life, the want of a son to inherit the lands, in no portion of which had he himself more than a life-interest. For in the ill-advised settlement which his father, Sir Francis, had chosen to make by will, even Diplow with its modicum of land had been left under the same conditions as the ancient and wide inheritance of the two Toppings, Diplow, where Sir Hugo had lived and hunted through many a season in his younger years, and where his wife and daughters ought to have been able to retire after his death. This grievance had naturally gathered emphasis as the years advanced, and Lady Mallinger, after having had three daughters in quick succession, had remained for eight years till now that she was over forty without producing so much as another girl ; while Sir Hugo, almost twenty years older, was at a time of life when, notwithstanding the fashion- able retardation of most things from dinners to marriages, a man's hopefulness is apt to show signs of wear, until restored by second childhood. In fact, he had begun to despair of a son, and this confirmation of Grandcourt's interest in the estates certainly tended to make his image and pre- sence the more unwelcome ; but, on the other hand, it carried circumstances which disposed Sir Hugo to take care that the relation between them should 216 DANIEL DERONDA. be kept as friendly as possible. It led bim to dwell on a plan which had grown up side by side with his disappointment of an heir; namely, to try and secure Diplow as a future residence for Lady Mai- linger and her daughters, and keep this pretty bit of the family inheritance for his own offspring in spite of that disappointment. Such knowledge as he had of his nephew's disposition and affairs en- couraged the belief that Grandcourt might consent to a transaction by which he would get a good sum of ready money, as an equivalent for his prospective interest in the domain of Diplow and the moderate amount of land attached to it. If, after all, the unhoped-for son should be born, the money would have been thrown away, and Grandcourt would have been paid for giving up interests that had turned out good for nothing ; but Sir Hugo set down this risk as nil, and of late years he had husbanded his fortune so well by the working of mines and the sale of leases that he was prepared for an outlay. Here was an object that made him careful to avoid any quarrel with Grandcourt. Some years before, when he was making improvements at the Abbey, and needed Grandcourt's concurrence in his felling an obstructive mass of timber on the de- mesne, he had congratulated himself on finding that there was no active, spite against him in his nephew's peculiar mind ; and nothing had since occurred to make them hate each other more than was compatible with perfect politeness, or with any accommodation that could be strictly mutual. Grandcourt, on his side, thought his uncle a superfluity and a bore, and felt that the list of things in general would be improved whenever Sir MEETING STREAMS. 217 Hugo came to be expunged. But he had been made aware through Lush, always a useful medium, of the baronet's inclinations concerning Diplow, and he was gratified to have the alternative of the money in his mind : even if he had not thought it in the least likely that he would choose to accept it, his sense of power would have been flattered by his being able to refuse what Sir Hugo desired. The hinted trans- action had told for something among the motives which had made him ask for a year's tenancy of Diplow, which it had rather annoyed Sir Hugo to grant, because the excellent hunting in the neigh- bourhood might decide Grandcourt not to part with his chance of future possession ; a man who has two places, in one of which the hunting is less good, naturally desiring a third where it is better. Also, Lush had thrown out to Sir Hugo the proba- bility that Grandcourt would woo and win Miss Arrowpoint, and in that case ready money might be less of a temptation to him. Hence, on this un- expected meeting at Leubronn, the baronet felt much curiosity to know how things had been going on at Diplow, was bent on being as civil as possible to his nephew, and looked forward to some private chat with Lush. Between Deronda and Grandcourt there was a more faintly marked but peculiar relation, depend- ing on circumstances which have yet to be made known. But on no side was there any sign of suppressed chagrin on the first meeting at the table d' Jidte, an hour after Grandcourt's arrival ; and when the quartet of gentlemen afterwards met on the terrace, without Lady Mallinger, they moved off together to saunter through the rooms, Sir Hugo saying as they entered the large saal, 218 DANIEL DERONDA. "Did you play much at Baden, Grandcourt?" " No ; I looked on and betted a little with some Russians there." " Had you luck ? " " What did I win, Lush ? " "You brought away about two hundred," said Lush. " You are not here for the sake of the play, then ? " said Sir Hugo. "No; I don't care about play now. It's a con- founded strain," said Grandcourt, whose diamond ring and demeanour, as he moved along playing slightly with his whisker, were being a good deal stared at by rouged foreigners interested in a new milord. " The fact is, somebody should invent a mill to do amusements for you, my dear fellow," said Sir Hugo, " as the Tartars get their praying done. But I agree with you; I never cared for play. It's monoto- nous, knits the brain up into meshes. And it knocks me up to watch it now. I suppose one gets poisoned with the bad air. I never stay here more than ten minutes. But where 's your gam- bling beauty, Deronda ? Have you seen her lately ? " " She 's gone," said Deronda, curtly. " An uncommonly fine girl, a perfect Diana," said Sir Hugo, turning to Grandcourt again. "Really worth a little straining to look at her. I saw her winning, and she took it as coolly as if she had known it all beforehand. The same day Deronda happened to see her losing like wildfire, and she bore it with immense pluck. I suppose she was cleaned out, or was wise enough to stop in time. How do you know she 's gone ? " "Oh, by the Visitor-list," said Deronda, with a MEETING STREAMS. 219 scarcely perceptible shrug. " Vandernoodt told me her name was Harleth, and she was with the Baron and Baroness von Langen. I saw by the list that Miss Harleth was no longer there." This held no further information for Lush than that Gwendolen had been gambling. He had already looked at the list, and ascertained that Gwendolen had gone, but he had no intention of thrusting this knowledge on Grandcourt before he asked for it; and he had not asked, finding it enough to believe that the object of search would turn up somewhere or other. But now Grandcourt had heard what was rather piquant, and not a word about Miss Harleth had been missed by him. After a moment's pause he said to Deronda, " Do you know those people, the Langens ? " " I have talked with them a little since Miss Harleth went away. I knew nothing of them before." " Where is she gone do you know ? " "She is gone home," said Deronda, coldly, as if he wished to say no more. But then, from a fresh impulse, he turned to look markedly at Grandcourt, and added, " But it is possible you know her. Her home is not far from Diplow : Offendene, near Wan- chester." Deronda, turning to look straight at Grandcourt, who was on his left hand, might have been a sub- ject for those old painters who liked contrasts of temperament. There was a calm intensity of life and richness of tint in his face that on a sudden gaze from him was rather startling, and often made him seem to have spoken, so that servants and offi- cials asked him automatically, " What did you say, 220 DANIEL DERONDA. sir?" when he had been quite silent. Graudcourt himself felt an irritation, which he did not show except hy a slight movement of the eyelids, at Deronda's turning round on him when he was not asked to do more than speak. But he answered, with his usual drawl, "Yes, I know her," and paused with his shoulder towards Deronda, to look at the gambling. " What of her, eh ? " asked Sir Hugo of Lush, as the three moved on a little way. " She must be a new-comer at Offendene. Old Blenny lived there after the dowager died." " A little too much of her," said Lush, in a low, significant tone ; not sorry to let Sir Hugo know the state of affairs. " Why ? how ? " said the baronet. They all moved out of the salon into a more airy promenade. "He has been on the brink of marrying her," Lush went on. "But I hope it's off now. She's a niece of the clergyman Gascoigne at Penni- cote. Her mother is a widow with a brood of daughters. This girl will have nothing, and is as dangerous as gunpowder. It would be a foolish marriage. But she has taken a freak against him, for she ran off here without notice, when he had agreed to call the next day. The fact is, he 's here after her; but he was in no great hurry, and be- tween his caprice and hers they are likely enough not to get together again. But of course he has lost his chance with the heiress." Grandcourt joining them said, " What a beastly den this is ! a worse hole than Baden. I shall go back to the hotel." When Sir Hugo and Deronda were alone, the baronet began, MEETING STREAMS. 221 " Rather a pretty story. That girl has something in her. She must be worth running after, has de Vimprevu. I think her appearance on the scene has bettered my chance of getting Diplow, whether the marriage comes off or not." "I should hope a marriage like that would not come off," said Deronda, in a tone of disgust. "What! are you a little touched with the sub- lime lash ? " said Sir Hugo, putting up his glasses to help his short sight in looking at his companion. " Are you inclined to run after her ? " " On the contrary," said Deronda, " I should rather be inclined to run away from her." " Why, you would easily cut out Grandcourt. A girl with her spirit would think you the finer match of the two," said Sir Hugo, who often tried Deronda's patience by finding a joke in impossible advice. (A difference of taste in jokes is a great strain on the affections.) " I suppose pedigree and land belong to a fine match," said Deronda, coldly. " The best horse will win in spite of pedigree, my boy. You remember Napoleon's mot, Je suis un ancttre" said Sir Hugo, who habitually under- valued birth, as men after dining well often agree that the good of life is distributed with wonderful equality. " I am not sure that I want to be an ancestor," said Deronda. "It doesn't seem to me the rarest sort of origination." " You won't run after the pretty gambler, then ? " said Sir Hugo, putting down his glasses. " Decidedly not." This answer was perfectly truthful ; nevertheless it had passed through Deronda's mind that under 222 DANIEL DERONDA. other circumstances he should have given way to the interest this girl had raised in him, and tried to know more of her. But his history had given him a stronger bias in another direction. He felt himself in no sense free. CHAPTEE XVI. " Men, like planets, have both a visible and an invisible history. The astronomer threads the darkness with strict deduction, ac- counting so for every visible arc in the wanderer's orbit ; and the narrator of human actions, if he did his work with the same com- pleteness, would have to thread the hidden pathways of feeling and thought which lead up to every moment of action, and to those moments of intense suffering which take the quality of action, like the cry of Prometheus, whose chained anguish seems a greater energy than the sea and sky he invokes and the deity he defies." DERONDA'S circumstances, indeed, had been excep- tional. One moment had been burnt into his life as its chief epoch, a moment full of July sunshine and large pink roses shedding their last petals on a grassy court enclosed on three sides by a Gothic cloister. Imagine him in such a scene : a boy of thirteen, stretched prone on the grass where it was in shadow, his curly head propped on his arms over a book, while his tutor, also reading, sat on a camp- stool under shelter. Deronda's book was Sismondi's History of the Italian Eepublics : the lad had a passion for history, eager to know how time had been filled up since the Flood, and how things were carried on in the dull periods. Suddenly he let down his left arm and looked at his tutor, saying in purest boyish tones, " Mr. Fraser, how was it that the popes and car- dinals always had so many nephews ? " The tutor, an able young Scotchman who acted as Sir Hugo Mallinger's secretary, roused rather 224 DANIEL DERONDA. unwillingly from his political economy, answered with the clear-cut, emphatic chant which makes a truth doubly telling in Scotch utterance, " Their own children were called nephews." " Why ? " said Deronda. " It was just for the propriety of the thing ; because, as you know very well, priests don't marry, and the children were illegitimate." Mr. Fraser, thrusting out his lower lip and making his chant of the last word the more emphatic for a little impatience at being interrupted, had already turned his eyes on his book again, while Deronda, as if something had stung him, started up in a sitting attitude with his back to the tutor. He had always called Sir Hugo Mallinger his uncle, and when it once occurred to him to ask about his father and mother, the baronet had answered, " You lost your father and mother when you were quite a little one ; that is why I take care of you." Daniel, then straining to discern something in that early twilight, had a dim sense of having been kissed very much, and surrounded by thin, cloudy, scented drapery, till his fingers caught in something hard, which hurt him, and he began to cry. Every other memory he had was of the little world in which he still lived. And at that time he did not mind about learning more, for he was too fond of Sir Hugo to be sorry for the loss of unknown parents. Life was very delight- ful to the lad, with an uncle who was always indul- gent and cheerful, a fine man in the bright noon of life, whom Daniel thought absolutely perfect, and whose place was one of the finest in England, at once historical, romantic, and home-liks : a pictu- resque architectural outgrowth from an abbey, which MEETING STREAMS. 225 had still remnants of the old monastic trunk. Dip- low lay in another county, and was a comparatively landless place which had come into the family from a rich lawyer on the female side who wore the per- ruque of the Kestoration; whereas the Mallingers had the grant of Monk's Topping, under Henry the Eighth, and ages before had held the neighbouring lands of King's Topping, tracing indeed their origin to a certain Hugues le Malingre, who came in with the Conqueror, and also apparently with a sickly complexion which had been happily corrected in his descendants. Two rows of these descendants, direct and collateral, females of the male line, and males of the female, looked down in the gallery over the cloisters on the nephew Daniel as he walked there ; men in armour with pointed beards and arched eye- brows, pinched ladies in hoops and ruffs with no face to speak of ; grave-looking men in black velvet and stuffed hips, and fair, frightened women hold- ing little boys by the hand; smiling politicians in magnificent perruques, and ladies of the prize- animal kind, with rose-bud mouths and full eyelids, according to Lely ; then a generation whose faces were revised and embellished in the taste of Knel- ler; and so on through refined editions of the family types in the time of Reynolds and Eomney, till the line ended with Sir Hugo and his younger brother Henleigh. This last had married Miss Grand- court, and taken her name along with her estates, thus making a junction between two equally old families, impaling the three Saracens' heads proper and three bezants of the one with the tower and falcons argent of the other, and, as it happened, uniting their highest advantages in the prospects of that Henleigh Mallinger Grandcourt who is at present VOL. I. 15 226 DANIEL DERONDA. more of an acquaintance to us than either Sir Hugo or his nephew Daniel Deronda. In Sir Hugo's youthful portrait with rolled collar and high cravat, Sir Thomas Lawrence had done justice to the agreeable alacrity of expression and sanguine temperament still to be seen in the original, but had done something more than justice in slightly lengthening the nose, which was in reality shorter than might have been expected in a Mallinger. Happily the appropriate nose of the family reap- peared in his younger brother, and was to be seen in all its refined regularity in his nephew Mallinger Grandcourt. But in the nephew Daniel Deronda the family faces of various types, seen on the walls of the gallery, found no reflex. Still he was handsomer than any of them, and when he was thirteen might have served as model for any painter who wanted to image the most memorable of boys : you could hardly have seen his face thoroughly meeting yours without believing that human creatures had done nobly in times past, and might do more nobly in time to come. The finest childlike faces have this consecrating power, and make us shudder anew at all the grossness and basely wrought griefs of the world, lest they should enter here and defile. But at this moment on the grass among the rose- petals, Daniel Deronda was making a first acquaint- ance with those griefs. A new idea had entered his mind, and was beginning to change the aspect of his habitual feelings as happy careless voyagers are changed when the sky suddenly threatens and the thought of danger arises. He sat perfectly still with his back to the tutor, while his face expressed rapid inward transition. The deep blush, which had come when he first started up, gradually subsided; but MEETING STREAMS. 227 his features kept that indescribable look of subdued activity which often accompanies a new mental sur- vey of familiar facts. He had not lived with other boys, and his mind showed the same blending of' child's ignorance with surprising knowledge which is oftener seen in bright girls. Having read Shake- speare as well as a great deal of history, he could have talked with the wisdom of a bookish child about men who were born out of wedlock and were held unfortunate in consequence, being under dis- advantages which required them to be a sort of heroes if they were to work themselves up to an equal standing with their legally born brothers. But he had never brought such knowledge into any association with his own lot, which had been too easy for him ever to think about it, until this moment when there had darted into his mind, with the magic of quick comparison, the possibility that here was the secret of his own birth, and that the man whom he called uncle was really his father. Some children, even younger than Daniel, have known the first arrival of care, like an ominous irremovable guest in their tender lives, on the dis- covery that their parents, whom they had imagined able to buy everything, were poor and in hard money troubles. Daniel felt the presence of a new guest who seemed to come with an enigmatic veiled face, and to carry dimly conjectured, dreaded revelations. The ardour which he had given to the imaginary world in his books suddenly rushed towards his own history and spent its pictorial energy there, explaining what he knew, representing the un- known. The uncle whom he loved very dearly took the aspect of a father who held secrets about him, who had done him a wrong, yes, a wrong j 228 DANIEL DERONDA. and what had become of his mother, from whom he must have been taken away ? Secrets about which he, Daniel, could never inquire ; for to speak or be spoken to about these new thoughts seemed like falling flakes of fire to his imagination. Those who have known an impassioned childhood will under- stand this dread of utterance about any shame con- nected with their parents. The impetuous advent of new images took possession of him with the force of fact for the first time told, and left him no imme- diate power for the reflection that he might be trem- bling at a fiction of his own. The terrible sense of collision between a strong rush of feeling and the dread of its betrayal found relief at length in big slow tears, which fell without restraint until the voice of Mr. Fraser was heard saying, " Daniel, do you see that you are sitting on the bent pages of your book ? " . Daniel immediately moved the book without turn- ing round, and after holding it before him for an instant, rose with it and walked away into the open grounds, where he could dry his tears unobserved. The first shock of suggestion past, he could remem- ber that he had no certainty how things really had been, and that he had been making conjectures about his own history, as he had often made stories about Pericles or Columbus, just to fill up the blanks be- fore they became famous. Only there came back certain facts which had an obstinate reality, al- most like the fragments of a bridge, telling you unmistakably how the arches lay. And again there came a mood in which his conjectures seemed like a doubt of religion, to be banished as an offence, and a mean prying after what he was not meant to know ; for there was hardly a delicacy of feeling this lad MEETING STREAMS. 229 was not capable of. But the summing up of all his fluctuating experience at this epoch was, that a secret impression had come to him which had given him something like a new sense in relation to all the elements of his life. And the idea that others probably knew things concerning him which they did not choose to mention, and which he would not have had them mention, set up in him a premature reserve which helped to intensify his inward experi- ence. His ears were open now to words which before that July day would have passed by him unnoted; and round every trivial incident which imagination could connect with his suspicions, a newly roused set of feelings were ready to cluster themselves. One such incident a month later wrought itself deeply into his life. Daniel had not only one of those thrilling boy voices which seem to bring an idyllic heaven and earth before our eyes, but a fine musical instinct, and had early made out accompani- ments for himself on the piano, while he sang from memory. Since then he had had some teaching ; and Sir Hugo, who delighted in the boy, used to ask for his music in the presence of guests. One morning after he had been singing " Sweet Echo " before a small party of gentlemen whom the rain had kept in the house, the baronet, passing from a smiling re- mark to his next neighbour, said, " Come here, Dan ! " The boy came forward with unusual reluctance. He wore an embroidered holland blouse which set off the rich colouring of his head and throat ; and the resistant gravity about his mouth and eyes as he was being smiled upon, made their beauty the more impressive. Every one was admiring him. 230 JDANIEL DERONDA. " What do you say to being a great singer ? Should you like to be adored by the world and take the house by storm, like Mario and Tamberlik ?" Daniel reddened instantaneously, but there was a just perceptible interval before he answered with angry decision, " No ; I should hate it ! " " Well, well, well ! " said Sir Hugo, with sur- prised kindliness intended to be soothing. But Daniel turned away quickly, left the room, and going to his own chamber threw himself on the broad window-sill, which was a favourite retreat of his when he had nothing particular to do. Here he could see the rain gradually subsiding with gleams through the parting clouds which lit up a great reach of the park, where the old oaks stood apart from each other, and the bordering wood was pierced with a green glade which met the eastern sky. This was a scene which had always been part of his home, part of the dignified ease which had been a matter of course in his life. And his ardent clinging nature had appropriated it all with affection. He knew a great deal of what it was to be a gentle- man by inheritance, and without thinking much about himself, for he was a boy of active per- ceptions and easily forgot his own existence in that of Robert Bruce, he had never supposed that he could be shut out from such a lot, or have a very different part in the world from that of the uncle who petted him. It is possible (though not greatly believed in at present) to be fond of poverty and take it for a bride, to prefer scoured deal, red quarries, and whitewash for one's private surroundings, to delight in no splendour but what has open doors for the whole nation, and to glory in having no privilege MEETING STREAMS. 231 except such as nature insists on ; and noblemen have been known to run away from elaborate ease and the option of idleness, that they might bind themselves for small pay to hard-handed labour. But Daniel's tastes were altogether in keeping with his nurture : his disposition was one in which every- day scenes and habits beget not ennui or rebellion, but delight, affection, aptitudes ; and now the lad had been stung to the quick by the idea that his uncle perhaps his father thought of a career for him which was totally unlike his own, and which he knew very well was not thought of among possible destinations for the sons of English gentle- men. He had often stayed in London with Sir Hugo, who to indulge the boy's ear had carried him to the opera to hear the great tenors, so that the image of a singer taking the house by storm was very vivid to him ; but now, spite of his musical gift, he set himself bitterly against the notion of being dressed up to sing before all those fine people who would not care about him except as a wonder- ful toy. That Sir Hugo should have thought of him in that position for a moment, seemed to Daniel an unmistakable proof that there was something about his birth which threw him out from the class of gentlemen to which the baronet belonged. Would it ever be mentioned to him ? Would the time come when his uncle would tell him everything ? He shrank from the prospect; in his imagination he preferred ignorance. If his father had been wicked, Daniel inwardly used strong words, for he was feeling the injury done him as a maimed boy feels the crushed limb which for others is merely reckoned in an average of accidents, if his father had done any wrong, he wished it might never be 232 DANIEL DERONDA. spoken of to him : it was already a cutting thought that such knowledge might be in other minds. Was it in Mr. Eraser's ? Probably not, else he would not have spoken in that way about the pope's nephews ? Daniel fancied, as older people do, that every one else's consciousness was as active as his own on a matter which was vital to him. Did Tur- vey the valet know ? and old Mrs. French the housekeeper ? and Banks the bailiff, with whom he had ridden about the farms on his pony ? And now there came back the recollection of a day some years before when he was drinking Mrs. Banks's whey, and Banks said to his wife with a wink and a cunning laugh, "He features the mother, eh?" At that time little Daniel had merely thought that Banks made a silly face, as the common farming men often did, laughing at what was not laugh- able ; and he rather resented being winked at and talked of as if he did not understand everything. But now that small incident became information : it was to be reasoned on. How could he be like his mother and not like his father? His mother must have been a Mallinger, if Sir Hugo were his uncle. But no ! His father might have been Sir Hugo's brother and have changed his name, as Mr. Henleigh Mallinger did when he married Miss Grandcourt. But then why had he never heard Sir Hugo speak of his brother Deronda, as he spoke of his brother Grandcourt? Daniel had never before cared about the family tree, only about that ances- tor who had killed three Saracens in one encounter. But now his mind turned to a cabinet of estate- maps in the library, where he had once seen an illu- minated parchment hanging out, that Sir Hugo said was the family tree. The phrase was new and odd MEETING STREAMS. 233 to him, he was a little fellow then, hardly more than half his present age, and he gave it no pre- cise meaning. He knew more now, and wished that he could examine that parchment. He imagined that the cabinet was always locked, and longed to try it. But here he checked himself. He might be seen; and he would never bring himself near even a silent admission of the sore that had opened in him. It is in such experiences of boy or girlhood, while elders are debating whether most education lies in science or literature, that the main lines of charac- ter are often laid down. If Daniel had been of a less ardently affectionate nature, the reserve about himself and the supposition that others had some- thing to his disadvantage in their minds, might have turned into a hard, proud antagonism. But inborn lovingness was strong enough to keep itself level with resentment. There was hardly any creature in his habitual world that he was not fond of ; teas- ing them occasionally, of course, all except his uncle, or " Nunc," as Sir Hugo had taught him to say ; for the baronet was the reverse of a straight- laced man, and left his dignity to take care of itself. Him Daniel loved in that deep-rooted filial way which makes children always the happier for being in the same room with father or mother, though their occupations may be quite apart. Sir Hugo's watch-chain and seals, his handwriting, his mode of smoking and of talking to his dogs and horses, had all a Tightness and charm about them to the boy which went along with the happiness of morning and breakfast-time. That Sir Hugo had always been a Whig, made Tories and Radicals equally opponents of the truest and best ; and the 234 DANIEL DERONDA. books he had written were all seen under the same consecration of loving belief which differenced what was his from what was not his, in spite of general resemblance. Those writings were various, from volumes of travel in the brilliant style, to articles on things in general, and pamphlets on political crises ; but to Daniel they were alike in having an unquestionable Tightness by which other people's information could be tested. Who cannot imagine the bitterness of a first sus- picion that something in this object of complete love was not quite right ? Children demand that their heroes should be fleckless, and easily believe them so : perhaps a first discovery to the contrary is hardly a less revolutionary shock to a passionate child than the threatened downfall of habitual beliefs which makes the world seem to totter for us in maturer life. But some time after this renewal of Daniel's agi- tation it appeared that Sir Hugo must have been making a merely playful experiment in his question about the singing. He sent for Daniel into the library, and looking up from his writing as the boy entered, threw himself sideways in his arm-chair. " Ah, Dan ! " he said kindly, drawing one of the old embroidered stools close to him. " Come and sit down here." Daniel obeyed, and Sir Hugo put a gentle hand on his shoulder, looking at him affectionately. " What is it, my boy ? Have you heard anything that has put you out of spirits lately ? " Daniel was determined not to let the tears come, but he could not speak. " All changes are painful when people have been happy, you know," said Sir Hugo, lifting his hand MEETING STREAMS. 235 from the boy's shoulder to his dark curls and rub- bing them gently. " You can't be educated exactly as I wish you to be without our parting. And I think you will find a great deal to like at school." This was not what Daniel expected, and was so far a relief, which gave him spirit to answer, " Am I to go to school ? " " Yes, I mean you to go to Eton. I wish you to have the education of an English gentleman ; and for that it is necessary that you should go to a pub- lic school in preparation for the university : Cambridge I mean you to go to ; it was my own university, " Daniel's colour came and went. " What do you say, sirrah ? " said Sir. Hugo, smiling. " I should like to be a gentleman," said Daniel, with firm distinctness, " and go to school, if that is what a gentleman's son must do." Sir Hugo watched him silently for a few moments, thinking he understood now why the lad had seemed angry at the notion of becoming a singer. Then he said tenderly, " And so you won't mind about leaving your old Nunc?" " Yes, I shall," said Daniel, clasping Sir Hugo's caressing arm with both his hands. " But sha'n't I come home and be with you in the holidays ? " " Oh, yes, generally," said Sir Hugo. " But now I mean you to go at once to a new tutor, to break the change for you before you go to Eton." After this interview Daniel's spirit rose again. He was meant to be a gentleman, and in some unaccountable way it might be that his conjectures were all wrong. The very keenness of the lad taught him to find comfort in his ignorance. While 236 DANIEL DERONDA. he was busying his mind in the construction of pos- sibilities, it became plain to him that there must be possibilities of which he knew nothing. He left off brooding, young joy and the spirit of adventure not being easily quenched within him, and in the inter- val before his going away he sang about the house, danced among the old servants, making them part- ing gifts, and insisted many times to the groom on the care that was to be taken of the black pony. " Do you think I shall know much less than the other boys, Mr. Eraser ? " said Daniel. It was his bent to think that every stranger would be surprised at his ignorance. " There are dunces to be found everywhere," said the judicious Fraser. "You '11 not be the biggest; but you 've not the makings of a Porson in you, or a Leibnitz either." " I don't want to be a Porson or a Leibnitz," said Daniel. " I would rather be a great leader, like Pericles or Washington." " Ay, ay ; you 've a notion they did with little parsing and less algebra," said Fraser. But in reality he thought his pupil a remarkable lad, to whom one thing was as easy as another if he had only a mind to it. Things went very well with Daniel in his new world, except that a boy with whom he was at once inclined to strike up a close friendship talked to him a great deal about his home and parents, and seemed to expect a like expansiveness in return. Daniel immediately shrank into reserve, and this experience remained a check on his naturally strong bent towards the formation of intimate friend- ships. Every one, his tutor included, set him down as a reserved boy, though he was so good- MEETING STREAMS. 237 humoured and unassuming, as well as quick both at study and sport, that nobody called his reserve disagreeable. Certainly his face had a great deal to do with that favourable interpretation ; but in this instance the beauty of the closed lips told no falsehood. A surprise that came to him before his first vacation strengthened the silent consciousness of a grief within, which might be compared in some ways with Byron's susceptibility about his deformed foot. Sir Hugo wrote word that he was married to Miss Kaymond, a sweet lady whom Daniel must remember having seen. The event would make no difference about his spending the vacation at the Abbey ; he would find Lady Mallinger a new friend whom he would be sure to love, and much more to the usual effect when a man, having done some- thing agreeable to himself, is disposed to congratu- late others on his own good fortune, and the deducible satisfactoriness of events in general. Let Sir Hugo be partly excused until the grounds of his action can be more fully known. The mis- takes in his behaviour to Deronda were due to that dulness towards what may be going on in other minds, especially the minds of children, which is among the commonest deficiencies even in good-na- tured men like him, when life has been generally easy to themselves, and their energies have been quietly spent in feeling gratified. No one was better aware than he that Daniel was generally sus- pected to be his own son. But he was pleased with that suspicion ; and his imagination had never once been troubled with the way in which the boy him- self might be affected, either then or in the future, by the enigmatic aspect of his circumstances. He 238 DANIEL DERONDA. was as fond of him as could be, and meant the best by him. And considering the lightness with which the preparation of young lives seems to lie on respectable consciences, Sir Hugo Mallinger can hardly be held open to exceptional reproach. He had been a bachelor till he was five-and-forty, had always been regarded as a fascinating man of ele- gant tastes; what could be more natural, even according to the index of language, than that he should have a beautiful boy like the little Deronda to take care of? The mother might even perhaps be in the great world, met with in Sir Hugo's residences abroad. The only person to feel any ob- jection was the boy himself, who could not have been consulted. And the boy's objections had never been dreamed of by anybody but himself. By the time Deronda was ready to go to Cam- bridge, Lady Mallinger had already three daughters, charming babies, all three, but whose sex was announced as a melancholy alternative, the offspring desired being a son : if Sir Hugo had no son, the succession must go to his nephew Mallinger Grand- court. Daniel no longer held a wavering opinion about his own birth. His fuller knowledge had tended to convince him that Sir Hugo was his father ; and he conceived that the baronet, since he never approached a communication on the subject, wished him to have a tacit understanding of the fact, and to accept in silence what would be generally considered more than the due love and nurture. Sir Hugo's marriage might certainly have been felt as a new ground of resentment by some youths in Deron- da's position, and the timid Lady Mallinger with her fast-coming little ones might have been images to scowl at, as likely to divert much that was dis- MEETING STREAMS. 239 posable in the feelings and possessions of the baronet from one who felt his own claim to be prior. But hatred of innocent human obstacles was a form of moral stupidity not in Deronda's grain ; even the indignation which had long mingled itself with his affection for Sir Hugo took the quality of pain rather than of temper ; and as his mind ripened to the idea of tolerance towards error, he habitually linked the idea with his own silent grievances. The sense of an entailed disadvantage the de- formed foot doubtfully hidden by the shoe makes a restlessly active spiritual yeast, and easily turns a self-centred, unloving nature into an Ishrnaelite. But in the rarer sort, who presently see their own frustrated claim as one among a myriad, the inex- orable sorrow takes the form of fellowship, and makes the imagination tender. Deronda's early- wakened susceptibility, charged at first with ready indignation and resistant pride, had raised in him a premature reflection on certain questions of life ; it had given a bias to his conscience, a sympathy with certain ills, and a tension of resolve in certain direc- tions, which marked him off from other youths much more than any talents he possessed. One day near the end of the Long Vacation, when he had been making a tour in the Ehineland with his Eton tutor, and was come for a farewell stay at the Abbey before going to Cambridge, he said to Sir Hugo, " What do you intend me to be, sir ? " They were in the library, and it was the fresh morning. Sir Hugo had called him in to read a letter from a Cambridge Don who was to be interested in him; and since the baronet wore an air at once business- like and leisurely, the moment seemed propitious 240 DANIEL DERONDA. for entering on a grave subject which had never yet been thoroughly discussed. " Whatever your inclination leads you to, my boy. I thought it right to give you the option of the army, but you shut the door on that, and I was glad. I don't expect you to choose just yet, by and by, when you have looked about you a little more and tried your mettle among older men. The university has a good wide opening into the forum. There are prizes to be won, and a bit of good fortune often gives the turn to a man's taste. From what I see and hear, I should think you can take up any- thing you like. You are in deeper water with your classics than I ever got into, and if you are rather sick of that swimming, Cambridge is the place where you can go into mathematics with a will, and disport yourself on the dry sand as much as you like. I floundered along like a carp." " I suppose money will make some difference, sir," said Daniel, blushing. " I shall have to keep myself by and by." "Not exactly. I recommend you not to be extravagant, yes, yes, I know, you are not in- clined to that; but you need not take up any- thing against the grain. You will have a bachelor's income, enough for you to look about with. Per- haps I had better tell you that you may consider yourself secure of seven hundred a year. You might make yourself a barrister, be a writer, take up politics. I confess that is what would please me best. I should like to have you at my elbow and pulling with me." Deronda looked embarrassed. He felt that he ought to make some sign of gratitude, but other feelings clogged his tongue. A moment was pass- MEETING STREAMS. 241 ing by in which a question about his birth was throbbing within him, and yet it seemed more impossible than ever that the question should find vent, more impossible than ever that he could hear certain things from Sir Hugo's lips. The liberal way in which he was dealt with was the more striking because the baronet had of late cared particularly for money, and for making the utmost of his life-interest in the estate by way of provid- ing for his daughters; and as all this flashed through Daniel's mind, it was momentarily within his imagination that the provision for him might come in some way from his mother. But such vaporous conjecture passed away as quickly as it came. Sir Hugo appeared not to notice anything peculiar in Daniel's manner, and presently went on with his usual chatty liveliness. " I am glad you have done some good reading out- side your classics, and have got a grip of French and German. The truth is, unless a man can get the prestige and income of a Don and write donnish books, it 's hardly worth while for him to make a Greek and Latin machine of himself, and be able to spin you out pages of the Greek dramatists at any verse you'll give him as a cue. That's all very fine, but in practical life nobody does give you the cue for pages of Greek. In fact, it 's a nicety of conversation which I would have you attend to, much quotation of any sort, even in English, is bad. It tends to choke ordinary remark. One could n't carry on life comfortably without a little blindness to the fact that everything has been said better than we can put it ourselves. But talking of Dons, I have seen Dons make a capital figure in VOL. I. 16 242 DANIEL DERONDA. society ; and occasionally they can shoot you down a cartload of learning in the right place, which will tell in politics. Such men are wanted ; and if you have any turn for being a Don, I say nothing against it." " I think there 's not much chance of that. Quicksett and Puller are much stronger than I am. I hope you will not be much disappointed if I don't come out with high honours." " No, no. I should like you to do yourself credit, but for God's sake don't come out as a superior expensive kind of idiot, like young Brecon, who got a Double First, and has been learning to knit braces ever since. What I wish you to get is a passport in life. I don't go against our university system : we want a little disinterested culture to make head against cotton and capital, especially in the House. My Greek has all evaporated: if I had to construe a verse on a sudden, I should get an apoplectic fit. But it formed my taste. I dare say my English is the better for it." On this point Daniel kept a respectful silence. The enthusiastic belief in Sir Hugo's writings as a standard, and in the Whigs as the chosen race among politicians, had gradually vanished along with the seraphic boy's face. He had not been the hardest of workers at Eton. Though some kinds of study and reading came as easily as boating to him, he was not of the material that usually makes the first-rate Eton scholar. There had sprung up in him a meditative yearning after wide knowledge which is likely always to abate ardour in the fight for prize acquirement in narrow tracks. Happily he was modest, and took any second-rateness in him- self simply as a fact, not as a marvel necessarily to be accounted for by a superiority. Still Mr. MEETING STREAMS. 243 Eraser's high opinion of the lad had not been altogether belied by the youth : Daniel had the stamp of rarity in a subdued fervour of sympathy, an activity of imagination on behalf of others, which did not show itself effusively, but was con- tinually seen in acts of considerateness that struck his companions as moral eccentricity. " Deronda would have been first-rate if he had had more ambition " - was a frequent remark about him. But how could a fellow push his way properly when he objected to swop for his own advantage, knocked under by choice when he was within an inch of victory, and, unlike the great Clive, would rather be the calf than the butcher ? It was a mistake, however, to suppose that Deronda had not his share of ambition : we know he had suffered keenly from the belief that there was a tinge of dishonour in his lot ; but there are some cases, and his was one of them, in which the sense of injury breeds not the will to inflict injuries and climb over them as a ladder, but a hatred of all injury. He had his flashes of fierceness, and could hit out upon occasion ; but the occasions were not always what might have been expected. For in what related to himself his resentful impulses had been early checked by a mastering affectionateness. Love has a habit of saying " Never mind " to angry self, who, sitting down for the nonce in the lower place, by and by gets used to it. So it was that as Deronda approached manhood his feeling for Sir Hugo, while it was getting more and more mixed with criticism, was gaining in that sort of allowance which reconciles criticism with tender- ness. The dear old beautiful home and everything within it, Lady Mallinger and her little ones in- 244 DANIEL DERONDA. eluded, were consecrated for the youth as they had been for the boy, only with a certain dif- ference of light on the objects. The altar-piece was no longer miraculously perfect, painted under infallible guidance, but the human hand discerned in the work was appealing to a reverent tender- ness safer from the gusts of discovery. Certainly Deronda's ambition, even in his spring-time, lay exceptionally aloof from conspicuous, vulgar tri- umph, and from other ugly forms of boyish energy ; perhaps because he was early impassioned by ideas, and burned his fire on those heights. One may spend a good deal of energy in disliking and resisting what others pursue ; and a boy who is fond of somebody else's pencil-case may not be more energetic than another who is fond of giving his own pencil-case away. Still, it was not De- ronda's disposition to escape from ugly scenes : he was more inclined to sit through them and take care of the fellow least able to take care of him- self. It had helped to make him popular that he was sometimes a little compromised by this apparent comradeship. For a meditative interest in learning how human miseries are wrought as precocious in him as another sort of genius in the poet who writes a Queen Mab at nineteen was so infused with kindliness that it easily passed for comradeship. Enough. In many of our neighbours' lives there is much not only of error and lapse, but of a certain exquisite goodness which can never be written or even spoken, only divined by each of us, according to the inward instruction of our own privacy. The impression he made at Cambridge corre- sponded to his position at Eton. Every one interested in him agreed that he might have taken MEETING STREAMS. 245 a high place if his motives had been of a more pushing sort, and if he had not, instead of regard- ing studies as instruments of success, hampered himself with the notion that they were to feed motive and opinion, a notion which set him criticising methods and arguing against his freight and harness when he should have been using all his might to pull. In the beginning his work at the university had a new zest for him : indifferent to the continuation of the Eton classical drill, he applied himself vigorously to mathematics, for which he had shown an early aptitude under Mr. Fraser, and he had the delight of feeling his strength in a comparatively fresh exercise of thought. That delight, and the favourable opinion of his tutor, determined him to try for a mathemat- ical scholarship in the Easter of his second year: he wished to gratify Sir Hugo by some achieve- ment, and the study of the higher mathematics, having the growing fascination inherent in all thinking which demands intensity, was making him a more exclusive worker than he had been before. But here came the old check which had been growing with his growth. He found the inward bent towards comprehension and thoroughness di- verging more and more from the track marked out by the standards of examination : he felt a height- ening discontent with the wearing futility and enfeebling strain of a demand for excessive reten- tion and dexterity without any insight into the principles which form the vital connections of knowledge. (Deronda's undergraduateship occurred fifteen years ago, when the perfection of our uni- versity methods was not yet indisputable.) In hours when his dissatisfaction was strong upon him 246 DANIEL DERONDA. he reproached himself for having been attracted by the conventional advantage of belonging to an English university, and was tempted towards the project of asking Sir Hugo to let him quit Cam- bridge and pursue a more independent line of study abroad. The germs of this inclination had been already stirring in his boyish love of universal history, which made him want to be at home in foreign countries, and follow in imagination the travelling students of the middle ages. He longed now to have the sort of apprenticeship to life which would not shape him too definitely, and rob him of the choice that might come from a free growth. One sees that Deronda's demerits were likely to be on the side of reflective hesitation, and this tendency was encouraged by his position : there was no need for him to get an immediate income, or to fit him- self in haste for a profession ; and his sensibility to the half-known facts of his parentage made him an excuse for lingering longer than others in a state of social neutrality. Other men, he inwardly said, had a more definite place and duties. But the project which flattered his inclination might not have gone beyond the stage of ineffective brooding, if certain circumstances had not quickened it into action. The circumstances arose out of an enthusiastic friendship which extended into his after-life. Of the same year with himself, and occupying small rooms close to his, was a youth who had come as an exhibitioner from Christ's Hospital, and had eccentricities enough for a Charles Lamb. Only to look at his pinched features and blond hair hanging over his collar reminded one of pale quaint heads by early German painters ; and when this faint colouring was lit up by a joke, there came MEETING STREAMS. 247 sudden creases about the mouth and eyes which might have been moulded by the soul of an aged humourist. His father, an engraver of some dis- tinction, had been dead eleven years, and his mother had three girls to educate and maintain on a meagre annuity. Hans Meyrick he had been daringly christened after Holbein felt him- self the pillar, or rather the knotted and twisted trunk, round which these feeble climbing plants must cling. There was no want of ability or of honest well-meaning affection to make the prop trustworthy : the ease and quickness with which he studied might serve him to win prizes at Cam- bridge, as he had done among the Blue Coats, in spite of irregularities. The only danger was, that the incalculable tendencies in him might be fatally timed, and that his good intentions might be frus- trated by some act which was not due to habit but to capricious, scattered impulses. He could not be said to have any one bad habit ; yet at longer or shorter intervals he had fits of impish recklessness, and did things that would have made the worst habits. Hans in his right mind, however, was a lovable creature, and in Deronda he had happened to find a friend who was likely to stand by him with the more constancy, from compassion for these brief aberra- tions that might bring a long repentance. Hans, indeed, shared Deronda's rooms nearly as much as he used his own : to Deronda he poured himself out on his studies, his affairs, his hopes ; the poverty of his home, and his love for the creatures there ; the itching of his fingers to draw, and his determina- tion to fight it away for the sake of getting some sort of plum that he might divide with his mother 248 DANIEL DERONDA. and the girls. He wanted no confidence in return, but seemed to take Deronda as an Olympian who needed nothing, an egotism in friendship which is common enough with mercurial, expansive na- tures. Deronda was content, and gave Meyrick all the interest he claimed, getting at last a brotherly anxiety about him, looking after him in his erratic moments, and contriving by adroitly delicate devices not only to make up for his friend's lack of pence, but to save him from threatening chances. Such friendship easily becomes tender : the one spreads strong sheltering wings that delight in spreading; the other gets the warm protection which is also a delight. Meyrick was going in for a classical scholarship ; and his success, in various ways mo- mentous, was the more probable from the steadying influence of Deronda's friendship. But an imprudence of Meyrick's, committed at the beginning of the autumn term, threatened to disappoint his hopes. With his usual alternation between unnecessary expense and self -privation, he had given too much money for an old engraving which fascinated him, and to make up for it, had come from London in a third-class carriage with his eyes exposed to a bitter wind and any irritating particles the wind might drive before it. The con- sequence was a severe inflammation of the eyes, which for some time hung over him the threat of a lasting injury. This crushing trouble called out all Deronda's readiness to devote himself, and he made every other occupation secondary to that of being companion and eyes to Hans, working with him and for him at his classics, that if possible his chance of the classical scholarship might be saved. Hans, to keep the knowledge of his suffering from MEETING STREAMS. 249 his mother and sisters, alleged his work as a reason for passing the Christinas at Cambridge, and his friend stayed up with him. Meanwhile Deronda relaxed his hold on his mathematics ; and Hans, reflecting on this, at length said, "Old fellow, while you are hoisting me you are risking yourself. With your mathematical cram one may be like Moses or Mahomet or some- body of that sort who had to cram, and forgot in one day what it had taken him forty to learn." Deronda would not admit that he cared about the risk, and he had really been beguiled into a little indifference by double sympathy: he was very anxious that Hans should not miss the much- needed scholarship, and he felt a revival of interest in the old studies. Still, when Hans, rather late in the day, got able to use his own eyes, Deronda had tenacity enough to try hard and recover his lost ground. He failed, however ; but he had the satisfaction of seeing Meyrick win. Success, as a sort of beginning that urged com- pletion, might have reconciled Deronda to his university course ; but the emptiness of all things, from politics to pastimes, is never so striking to us as when we fail in them. The loss of the personal triumph had no severity for him, but the sense of having spent his time ineffectively in a mode of working which had been against the grain, gave him a distaste for any renewal of the process, which turned his imagined project of quitting Cambridge into a serious intention. In speaking of his inten- tion to Meyrick he made it appear that he was glad of the turn events had taken, glad to have the balance dip decidedly, and feel freed from his hesitations ; but he observed that he must of course 2 5 o DANIEL DERONDA. submit to any strong objection on the part of Sii Hugo. Meyrick's joy and gratitude were disturbed by much uneasiness. He believed in Deronda's al- leged preference, but he felt keenly that in serving him Daniel had placed himself at a disadvantage in Sir Hugo's opinion, and he said mournfully : " If you had got the scholarship, Sir Hugo would have thought that you asked to leave us with a bet- ter grace. You have spoilt your luck, for my sake, and I can do nothing to mend it" " Yes, you can ; you are to be a first-rate fellow. I call that a first-rate investment of my luck." " Oh, confound it ! You save an ugly mongrel from drowning, and expect him to cut a fine figure. The poets have made tragedies enough about sign- ing one's self over to wickedness for the sake of getting something plummy ; I shall write a tragedy of a fellow who signed himself over to be good, and was uncomfortable ever after." But Hans lost no time in secretly writing the history of the affair to Sir Hugo, making it plain that but for Deronda's generous devotion he could hardly have failed to win the prize he had been working for. The two friends went up to town together : Mey- rick to rejoice with bis mother and the girls in their little home at Chelsea ; Deronda to carry out the less easy task of opening his mind to Sir Hugo. He relied a little on the baronet's general tolerance of eccentricities, but he expected more opposition than he met with. He was received with even warmer kindness than usual, the failure was passed over lightly, and when he detailed his reasons for wish- ing to quit the university and go to study abroad, MEETING STREAMS. 251 Sir Hugo sat for some time in a silence which was rather meditative than surprised. At last he said, looking at Daniel with examination, " So you don't want to be an Englishman to the backbone, after all?" " I want to be an Englishman, but I want to understand other points of view. And I want to get rid of a merely English attitude in studies." " I see ; you don't want to be turned out in the same mould as every other youngster. And I have nothing to say against your doffing some of our national prejudices. I feel the better myself for having spent a good deal of my time abroad. But, for God's sake, keep an English cut, and don't be- come indifferent to bad tobacco ! And, my dear boy, it is good to be unselfish and generous ; but don't carry that too far. It will not do to give yourself to be melted down for the benefit of the tallow-trade ; you must know where to find yourself. However, I shall put no veto on your going. Wait until I can get off Committee, and I '11 run over with you." So Deronda went according to his will. But not before he had spent some hours with Hans Meyrick, and been introduced to the mother and sisters in the Chelsea home. The shy girls watched and registered every look of their brother's friend, declared by Hans to have been the salvation of him, a fellow like nobody else, and, in fine, a brick. They so thoroughly accepted Deronda as an ideal, that when he was gone the youngest set to work, under the criticism of the two elder girls, to paint him as Prince Camaralzaman. CHAPTER XVII. This is truth the poet sings, That a sorrow's crown of sorrow is remembering happier things. TENNYSON : Locksley HalL ON a fine evening near the end of July, Deronda was rowing himself on the Thames. It was al- ready a year or more since he had come back to England, with the understanding that his educa- tion was finished, and that he was somehow to take his place in English society ; but though, in deference to Sir Hugo's wish, and to fence off idle- ness, he had begun to read law, this apparent de- cision had been without other result than to deepen the roots of indecision. His old love of boating had revived with the more force now that he was in town with the Mallingers, because he could nowhere else get the same still seclusion which the river gave him. He had a boat of his own at Putney, and whenever Sir Hugo did not want him, it was his chief holiday to row till past sunset and come in again with the stars. Not that he was in a sen- timental stage; but he was in another sort of contemplative mood perhaps more common in the young men of our day, that of questioning whether it were worth while to take part in the battle of the world ; I mean, of course, the young men in whom the unproductive labour of questioning is sustained by three or five per cent on capital which some- body else has battled for. It puzzled Sir Hugo that one who made a splendid contrast with all that was MEETING STREAMS. 253 sickly and puling should be hampered with ideas which, since they left an accomplished Whig like himself unobstructed, could be no better than spec- tral illusions; especially as Deronda set himself against authorship, a vocation which is under- stood to turn foolish thinking into funds. Rowing in his dark-blue shirt and skull-cap, his curls closely clipped, his mouth beset with abun- dant soft waves of beard, he bore only disguised traces of the seraphic boy " trailing clouds of glory." Still, even one who had never seen him since his boy- hood might have looked at him with slow recogni- tion, due perhaps to- the peculiarity of the gaze which Gwendolen chose to call " dreadful," though it had really a very mild sort of scrutiny. The voice, sometimes audible in subdued snatches of song, had turned out merely a high barytone; indeed, only to look at his lithe powerful frame and the firm gravity of his face would have been enough for an experienced guess that he had no rare and ravishing tenor such as nature reluctantly makes at some sacrifice. Look at his hands ; they are not small and dimpled, with tapering fingers that seem to have only a deprecating touch ; they are long, flexible, firmly grasping hands, such as Titian has painted in a picture where he wanted to show the combination of refinement with force. And there is something of a likeness, too, between the faces belonging to the hands, in both the uniform pale-brown skin, the perpendicular brow, the calmly penetrating eyes. Not seraphic any longer: thor- oughly terrestrial and manly ; but still of a kind to raise belief in a human dignity which can afford to acknowledge poor relations. Such types meet us here and there among average 254 DANIEL DERONDA. conditions; in a workman, for example, whistling over a bit of measurement and lifting his eyes to answer our question about the road. And often the grand meanings of faces as well as of written words may lie chiefly in the impressions of those who look on them. But it is precisely such impres- sions that happen just now to be of importance in re- lation to Deronda, rowing on the Thames in a very ordinary equipment for a young Englishman at lei- sure, and passing under Kew Bridge with no thought of an adventure in which his appearance was likely to play any part. In fact, he objected very strongly to the notion, which others had not allowed him to esoape, that his appearance was of a kind to draw attention ; and hints of this, intended to be com- plimentary, found an angry resonance in him, coming from mingled experiences, to which a clew has already been given. His own face in the glass had during many years been associated for him with thoughts of some one whom he must be like, one about whose character and lot he continually won- dered, and never dared to ask. In the neighbourhood of Kew Bridge, between six and seven o'clock, the river was no solitude. Several persons were sauntering on the towing- path, and here and there a boat was plying. Deronda had been rowing fast to get over this spot, when, becoming aware of a great barge advanc- ing towards him, he guided his boat aside, and rested on his oar within a couple of yards of the river-brink. He was all the while unconsciously continuing the low-toned chant which had haunted his throat all the way up the river, the gondolier's song in the " Otello," where Rossini has worthily set to music the immortal words of Dante, DEROXTU MEETS MIRAH ox THE BANKS OF THE THAMES. MEETING STREAMS. 255 " Nessun maggior dolore Che ricordarsi del tempo i'elice Nella miseria ; " l and as he rested on his oar, the pianissimo fall of the melodic wail " nella miseria " was distinctly audible on the brink of the water. Three or four persons had paused at various spots to watch the barge pass- ing the bridge, and doubtless included in their notice the young gentleman in the boat ; but probably it was only to one ear that the low vocal sounds came with more significance than if they had been an insect-murmur amidst the sum of current noises. Deronda, awaiting the barge, now turned his head to the river-side, and saw at a few yards' distance from him a figure which might have been an impersonation of the misery he was uncon- sciously giving voice to : a girl hardly more than eighteen, of low slim figure, with most delicate O ' " little face, her dark curls pushed behind her ears under a large black hat, a long woollen cloak over her shoulders. Her hands were hanging down clasped before her, and her eyes were fixed on the river with a look of immovable, statue-like despair. This strong arrest of his attention made him cease singing : apparently his voice had entered her inner world without her having taken any note of whence it came, for when it suddenly ceased she changed her attitude slightly, and looking round with a frightened glance, met Derouda's face. It was but a couple of moments, but that seems a long while for two people to look straight at each other. Her look was something like that of a fawn or other gentle animal before it turns to run away : no 1 Dante's words are best rendered by our own poet in the lines at the head of the chapter. 256 DANIEL DERONDA. blush, no special alarm, but only some timidity which yet could not hinder her from a long look before she turned. In fact, it seemed to Deronda that she was only half conscious of her surround- ings : was she hungry, or was there some other cause of bewilderment ? He felt an outleap of interest and compassion towards her ; but the next instant she had turned and walked away to a neigh- bouring bench under a tree. He had no right to linger and watch her: poorly dressed, melancholy women are common sights ; it was only the delicate beauty, the picturesque lines and colour of the image that were exceptional, and these conditions made it the more markedly impossible that he should obtrude his interest upon her. He began to row away, and was soon far up the river ; but no other thoughts were busy enough quite to expel that pale image of unhappy girlhood. He fell again and again to speculating on the probable romance that lay behind that loneliness and look of desolation ; then to smile at his own share in the prejudice that interesting faces must have interesting adventures; then to justify himself for feeling that sorrow was the more tragic when it befell delicate, childlike beauty. " I should not have forgotten the look of misery if she had been ugly and vulgar," he said to himself. But there was no denying that the attractiveness of the image made it likelier to last. It was clear to him as an onyx cameo: the brown-black drapery, the white face with small, small features and dark, long-lashed eyes. His mind glanced over the girl- tragedies that are going on in the world, hidden, unheeded, as if they were but tragedies of the copse or hedgerow, where the helpless drag wounded wings forsakenly, and streak the shadowed moss with the MEETING STREAMS. 257 red moment-hand of their own death. Deronda of late, in his solitary excursions, had been occupied chiefly with uncertainties about his own course ; but those uncertainties, being much at their leisure, were wont to have such wide-sweeping connec- tions with all life and history that the new image of helpless sorrow easily blent itself with what seemed to him the strong array of reasons why he should shrink from getting into that routine of the world which makes men apologize for all its wrong- doing, and take opinions as mere professional equip- ment, why he should not draw strongly at any thread in the hopelessly entangled scheme of things. He used his oars little, satisfied to go with the tide and be taken back by it. It was his habit to indulge himself in that solemn passivity which easily comes with the lengthening shadows and mellowing light, when thinking and desiring melt together imperceptibly, and what in other hours may have seemed argument takes the quality of passionate vision. By the time he had come back again with the tide past Kichmond Bridge the sun was near setting ; and the approach of his favourite hour with its deepening stillness, and darkening masses of tree and building between the double glow of the sky and the river disposed him to linger as if they had been an unfinished strain of music. He looked out for a perfectly solitary spot where he could lodge his boat against the bank, and, throwing himself on his back with his head propped on the cushions, could watch out the light of sunset and the opening of that bead-roll which some Oriental poet describes as God's call to the little stars, who each answer, " Here am I." He chose a spot in the bend of the river just VOL. I. 17 258 DANIEL DERONDA. opposite Kew Gardens, where he had a great breadth of water before him reflecting the glory of the sky, while he himself was in shadow. He lay with his hands behind his head propped on a level with the boat's edge, so that he could see all around him, but could not be seen by any one at a few yards' dis- tance ; and for a long while he never turned his eyes from the view right in front of him. He was forgetting everything else in a half-speculative, half- involuntary identification of himself with the objects he was looking at, thinking how far it might be pos- sible habitually to shift his centre till his own personality would be no less outside him than the landscape, when the sense of something moving on the bank opposite him where it was bordered by a line of willow-bushes, made him turn his glance thitherward. In the first moment he had a darting presentiment about the moving figure ; and now he could see the small face with the strange dying sun- light upon it. He feared to frighten her by a sud- den movement, and watched her with motionless attention. She looked round, but seemed only to gather security from the apparent solitude, hid her hat among the willows, and immediately took off her woollen cloak. Presently she seated herself and deliberately dipped the cloak in the water, holding it there a little while, then taking it out with effort, rising from her seat as she did so. By this time Derouda felt sure that she meant to wrap the wet cloak round her as a drowning-shroud ; there was no longer time to hesitate about frightening her. He rose and seized his oar to ply across ; happily her position lay a little below him. The poor thing, overcome with terror at this sign of discovery from the opposite bank, sank down on the brink again, MEETING STREAMS. 259 holding her cloak but half out of the water. She crouched and covered her face as if she kept a faint hope that she had not been seen, and that the boat- man was accidentally coming towards her. But soon he was within brief space of her, steadying his boat against the bank, and speaking, but very gently, "Don't be afraid. . . . You are unhappy. . . . Pray trust me. . . . Tell me what I can do to help you." She raised her head and looked up at him. His face now was towards the light, and she knew it again. But she did not speak for a few moments, which were a renewal of their former gaze at each other. At last she said in a low sweet voice, with an accent so distinct that it suggested foreignness and yet was not foreign, " I saw you before ; " . . . and then added dreamily, after a like pause, " nella miseria." Deronda, not understanding the connection of her thought, supposed that her mind was weakened by distress and hunger. " It was you, singing ? " she went on, hesitatingly "Nessun maggior dolore." . . . The mere words themselves, uttered in her sweet undertones, seemed to give the melody to Deronda's ear. "Ah, yes," he said, understanding now, "I am often singing them. But I fear you will injure your- self staying here. Pray let me carry you in my boat to some place of safety. And that wet cloak let me take it." He would not attempt to take it without her leave, dreading lest he should scare her. Even at his words, he fancied that she shrank and clutched the cloak more tenaciously. But her eyes were fixed 260 DANIEL DERONDA. on him with a question in them as she said, " You look good. Perhaps it is God's command." " Do trust me. Let me help you. I will die before I will let any harm come to you." She rose from her sitting posture, first dragging the saturated cloak and then letting it fall on the ground, it was too heavy for her tired arms. Her little woman's figure as she laid her delicate chilled hands together one over the other against her waist, and went a step backward while she leaned her head forward as if not to lose her sight of his face, was unspeakably touching. " Great God ! " the words escaped Deronda in a tone so low and solemn that they seemed like a prayer become unconsciously vocal. The agitating impres- sion this forsaken girl was making on him stirred a fibre that lay close to his deepest interest in the fates of women, " perhaps my mother was like this one." The old thought had come now with a new impetus of mingled feeling, and urged that exclamation in which both East and West have for ages concentrated their awe in the presence of inexorable calamity. The low-toned words seemed to have some re- assurance in them for the hearer: she stepped for- ward close to the boat's side, and Deronda put out his hand, hoping now that she would let him help her in. She had already put her tiny hand into his, which closed round it, when some new thought struck her, and drawing back she said, " I have nowhere to go, nobody belonging to me in all this land." " I will take you to a lady who has daughters," said Deronda, immediately. He felt a sort of relief in gathering that the wretched home and cruel friends he imagined her to be fleeing from were not in the MEETING STREAMS. 261 near background. Still she hesitated, and said more timidly than ever, " Do you belong to the theatre ? " "No; I have nothing to do with the theatre," said Deronda, in a decided tone. Then beseech- ingly, " I will put you in perfect safety at once : with a lady, a good woman ; I am sure she will be kind. Let us lose no time : you will make yourself ill. Life may still become sweet to you. There are good people there are good women who will take care of you." She drew backward no more, but stepped in easily, as if she were used to such action, and sat down on the cushions. " You had a covering for your head," said Deronda. " My hat ? " (she lifted up her hands to her head.) " It is quite hidden in the bush." " I will find it," said Deronda, putting out his hand deprecatingly as she attempted to rise. " The boat is fixed." He jumped out, found the hat, and lifted up the saturated cloak, wringing it and throwing it into the bottom of the boat. " We must carry the cloak away, to prevent any one who may have noticed you from thinking you have been drowned," he said cheerfully, as he got in again and presented the old hat to her. " I wish I had any other garment than my coat to offer you. But shall you mind throwing it over your shoulders while we are on the water ? It is quite an ordinary thing to do, when people return late and are not enough provided with wraps." He 'held out the coat towards her with a smile, and there came a faint melancholy smile in answer, as she took it and put it on very cleverly. 262 DANIEL DERONDA. " I have some biscuits, should you like them ? " said Deronda. " No ; I cannot eat. I had still some money left to buy bread." He began to ply his oar without further remark, and they went along swiftly for many minutes with- out speaking. She did not look at him, but was watching the oar, leaning forward in an attitude of repose, as if she were beginning to feel the comfort of returning warmth and the prospect of life instead of death. The twilight was deepening; the red flush was all gone, and the little stars were giving their answer one after another. The moon was rising, but was still entangled among trees and buildings. The light was not such that he could distinctly discern the expression of her features or her glance, but they were distinctly before him nevertheless, features and a glance which seemed to have given a fuller meaning for him to the human face. Among his anxieties one was dominant : his first impression about her, that her mind might be disordered, had not been quite dissipated : the pro- ject of suicide was unmistakable, and gave a deeper colour to every other suspicious sign. He longed to begin a conversation, but abstained, wishing to en- courage the confidence that might induce her to speak first. At last she did speak. " I like to listen to the oar." So do I." "If you had not come, I should have been dead now." " I cannot bear you to speak of that I hope you will never be sorry that I came." " I cannot see how I shall be glad to live. The maggior dolore and the miseria have lasted longer MEETING STREAMS. 263 than the tempo felice." She paused, and then went on dreamily, " Dolor e miseria I think those words are alive." Deronda was mute: to question her seemed an unwarrantable freedom ; he shrank from appearing to claim the authority of a benefactor, or to treat her with the less reverence because she was in dis- tress. She went on musingly, " I thought it was not wicked. Death and life are one before the Eternal. I know our fathers slew their children and then slew themselves, to keep their souls pure. I meant it so. But now I am commanded to live. I cannot see how I shall live." " You will find friends. I will find them for you." She shook her head and said mournfully, "Not my mother and brother. I cannot find them." "You are English? You must be, speaking English so perfectly." She did not answer immediately, but looked at Deronda again, straining to see him in the doubtful light. Until now she had been watching the oar. It seemed as if she were half roused, and wondered which part of her impressions was dreaming and which waking. Sorrowful isolation had benumbed her sense of reality, and the power of distinguish- ing outward and inward was continually slipping away from her. Her look was full of wondering timidity, such as the forsaken one in the desert might have lifted to the angelic vision before she knew whether his message were in anger or in pity. " You want to know if I am English ? " she said at last, while Deronda was reddening nervously under a gaze which he felt more fully than he saw. " I want to know nothing except what you like to tell me," he said, still uneasy in the fear that her 264 DANIEL DERONDA. miiid was wandering. " Perhaps it is not good for you to talk." " Yes, I will tell you. I am English-born. But I am a Jewess." Deronda was silent, inwardly wondering that he had not said this to himself before, though any one who had seen delicate-faced Spanish girls might simply have guessed her to be Spanish. " Do you despise me for it ? " she said presently, in low tones, which had a sadness that pierced like a cry from a small dumb creature in fear. " Why should I ? " said Deronda. " I am not so foolish." "I know many Jews are bad." " So are many Christians. But I should not think it fair for you to despise me because of that." " My mother and brother were good. But I shall never find them. I am come a long way from abroad. I ran away ; but I cannot tell you I can- not speak of it. I thought I might find my mother again God would guide me. But then I de- spaired. This moruing when the light came, I felt as if one word kept sounding within me, Never ! never ! But now I begin to think " her words were broken by rising sobs "I am commanded to live perhaps we are going to her." With an outburst of weeping she buried her head on her knees. He hoped that this passionate weep- ing might relieve her excitement. Meanwhile he was inwardly picturing in much embarrassment how he should present himself with her in Park Lane, the course which he had at first unreflectingly deter- mined on. No one kinder and more gentle than Lady Mallinger ; but it was hardly probable that she would be at home ; and he had a shuddering MEETING STREAMS. 265 sense of a lackey staring at this delicate, sorrowful ' image of womanhood, of glaring lights and fine staircases, and perhaps chilling suspicious manners from lady's-maid and housekeeper, that might scare the mind already in a state of dangerous suscepti- bility. But to take her to any other shelter than a home already known to hirn was not to be contem- plated : he was full of fears about the issue of the adventure which had brought on him a responsi- bility all the heavier for the strong and agitating impression this childlike creature had made on him. But another resource came to mind : he could ven- ture to take her to Mrs. Meyrick's, to the small home at Chelsea, where he had been often enough since his return from abroad to feel sure that he could appeal there to generous hearts, which had a romantic readiness to believe in innocent need and to help it. Hans Meyrick was safe away in Italy, and Deronda felt the comfort of presenting himself with his charge at a house where he would be met by a motherly figure of quakerish neatness, and three girls who hardly knew of any evil closer to them than what lay in history books and dramas, and would at once associate a lovely Jewess with Rebecca in " Ivanhoe," besides thinking that every- thing they did at Deronda's request would be done for their idol, Hans. The vision of the Chelsea home once raised, Deronda no longer hesitated. The rumbling thither in the cab after the still- ness of the water seemed long. Happily his charge had been quiet since her fit of weeping, and sub- mitted like a tired child. When they were in the cab, she laid down her hat and tried to rest her head, but the jolting movement would not let it rest : still she dozed, and her sweet head hung help- less first on one side, then on the other. 266 DANIEL DERONDA. " They are too good to have any fear about taking her in," thought Deronda. Her person, her voice, her exquisite utterance, were one strong appeal to belief and tenderness. Yet what had been the history which had brought her to this desolation ? He was going on a strange errand, to ask shelter for this waif. Then there occurred to him the beautiful story Plutarch somewhere tells of the Delphic women : how when the Maenads, outworn with their torch-lit wanderings, lay down to sleep in the market-place, the matrons came and stood silently round them to keep guard over their slum- bers; then, when they waked, ministered to them tenderly and saw them safely to their own borders. He could trust the women he was going to for having hearts as good. Deronda felt himself growing older this evening and entering on a new phase in finding a life to which his own had come perhaps as a rescue ? But how to make sure that snatching from death was rescue? The moment of finding a fellow-crea- ture is often as full of mingled doubt and exultation as the moment of finding an idea. CHAPTER XVIII. " Life is a various mother : now she dons Her plumes and brilliants, climbs the marble stairs With head aloft, nor ever turns her eyes On lackeys who attend her ; now she dwells Grim-clad up darksome alleys, breathes hot gin, And screams in pauper riot. But to these She came a frugal matron, neat and deft, With cheerful morning thoughts and quick device To find the much in little." MRS. MEYRICK'S house was not noisy : the front parlour looked on the river, and the back on gardens, so that though she was reading aloud to her daugh- ters, the window could be left open to freshen the air of the small double room where a lamp and two candles were burning. The candles were on a table apart for Kate, who was drawing illustrations for a publisher; the lamp was not only for the reader, but for Amy and Mab, who were embroider- ing satin cushions for " the great world." Outside, the house looked very narrow and shabby, the bright light through the holland blind showing the heavy old-fashioned window-frame ; but it is pleasant to know that many such grim-walled slices of space in our foggy London have been, and still are the homes of a culture the more spotlessly free from vulgarity, because poverty had rendered everything like display an impersonal question, and all the grand shows of the world simply a spectacle which rouses no petty rivalry or vain effort after possession. 268 DANIEL DERONDA. The Meyricks' was a home of that kind ; and they all clung to this particular house in a row because its interior was filled with objects always in the same places, which for the mother held memories of her marriage time, and for the young ones seemed as necessary and uncriticised a part of their world as the stars of the Great Bear seen from the back windows. Mrs. Meyrick had borne much stint of other matters that she might be able to keep some engravings specially cherished by her husband ; and the narrow spaces of wall held a world-history in scenes and heads which the chil- dren had early learned by heart. The chairs and tables were also old friends preferred to new. But in these two little parlours with no furniture that a broker would have cared to cheapen except the prints and piano, there was space and apparatus for a wide-glancing, nicely select life, open to the highest things in music, painting, and poetry. I am not sure that in the times of greatest scarcity, before Kate could get paid work, these ladies had always had a servant to light their fires and sweep their rooms ; yet they were fastidious in some points, and could not believe that the manners of ladies in the fashionable world were so full of coarse selfishness, petty quarrelling, and slang as they are represented to be in what are called literary photographs. The Meyricks had their little oddities, streaks of eccen- tricity from the mother's blood as well as the father's, their minds being like mediaeval houses with unex- pected recesses and openings from this into that, flights of steps and sudden outlooks. But mother and daughters were all united by a triple bond, family love ; admiration for the finest work, the best action ; and habitual industry. Hans'a MEETING STREAMS. 269 desire to spend some of his money in making their lives more luxurious had been resisted by all of them, and both they and he had been thus saved from regrets at the threatened triumph of his yearn- ing for art over the attractions of secured income, a triumph that would by and by oblige him to give up his fellowship. They could all afford to laugh at his Gavarni-caricatures, and to hold him blameless in following a natural bent which their unselfish- ness and independence had left without obstacle. It was enough for them to go on in their old way, only having a grand treat of opera-going (to the gallery) when Hans came home on a visit. Seeing the group they made this evening, one could hardly wish them to change their way of life. They were all alike small, and so in due proportion with their miniature rooms. Mrs. Meyrick was reading aloud from a French book : she was a lively little woman, half French, half Scotch, with a pretty artic- ulateness of speech that seemed to make daylight in her hearer's understanding. Though she was not yet fifty, her rippling hair, covered by a quakerish net cap, was chiefly gray, but her eyebrows were brown as the bright eyes below them ; her black dress, almost like a priest's cassock with its row of buttons, suited a neat figure hardly five feet high. The daughters were to match the mother, except that Mab had Hans's light hair and complexion, with a bossy irregular brow and other quaintnesses that reminded one of him. Everything about them was compact, from the firm coils of their hair, fastened back & la Chinoise, to their gray skirts in puritan nonconformity with the fashion, which at that time would have demanded that four feminine cir- cumferences should fill all the free space in the front 270 DANIEL DERONDA. parlour. All four, if they had been wax-work, might have been packed easily in a fashionable lady's travelling trunk. Their faces seemed full of speech, as if their minds had been shelled, after the manner of horse-chestnuts, and become brightly visible. The only large thing of its kind in the room was Hafiz, the Persian cat, comfortably poised on the brown leather back of a chair, and opening his large eyes now and then to see that the lower animals were not in any mischief. The book Mrs. Meyrick had before her was Erckmann-Chatrian's Histoire (fun Conscrit. She had just finished reading it aloud, and Mab, who had let her work fall on the ground while she stretched her head forward and fixed her eyes on the reader, exclaimed, " I think that is the finest story in the world." " Of course, Mab ! " said Amy ; " it is the last you have heard. Everything that pleases you is the best in its turn." " It is hardly to be called a story," said Kate. " It is a bit of history brought near us with a strong telescope. We can see the soldiers' faces : no, it is more than that, we can hear everything, we can almost hear their hearts beat." " I don't care what you call it," said Mab, flirting away her thimble. "Call it a chapter in Revela- tions. It makes me want to do something good, something grand. It makes me so sorry for every- body. It makes me like Schiller, I want to take the world in my arms and kiss it. I must kiss you instead, little mother ! " She threw her arms round her mother's neck. "Whenever you are in that mood, Mab, down goes your work," said Amy. "It would be doing MEETING STREAMS. 271 something good to finish your cushion without soil- ing it." " Oh oh oh ! " groaned Mab, as she stooped to pick up her work and thimble. " I wish I had three wounded conscripts to take care of." " You would spill their beef-tea while you were talking," said Amy. " Poor Mab ! don't be hard on her," said the mother. " Give me the embroidery now, child. You go on with your enthusiasm, and I will go on with the pink and white poppy." "Well, ma, I think you are more caustic than Amy," said Kate, while she drew her head back to look at her drawing. "Oh oh oh!" cried Mab again, rising and stretching her arms. " I wish something wonder- ful would happen. I feel like the deluge. The waters of the great deep are broken up, and the windows of heaven are opened. I must sit down and play the scales." Mab was opening the piano while the others were laughing at this climax, when a cab stopped before the house, and there forthwith came a quick rap of the knocker. " Dear me ! " said Mrs. Meyrick, starting up, " it is after ten, and Phoabe is gone to bed." She has- tened out, leaving the parlour door open. " Mr. Deronda ! " The girls could hear this exclamation from their mamma. Mab clasped her hands, saying in a loud whisper, "There now! something is going to happen ; " Kate and Amy gave up their work in amazement. But Deronda's tone in reply was so low that they could not hear his words, and Mrs. Meyrick immediately closed the parlour door. 272 DANIEL DERONDA. "I know I am trusting to your goodness in a most extraordinary way," Deronda went on, after giving his brief narrative, " but you can imagine how helpless I feel with a young creature like this on my hands. I could not go with her among strangers, and in her nervous state I should dread taking her into a house full of servants. I have trusted to your mercy. I hope you will not think my act unwarrantable." " On the contrary. You have honoured me by trusting me. I see your difficulty. Pray bring her in. I will go and prepare the girls." While Deronda went back to the cab, Mrs. Meyrick turned into the parlour again and said, " Here is somebody to take care of instead of your wounded conscripts, Mab : a poor girl who was going to drown herself in despair. Mr. Deronda found her only just in time to save her. He brought her along in his boat, and did not know what else it would be safe to do with her, so he has trusted us and brought her here. It seems she is a Jewess, but quite refined, he says, knowing Italian and music." The three girls, wondering and expectant, came forward and stood near each other in mute confidence that they were all feeling alike under this appeal to their compassion. Mab looked rather awe-stricken, as if this answer to her wish were something preternatural. Meanwhile Deronda, going to the door of the cab where the pale face was now gazing out with roused observation, said, " I have brought you to some of the kindest people in the world : there are daughters like you. It is a happy home. Will you let me take you to them ? " MEETING STREAMS. 273 She stepped out obediently, putting her hand in his and forgetting her hat ; and when Deronda led her into the full light of the parlour where the four little women stood awaiting her, she made a picture that would have stirred much duller sensibilities than theirs. At first she was a little dazed by the sudden light, and before she had concentrated her glance he had put her hand into the mother's. He was inwardly rejoicing that the Mey ricks were so small : the dark-curled head was the highest among them. The poor wanderer could not be afraid of these gentle faces so near hers ; and now she was looking at each of them in turn while the mother said, " You must be weary, poor child." " We will take care of you, we will comfort you, we will love you," cried Mab, no longer able to restrain herself, and taking the small right hand caressingly between both her own. This gentle welcoming warmth was penetrating the bewildered one : she hung back just enough to see better the four faces in front of her, whose good-will was being reflected in hers, not in any smile, but in that undefmable change which tells us that anxiety is passing into contentment. For an instant she looked up at Deronda, as if she were referring all this mercy to him, and then again turning to Mrs. Meyrick, said with more collectedness in her sweet tones than he had heard before, " I am a stranger. I am a Jewess. You might have thought I was wicked." , " No, we are sure you are good," burst out Mab. " We think no evil of you, poor child. You shall be safe with us," said Mrs. Meyrick. " Come now and sit down. You must have some food, and then go to rest." VOL. I. 18 274 DANIEL DERONDA. The stranger looked up again at Deronda, who said, " You will have no more fears with these friends ? You will rest to-night ? " " Oh, I should not fear. I should rest. I think these are the ministering angels." Mrs. Meyrick wanted to lead her to a seat, but again hanging back gently, the poor weary thing spoke as if with a scruple at being received without a further account of herself : " My name is Mirah Lapidoth. I am come a long way, all the way from Prague by myself. I made my escape. I ran away from dreadful things. I came to find my mother and brother in London. I had been taken from my mother when I was lit- tle, but I thought I could find her again. I had trouble, the houses were all gone, I could not find her. It has been a long while, and I had not much money. That is why I am in distress." " Our mother will be good to you," cried Mab. " See what a nice little mother she is ! " "Do sit down now," said Kate, moving a chair forward, while Amy ran to get some tea. Mirah resisted no longer, but seated herself with perfect grace, crossing her little feet, laying her hands one over the other on her lap, and looking at her friends with placid reverence ; whereupon Hafiz, who had been watching the scene restlessly, came forward with tail erect and rubbed himself against her ankles. Deronda felt it time to take his leave. "Will you allow me to come again and inquire perhaps at five to-morrow ? " he said to Mrs. Meyrick. " Yes, pray ; we shall have had time to make acquaintance then." MEETING STREAMS. 275 " Good-by," said Deronda, looking down at Mirah, and putting out his hand. She rose as she took it, and the moment brought back to them both strongly the other moment when she had first taken that outstretched hand. She lifted her eyes to his, and said with reverential fervour : " The God of our fathers bless you and deliver you from all evil as you have delivered me. I did not believe there was any man so good. None before have thought me worthy of the best. You found me poor and miserable, yet you have given me the best." Deronda could not speak, but with silent adieux to the Meyricks, hurried away. BOOK III. MAIDENS CHOOSING. CHAPTER XIX. pity the man who can travel from Dan to Beersheba, and Bay, " 'T is all barren ; " and so it is : and so is all the world to him who will not cultivate the fruits it offers. STERNE : Sentimental Journey, To say that Deronda was romantic would be to misrepresent him ; but under his calm and some- what self-repressed exterior there was a fervour which made him easily find poetry and romance among the events of every-day life And perhaps poetry and romance are as plentiful as ever in the world except for those phlegmatic natures who I suspect would in any age have regarded them as a dull form of erroneous thinking. They exist very easily in the same room with the microscope and even in railway carriages : what banishes them is the vacuum in gentlemen and lady passengers. How should all the apparatus of heaven and earth, from the farthest firmament to the tender bosom of the mother who nourished us, make poetry for a mind that has no movements of awe and tender- ness, no sense of fellowship which thrills from the near to the distant, and back again from the dis- tant to the near? MAIDENS CHOOSING. 277 To Deronda this event of finding Mirah was as heart-stirring as anything that befell Orestes or Einaldo. He sat up half the night, living again through the moments since he had first discerned Mirah on the river-brink, with the fresh and fresh vividness which belongs to emotive memory. When he took up a book to try and dull this urgency of inward vision, the printed words were no more than a network through which he saw and heard everything as clearly as before, saw not only the actual events of two hours, but possibili- ties of what had been and what might be which those events were enough to feed with the warm blood of passionate hope and fear. Something in his own experience caused Mirah 's search after her mother to lay hold with peculiar force on his im- agination. The first prompting of sympathy was to aid her in the search : if given persons were extant in London, there were ways of finding them, as subtle as scientific experiment, the right machin- ery being set at work. But here the mixed feelings which belonged to Deronda 's kindred experience naturally transfused themselves into his anxiety on behalf of Mirah. The desire to know his own mother, or to know about her, was constantly haunted with dread ; and in imagining what might befall Mirah it quickly occurred to him that finding the mother and brother from whom she had been parted when she was a little one might turn out to be a calam- ity. When she was in the boat she said that her mother and brother were good ; but the goodness might have been chiefly in her own ignorant inno- cence and yearning memory, and the ten or twelve years since the parting had been time enough for 278 DANIEL DERONDA. much worsening. Spite of his strong tendency to side with the objects of prejudice, and in general with those who got the worst of it, his interest had never been practically drawn towards existing Jews ; and the facts he knew about them, whether they walked conspicuous in fine apparel or lurked in by-streets, were chiefly of the sort most repug- nant to him. Of learned and accomplished Jews he took it for granted that they had dropped their religion, and wished to be merged in the people of their native lands. Scorn flung at a Jew as such would have roused all his sympathy in griefs of inheritance; but the indiscriminate scorn of a race will often strike a specimen who has well earned it on his own account, and might fairly be gibbeted as a rascally son of Adam. It appears that the Caribs, who know little of theology, regard thiev- ing as a practice peculiarly connected with Chris- tian tenets, and probably they could allege experimental grounds for this opinion. Deronda could not escape (who can ?) knowing ugly stories of Jewish characteristics and occupations ; and though one of his favourite protests was against the severance of past and present history, he was like others who shared his protest, in never hav- ing cared to reach any more special conclusions about actual Jews than that they retained the virtues and vices of a long-oppressed race. But now that Mirah's longing roused his mind to a closer survey of details, very disagreeable images urged themselves of what it might be to find out this middle-aged Jewess and her son. To be sure, there was the exquisite refinement and charm of the creature herself to make a pre- sumption in favour of her immediate kindred, MAIDENS CHOOSING. 279 but he must wait to know more : perhaps through Mrs. Meyrick he might gather some guiding hints from Mirah's own lips. Her voice, her accent, her looks, all the sweet purity that clothed her as with a consecrating garment, made him shrink the more from giving her, either ideally or practically, an association with what was hateful or contami- nating. But these fine words with which we fumigate and becloud unpleasant facts are not the language in which we think. Deronda's thinking went on in rapid images of what might be : he saw himself guided by some official scout into a dingy street; he entered through a dim doorway, and saw a hawk-eyed woman, rough -headed, and un- washed, cheapening a hungry girl's last bit of finery ; or in some quarter only the more hideous for being smarter, he found himself under the breath of a young Jew, talkative and familiar, will- ing to show his acquaintance with gentlemen's tastes, and not fastidious in any transactions with which they would favour him, and so on through the brief chapter of his experience in this kind. Excuse him : his mind was not apt to run sponta- neously into insulting ideas, or to practise a form of wit which identifies Moses with the advertise- ment sheet ; but he was just now governed by dread, and if Mirah's parents had been Christian, the chief difference would have been that his fore- bodings would have been fed with wider knowl- edge. It was the habit of his mind to connect dread with unknown parentage, and in this case as well as his own there was enough to make the connection reasonable. But what was to be done with Mirah ? She needed shelter and protection in the fullest sense, 280 DANIEL DERONDA. and all his chivalrous sentiment roused itself to insist that the sooner and the more fully he could engage for her the interest of others besides him- self, the better he should fulfil her claims on him. He had no right to provide for her entirely, though he might be able to do so ; the very depth of the impression she had produced made him desire that she should understand herself to be entirely inde- pendent of him ; and vague visions of the future which he tried to dispel as fantastic left their in- fluence in an anxiety stronger than any motive he could give for it, that those who saw his actions closely should be acquainted from the first with the history of his relation to Mirah. He had learned to hate secrecy about the grand ties and obligations of his life, to hate it the more because a strong spell of interwoven sensibilities hindered him from breaking such secrecy. Deronda had made a vow to himself that since the truths which disgrace mortals are not all of their own making the truth should never be made a disgrace to another by his act. He was not without terror lest he should break this vow, and fall into the apologetic philosophy which explains the world into contain- ing nothing better than one's own conduct. At one moment he resolved to tell the whole of his adventure to Sir Hugo and Lady Mallinger the next morning at breakfast; but the possibility that something quite new might reveal itself on his next visit to Mrs. Meyrick's checked this impulse, and he finally went to sleep on the conclusion that he would wait until that visit had been made. It will hardly bb denied that even in this frail and corrupted world we sometimes meet persons who iu their very mien and aspect, as well as in the whole habit of life, manifest such a signa- ture and stamp of virtue as to make our judgment of them a matter of intuition rather than the result of continued examina- tion. ALEXANDER KNOX : quoted in Southey's Life of Wesley. MIRAH said that she had slept well that night; and when she came down in Mab's black dress, her dark hair curling in fresh fibrils as it gradually dried from its plenteous bath, she looked like one who was beginning to take comfort after the long sorrow and watching which had paled her cheek and made deep blue semicircles under her eyes. It was Mab who carried her breakfast and ushered her down, with some pride in the effect produced by a pair of tiny felt slippers which she had rushed out to buy because there were no shoes in the house small enough for Mirah, whose borrowed dress ceased about her ankles, and displayed the cheap clothing that moulding itself on her feet seemed an adorn- ment as choice as the sheaths of buds. The far- thing buckles were bijoux. " Oh, if you please, mamma ! " cried Mab, clasp- ing her hands and stooping towards Mirah 's feet, as she entered the parlour; " look at the slippers, how beautifully they fit! I declare she is like the Queen Budoor, ' two delicate feet, the work of the protecting and all-recompensing Creator, support her ; and I wonder how they can sustain what is above them. ' " 2&2 DANIEL DERONDA. Mirah looked down at her own feet in a child- like way, and then smiled at Mrs. Meyrick, who was saying inwardly, " One could hardly imagine this creature having an evil thought; but wise people would tell me to be cautious. " She re- turned Mirah's smile and said, " I fear the feet have had to sustain their burthen a little too often lately. But to-day she will rest and be my companion. " " And she will tell you so many things and I shall not hear them," grumbled Mab, who felt herself in the first volume of a delightful romance and obliged to miss some chapters because she had to go to pupils. Kate was already gone to make sketches along the river, and Amy was away on business errands. It was what the mother wished, to be alone with this stranger, whose story must be a sorrowful one, yet was needful to be told. The small front parlour was as good as a temple that morning. The sunlight was on the river, and soft air came in through the open window; the walls showed a glorious silent cloud of witnesses ; the Virgin soaring amid her cherubic escort ; grand Melancholia with her solemn universe ; the Prophets and Sibyls ; the School of Athens ; the Last Supper ; mystic groups where far-off ages made one moment ; grave Holbein and Rembrandt heads ; the Tragic Muse ; last-century children at their musings or their play; Italian poets, all were there through the medium of a little black and white. The neat mother who had weathered her troubles, and come out of them with a face still cheerful, was sorting coloured wools for her em- broidery. Hafiz purred on the window-ledge, the MAIDENS CHOOSING. 283 clock on the mantelpiece ticked without hurry, and the occasional sound of wheels seemed to lie outside the more massive central quiet. Mrs. Meyrick thought that this quiet might be the best invitation to speech on the part of her companion, and chose not to disturb it by remark. Mirah sat opposite in her former attitude, her hands clasped on her lap, her ankles crossed, her eyes at first travelling slowly over the objects around her, but finally resting with a sort of placid reverence on Mrs. Meyrick. At length she began to speak softly. " I remember my mother's face better than any- thing ; yet I was not seven when I was taken away, and I am nineteen now. " " I can understand that, " said Mrs. Meyrick. " There are some earliest things that last the longest. " " Oh, yes, it was the earliest. I think my life began with waking up and loving my mother's face : it was so near to me, and her arms were round me, and she sang to me. One hymn she sang so often, so often ; and then she taught me to sing it with her : it was the first I ever sang. They were always Hebrew hymns she sang ; and because I never knew the meaning of the words they seemed full of nothing but our love and happiness. "When I lay in my little bed and it was all white above me, she used to bend over me between me and the white, and sing in a sweet low voice. I can dream myself back into that time when I am awake, and often, it comes back to me in my sleep, my hand is very little, I put it up to her face and she kisses it. Sometimes in my dream I begin to tremble and think that we are both dead ; but then I wake 284 DANIEL. DEKONDA. up and my hand lies like this, and for a moment I hardly know myself. But if I could see my mother again, I should know her. " " You must expect some change after twelve years, " said Mrs. Meyrick, gently. " See my gray hair : ten years ago it was bright brown. The days and the months pace over us like restless little birds, and leave the marks of their feet back- wards and forwards ; especially when they are like birds with heavy hearts, then they tread heavily." " Ah, I am sure her heart has been heavy for want of me. But to feel her joy if we could meet again, and I could make her know how I love her, and give her deep comfort after all her mourning ! If that could be, I should mind nothing ; I should be glad that I have lived through my trouble. I did despair. The world seemed miserable and wicked ; none helped me so that I could bear their looks and words ; I felt that my mother was dead, and death was the only way to her. But then in the last moment yesterday, when I longed for the water to close over me and I thought that death was the best image of mercy then goodness came to me living, and I felt trust in the living. And it is strange but I began to hope that she was living too. And now I am with you here this morning, peace and hope have come into me like a flood. I want nothing ; I can wait ; because I hope and believe and am grateful oh, so grate- ful ! You have not thought evil of me you have not despised me. " Mirah spoke with low -toned fervour, and sat as still as a picture all the while. " Many others would have felt as we do, my MAIDENS CHOOSING. 285 dear, " said Mrs. Meyrick, feeling a mist come over her eyes as she looked at her work. " But I did not meet them they did not come to me. " " How was it that you were taken from your mother ? " " Ah, I am a long while coming to that. It is dreadful to speak of, yet I must tell you I must tell you everything. My father it was he who took me away. I thought we were only going on a little journey ; and I was pleased. There was a box with all my little things in. But we went on board a ship, and got farther and farther away from the land. Then I was ill ; and I thought it would never end it was the first misery, and it seemed endless. But at last we landed. I knew nothing then, and believed what my father said. He comforted me, and told me I should go back to my mother. But it was America we had reached, and it was long years before we came back to Europe. At first I often asked my father when we were going back ; and I tried to learn writing fast, because I wanted to write to my mother; but one day when he found me trying to write a letter, he took me on his knee and told me that my mother and brother were dead ; that was why we did not go back. I remember my brother a little ; he carried me once ; but he was not always at home. I believed my father when he said that they were dead. I saw them under the earth when he said they were there, with their eyes forever closed. I never thought of its not being true ; and I used to cry every night in my bed for a long while. Then when she came so often to me, in my sleep, I thought she must be living about me 286 DANIEL DERONDA. though I could not always see her, and that com- forted me. I was never afraid in the dark, be- cause of that ; and very often in the day I used to shut my eyes and bury my face and try to see her and to hear her singing. I came to do that at last without shutting my eyes. " Mirah paused with a sweet content in her face, as if she were having her happy vision, while she looked out towards the river. " Still your father was not unkind to you, I hope," said Mrs. Meyrick, after a minute, anx- ious to recall her. " No ; he petted me, and took pains to teach me. He was an actor; and I found out, after, that the ' Coburg ' I used to hear of his going to at home was a theatre. But he had more to do with the theatre than acting. He had not always been an actor ; he had been a teacher, and knew many lan- guages. His acting was not very good, I think ; but he managed the stage, and wrote and translated plays. An Italian lady, a singer, lived with us a long time. They both taught me; and I had a master besides, who made me learn by heart and recite. I worked quite hard, though I was so little; and I was not nine when I first went on the stage. I could easily learn things, and I was not afraid. But then and ever since I hated our way of life. My father had money, and we had finery about us in a disorderly way ; always there were men and women coming and going, there was loud laughing and disputing, strutting, snapping of fingers, jeering, faces I did not like to look at though many petted and caressed me. But then I remembered my mother. Even at first when I understood nothing, I shrank away from all those MAIDENS CHOOSING. 287 things outside me into companionship with thoughts that were not like them ; and I gathered thoughts very fast, because I read many things, plays and poetry, Shakespeare and Schiller, and learned evil and good. My father began to believe that I might be a great singer : my voice was considered wonderful for a child ; and he had the best teach- ing for me. But it was painful that he boasted of me, and set me to sing for show at any minute, as if I had been a musical box. Once when I was nine years old, I played the part of a little girl who had been forsaken and did not know it, and sat singing to herself while she played with flowers. I did it without any trouble ; but the clapping and all the sounds of the theatre were hateful to me ; and I never liked the praise I had, because it seemed all very hard and unloving : I missed the love and the trust I had been born into. I made a life in my own thoughts quite different from everything about me : I chose what seemed to me beautiful out of the plays and everything, and made my world out of it ; and it was like a sharp knife always grazing me that we had two sorts of life which jarred so with each other, women looking good and gentle on the stage, and saying good things as if they felt them, and directly after I saw them with coarse, ugly manners. My father sometimes noticed my shrinking ways ; and Signora said one day when I had been rehearsing, ' She will never be an artist : she has no notion of being anybody but herself. That does very well now, but by and by you will see, she will have no more face and action than a singing-bird. ' My father was angry, and they quarrelled. I sat alone and cried, because what she had said was like a 238 DANIEL DERONDA. long unhappy future unrolled before me. I did not want to be an artist; but this was what my father expected of me. After a while Signora left us, and a governess used to come and give me les- sons in different things, because my father began to be afraid of my singing too much ; but I still acted from time to time. Rebellious feelings grew stronger in me, and I wished to get away from this life ; but I could not tell where to go, and I dreaded the world. Besides, I felt it would be wrong to leave my father : I dreaded doing wrong, for I thought I might get wicked and hateful to myself, in the same way that many others seemed hateful to me. For so long, so long I had never felt my outside world happy; and if I got wicked I should lose my world of happy thoughts where my mother lived with me. That was my childish notion all through those years. Oh, how long they were ! " Mirah fell to musing again. " Had you no teaching about what was your duty ? " said Mrs. Meyrick. She did not like to say " religion, " finding herself on inspection rather dim as to what the Hebrew religion might have turned into at this date. " No only that I ought to do what my father wished. He did not follow our religion at New York, and I think he wanted me not to know much about it. But because my mother used to take me to the synagogue, and I remembered sitting on her knee and looking through the railing and hearing the chanting and singing, I longed to go. One day when I was quite small I slipped out and tried to find the synagogue, but I lost myself a long while till a pedler questioned me and took me home. My father, missing me, had been in much MAIDENS CHOOSING. 289 fear, and was very angry. I too had been so frightened at losing myself that it was long before I thought of venturing out again. But after Sig- nora left us we went to rooms where our landlady was a Jewess and observed her religion. I asked her to take me with her to the synagogue ; and I read in her prayer-books and Bible, and when I had money enough I asked her to buy me books of my own, for these books seemed a closer companion- ship with my mother : I knew that she must have looked at the very words and said them. In that way I have come to know a little of our religion, and the history of our people, besides piecing to- gether what I read in plays and other books about Jews and Jewesses ; because I was sure that my mother obeyed her religion. I had left off asking my father about her. It is very dreadful to say it, but I began to disbelieve him. I had found that he did not always tell the truth, and made prom- ises without meaning to keep them; and that raised my suspicion that my mother and brother were still alive, though he had told me that they were dead. For in going over the past again and again, as I got older and knew more, I felt sure that my mother had been deceived, and had ex- pected to see us back again after a very little while ; and my father taking me on his knee and telling me that my mother and brother were both dead seemed to me now nothing but a bit of act- ing, to set my mind at rest. The cruelty of that falsehood sank into me, and I hated all untruth because of it. I wrote to my mother secretly : I knew the street, Colman Street, where we lived, and that it was near Blackfriars Bridge and the Coburg, and that our name was Cohen then, though VOL. i. 19 2 9 o DANIEL DERONDA. my father called us Lapidoth, because he said it was a name of his forefathers in Poland. I sent my letter secretly ; but no answer came, and I thought there was no hope for me. Our life in America did not last much longer. My father suddenly told me we were to pack up and go to Hamburg, and I was rather glad. I hoped we might get among a different sort of people, and I knew German quite well, some German plays almost all by heart. My father spoke it better than he spoke English. I was thirteen then, and I seemed to myself quite old, I knew so much, and yet so little. I think other children cannot feel as I did. I had often wished that I had been drowned when I was going away from my mother. But I set myself to obey and suffer: what else could I do ? One day when we were on our voy- age, a new thought came into my mind. I was not very ill that time, and I kept on deck a good deal. My father acted and sang and joked to amuse people on board, and I used often to overhear re- marks about him. One day, when I was looking at the sea and nobody took notice of me, I over- heard a gentleman say, ' Oh, he is one of those clever Jews, a rascal, I should n't wonder. There 's no race like them for cunning in the men and beauty in the women. I wonder what market he means that daughter for. ' When I heard this it darted into my mind that the unhappiness in my life came from my being a Jewess, and that always to the end the world would think slightly of me and that I must bear it, for I should be judged by that name ; and it comforted me to be- lieve that my suffering was part of the affliction of my people, my part in the long song of mourn- MAIDENS CHOOSING. 291 ing that has been going on through ages and ages. For if many of our race were wicked and made merry in their wickedness, what was that but part of the affliction borne by the just among them, who were despised for the sins of their brethren ? But you have not rejected me. " Mirah had changed her tone in this last sentence, having suddenly reflected that at this moment she had reason not for complaint but for gratitude. . " And we will try to save you from being judged unjustly by others, my poor child," said Mrs. Meyrick, who had now given up all attempt at going on with her work, and sat listening with folded hands and a face hardly less eager than Mab's would have been. " Go on, go on: tell me all." " After that we lived in different towns, Ham- burg and Vienna the longest. I began to study singing again, and my father always got money about the theatres. I think he brought a good deal of money from America : I never knew why we left. For some time he was in great spirits about my singing, and he made me rehearse parts and act continually. He looked forward to my coming out in the opera. But by and by it seemed that my voice would never be strong enough, it did not fulfil its promise. My master at Vienna said, ' Don't strain it further: it will never do for the public : it is gold, but a thread of gold dust. ' My father was bitterly disappointed : we were not so well off at that time. I think I have not quite told you what I felt about my father. I knew he was fond of me and meant to indulge me, and that made me afraid of hurting him ; but he always mistook what would please me and give me happi- 292 DANIEL DERONDA. ness. It was his nature to take everything lightly ; and I soon left off asking him any question about things that I cared for much, because he always turned them off with a joke. He would even ridi- cule our own people ; and once when he had been imitating their movements and their tones in pray- ing, only to make others laugh, I could not restrain myself, for I always had an anger in my heart about my mother, and when we were alone, I said, ' Father, you ought not to mimic our own people before Christians who mock them : would it not be bad if I mimicked you, that they might mock you ? ' But he only shrugged his shoulders and laughed and pinched my chin, and said, ' You couldn't do it, my dear' It was this way of turning off everything, that made a great wall be- tween me and my father, and whatever I felt most I took the most care to hide from him. For there were some things when they were laughed at I could not bear it : the world seemed like a hell to me. Is this world and all the life upon it only like a farce or a vaudeville, where you find no great meanings ? Why, then, are there tragedies and grand operas, where men do difficult things and choose to suffer ? I think it is silly to speak of all things as a joke. And I saw that his wishing me to sing the greatest music, and parts in grand operas, was only wishing for what would fetch the greatest price. That hemmed in my gratitude for his affectionateness, and the tenderest feeling I had towards him was pity. Yes, I did sometimes pity him. He had aged and changed. Now he was no longer so lively. I thought he seemed worse, less good to others and to me. Every now and then in the latter years his gayety went away 1 MAIDENS CHOOSING. 293 suddenly, and he would sit at home silent and gloomy; or he would come in and fling himself down and sob, just as I have done myself when I have been in trouble. If I put my hand on his knee and said, ' What is the matter, father ? ' he would make no answer, but would draw my arm round his neck and put his arm round me and go on crying. There never came any confidence be- tween us ; but oh, I was sorry for him. At those moments I knew he must feel his life bitter, and I pressed my cheek against his head and prayed. Those moments were what most bound me to him ; and I used to think how much my mother once loved him, else she would not have married him. " But soon there came the dreadful time. We had been at Pesth, and we came back to Vienna. In spite of what my master Leo had said, my father got me an engagement, not at the opera, but to take singing parts at a suburb theatre in Vienna. He had nothing to do with the theatre then ; I did not understand what he did, but I think he was continually at a gambling-house, though he was careful always about taking me to the theatre. I was very miserable. The plays I acted in were detestable to me. Men came about us and wanted to talk to me. Women and men seemed to look at me with a sneering smile : it was no better than a fiery furnace. Perhaps I make it worse than it was you don't know that life ; but the glare and the faces, and my having to go on and act and sing what I hated, and then see people who came to stare at me behind the scenes it was all so much worse than when I was a little girl. I went through with it ; I did it ; I had set my mind to 294 DANIEL DERONDA, obey my father and work, for I saw nothing better that I could do. But I felt that my voice was getting weaker, and I knew that my acting was not good except when it was not really acting, but the part was one that I could be myself in, and some feeling within me carried me along. That was seldom. " Then in the midst of all this, the news came to me one morning that my father had been taken to prison, and he had sent for me. He did not tell me the reason why he was there, but he ordered me to go to an address he gave me, to see a Count who would be able to get him released. The address was to some public rooms where I was to ask for the Count, and beg him to come to my father. I found him, and recognized him as a gentleman whom I had seen the other night for the first time behind the scenes. That agitated me, for I remembered his way of looking at me and kissing my hand, I thought it was in mock- ery. But I delivered my errand and he promised to go immediately to my father, who came home again that very evening, bringing the Count with him. I now began to feel a horrible dread of this man, for he worried me with his attentions, his eyes were always on me : I felt sure that whatever else there might be in his mind towards me, below it all there was scorn for the Jewess and the actress. And when he came to me the next day in the theatre and would put my shawl round me, a terror took hold of me; I saw that my father wanted me to look pleased. The Count was neither very young nor very old : his hair and eyes were pale ; he was tall and walked heavily, and his face was heavy and grave except when he looked at me. MAIDENS CHOOSING. 295 He smiled at me, and his smile went through me with horror : I could not tell why he was so much worse to me than other men. Some feelings are like our hearing : they come as sounds do, before we know their reason. My father talked to me about him when we were alone, and praised him, said what a good friend he had been. I said nothing, because I supposed he had got my father out of prison. When the Count came again, my father left the room. He asked me if I liked be- ing on the stage. I said No, I only acted in obedience to my father. He always spoke French, and called me ' petit ange ' and such things, which I felt insulting. I knew he meant to make love to me, and I had it firmly in my mind that a nobleman and one who was not a Jew could have no love for me that was not half contempt. But then he told me that I need not act any longer; he wished me to visit him at his beautiful place, where I might be queen of everything. It was difficult to me to speak, I felt so shaken with anger : I could only say, ' I would rather stay on the stage forever,' and I left him there. Hurrying out of the room, I saw my father sauntering in the passage. My heart was crushed. I went past him and locked myself up. It had sunk into me that my father was in a conspiracy with that man against ine. But the next day he persuaded me to come out : he said that I had mistaken everything, and he would explain : if I did not come out and act and fulfil my engagement, we should be ruined and he must starve. So I went on acting, and for a week or more the Count never came near me. My father changed our lodgings, and kept at home except when he went to the theatre with me. He 296 DANIEL DERONDA. began one day to speak discouragingly of my act- ing, and say, I could never go on singing in public I should lose my voice I ought to think of my future, and not put my nonsensical feelings between me and my fortune. He said, ' What will you do ? You will be brought down Jx> sing and beg at people's doors. You have had a splen- did offer and ought to accept it. ' I could not speak : a horror took possession of me when I thought of my mother and of him. I felt for the first time that I should not do wrong to leave him. But the next day he told me that he had put an end to my engagement at the theatre, and that we were to go to Prague. I was getting suspicious of everything, and my will was hardening to act against him. It took us two days to pack and get ready ; and I had it in my mind that I might be obliged to run away from my father, and then I would come to London and try if it were possible to find my mother. I had a little money, and I sold some things to get more. I packed a few clothes in a little bag that I could carry with me, and I kept my mind on the watch. My father's silence his letting drop that subject of the Count's offer made me feel sure that there was a plan against me. I felt as if it had been a plan to take me to a madhouse. I once saw a picture of a madhouse, that I could never forget; it seemed to me very much like some of the life I had seen, the people strutting, quarrelling, leering, the faces with cunning and malice in them. It was my will to keep myself from wickedness ; and I prayed for help. I had seen what despised women were : and my heart turned against my father, for I saw always behind him that man who MAIDENS CHOOSING. 97 made me shudder. You will think I had not enough reason for my suspicions, and perhaps I had not, outside my own feeling ; but it seemed to me that my mind had been lit up, and all that might be stood out clear and sharp. If I slept, it was only to see the same sort of things, and I could hardly sleep at all. Through our journey I was everywhere on the watch. I don't know why, but it came before me like a real event, that my father would suddenly leave me and I should find myself with the Count where I could not get away from him. I thought God was warning me : my mother's voice was in my soul. It was dark when we reached Prague, and though the strange bunches of lamps were lit it was difficult to distinguish faces as we drove along the street. Mv father O v chose to sit outside he was always smoking now and I watched everything in spite of the dark- ness. I do believe I could see better then than ever I did before : the strange clearness within seemed to have got outside me. It was not my habit to notice faces and figures much in the street; but this night I saw every one ; and when we passed before a great hotel, I caught sight only of a back that was passing in the light of the great bunch of lamps a good way off fell on it. I knew it before the face was turned, as it fell into shadow, I knew who it was. Help came to me. I feel sure help came to me. I did not sleep that night. I put on my plainest things, the cloak and hat I have worn ever since ; and I sat watching for the light and the sound of the doors being unbarred. Some one rose early at four o'clock to go to the railway. That gave me courage. I slipped out with my little bag under my cloak, and none 298 DANIEL DERONDA. noticed me. I had been a long while attending to the railway guide that I might learn the way to England ; and before the sun had risen I was in the train for Dresden. Then I cried for joy. I did not know whether my money would last out, but I trusted. I could sell the things in my bag, and the little rings in my ears, and I could live on bread only. My only terror was lest my father should follow me. But I never paused. I came on, and on, and on, only eating bread now and then. When I got to Brussels I saw that I should not have enough money, and I sold all that I could sell ; but here a strange thing happened. Putting my hand into the pocket of my cloak, I found a half- napoleon. Wondering and wondering how it came there, I remembered that on the way from Cologne there was a young workman sitting against me. I was frightened at every one, and did not like to be spoken to. At first he tried to talk, but when he saw that I did not like it, he left off. It was a long journey ; I ate nothing but a bit of bread, and he once offered me some of the food he brought in, but I refused it. I do believe it was he who put that bit of gold in my pocket. Without it I could hardly have got to Dover, and I did walk a good deal of the way from Dover to London. I knew I should look like a miserable beggar -girl. I wanted not to look very miserable, because if I found my mother it would grieve her to see me so. But oh, how vain my hope was that she would be there to see me come ! As soon as I set foot in London, I began to ask for Lambeth and Blackfriars Bridge, but they were a long way off, and I went wrong. At last I got to Blackfriars Bridge and asked for Colman Street People shook their heads. None MAIDENS CHOOSING. 299 knew it. I saw it in my mind, our doorsteps, and the white tiles hung in the windows, and the large brick building opposite with wide doors. But there was nothing like it. At last when I asked a tradesman where the Coburg Theatre and Colman Street were, he said, ' Oh, my little woman, that 's all done away with. The old streets have been pulled down ; everything is new. ' I turned away, and felt as if death had laid a hand on me. He said : ' Stop, stop ! young woman ; what is it you 're wanting with Colman Street, eh ? ' meaning well, perhaps. But his tone was what I could not bear ; and how could I tell him what I wanted ? I felt blinded and bewildered with a sudden shock. I suddenly felt that I was very weak and weary, and yet where could I go ? for I looked so poor and dusty, and had nothing with me I looked like a street-beggar. And I was afraid of all places where I could enter. I lost my trust. I thought I was forsaken. It seemed that I had been in a fever of hope delirious all the way from Prague ; I thought that I was helped, and I did nothing but strain my mind forward and think of finding my mother ; and now r there I stood in a strange world. All who saw me would think ill of me, and I must herd with beggars. I stood on the bridge and looked along the river. People were going on to a steamboat. Many of them seemed poor, and I felt as if it would be a refuge to get away from the streets : perhaps the boat would take me where I could soon get into a solitude. I had still some pence left, and I bought a loaf when I went on the boat. I wanted to have a little time and strength to think of life and death. How could I live ? And now again 3oo DANIEL DERONDA. it seemed that if ever I were to find my mother again, death was the way to her. I ate, that I might have strength to think. The boat set me down at a place along the river I don't know where and it was late in the evening. I found some large trees apart from the road, and I sat down under them that I might rest through the night. Sleep must have soon come to me, and when I awoke it was morning. The birds were singing, the dew was white about me, I felt chill and oh so lonely ! I got up and walked, and fol- lowed the river a long way, and then turned back again. There was no reason why I should go any- where. The world about me seemed like a vision that was hurrying by while I stood still with ray pain. My thoughts were stronger than I was : they rushed in and forced me to see all my life from the beginning ; ever since I was carried away from my mother I had felt myself a lost child taken up and used by strangers, who did not care what my life was to me, but only what I could do for them. It seemed all a weary wandering and heart-loneliness, as if I had been forced to go to merry-makings without the expectation of joy. And now it was worse. I was lost again, and I dreaded lest any stranger should notice me and speak to me. I had a terror of the world. None knew me ; all would mistake me. I had seen so many in my life who made themselves glad with scorning, and laughed at another's shame. What could I do ? This life seemed to be closing in upon me with a wall of fire, everywhere there was scorching that made me shrink. The high sunlight made me shrink. And I began to think that my despair was the voice of God telling me MAIDENS CHOOSING. 301 to die. But it would take me long to die of hun- ger. Then I thought of my People, how they had been driven from land to land and been afflicted, and multitudes had died of misery in their wan- dering was I the first ? And in the wars and troubles when Christians were cruelest, our fathers had sometimes slain their children and afterwards themselves ; it was to save them from being false apostates. That seemed to make it right for me to put an end to my life ; for calamity had closed me in too, and I saw no pathway but to evil. But my mind got into war with itself, for there were con- trary things in it. I knew that some had held it wrong to hasten their own death, though they were in the midst of flames ; and while I had some strength left it was a longing to bear if I ought to bear, else where was the good of all my life ? It had not been happy since the first years : when the light came every morning, I used to think, ' I will bear it. ' But always before I had some hope ; now it was gone. With these thoughts I wan- dered and wandered, inwardly crying to the Most High, from whom I should not flee in death more than in life, though I had no strong faith that He cared for me. The strength seemed departing from my soul : deep below all my cries was the feel- ing that I was alone and forsaken. The more I thought the wearier I got, till it seemed I was not thinking at all, but only the sky and the river and the Eternal God were in my soul. And what was it whether I died or lived ? If I lay down to die in the river, was it more than lying down to sleep ? for there too I committed my soul I gave myself up. I could not hear memories any more : I could only feel what was present in me, it was all one 302 DANIEL DERONDA. longing to cease from my weary life, which seemed only a pain outside the great peace that I might enter into. That was how it was. When the evening came and the sun was gone, it seemed as if that was all I had to wait for. And a new strength came into me to will what I would do. You know what I did. I was going to die. You know what happened did he not tell you ? Faith came to me again : I was not forsaken. He told you how he found me ? " Mrs. Meyrick gave no audible answer, but pressed her lips against Mirah's forehead. " She 's just a pearl: the mud has only washed her," was the fervid little woman's closing com- mentary when, tete-a-tete with Deronda in the back parlour that evening, she hud conveyed Mirah's story to him with much vividness. " What is your feeling about a search for this mother ? " said Deronda, " Have you no fears ? I have, I confess. " "Oh, I believe the mother's good," said Mrs. Meyrick, with rapid decisiveness ; " or was good. She may be dead, that 's my fear. A good woman, you may depend : you may know it by the scoundrel the father is. Where did the child get her goodness from ? Wheaten flour has to be accounted for. " Deronda was rather disappointed at this answer : he had wanted a confirmation of his own judgment, and he began to put in demurrers. The argument about the mother would not apply to the brother ; and Mrs. Meyrick admitted that the brother might be an ugly likeness of the father. Then, as to advertising, if the name was Cohen, you might as well advertise for two undescribed terriers: and MAIDENS CHOOSING. 303 here Mrs. Meyrick helped him, for the idea of an advertisement, already mentioned to Mirah, had roused the poor child's terror: she was convinced that her father would see it, he saw everything in the papers. Certainly there were safer means than advertising : men might be set to work whose business it was to find missing persons ; but De- ronda wished Mrs. Meyrick to feel with him that it would be wiser to wait, before seeking a dubious perhaps a deplorable result; especially as he was engaged to go abroad the next week for a couple of months. If a search were made, he would like to be at hand, so that Mrs. Meyrick might not be unaided in meeting any consequences, supposing that she would generously continue to watch over Mirah. " We should be very jealous of any one who took the task from us, " said Mrs. Meyrick. " She will stay under my roof: there is Hans's old room for her." " Will she be content to wait ? " said Deronda, anxiously. " No trouble there. It is not her nature to run into planning and devising : only to submit. See how she submitted to that father! It was a won- der to herself how she found the will and contriv- ance to run away from him. About finding her mother, her only notion now is to trust : since you were sent to save her and we are good to her, she trusts that her mother will be found in the same unsought way. And when she is talking I catch her feeling like a child. " Mrs. Meyrick hoped that the sum Deronda put into her hands as a provision for Mirah 's wants was more than would be needed : after a little 304 DANIEL DERONDA. while Mirah would perhaps like to occupy herself as the other girls did, and make herself independ- ent. Deronda pleaded that she must need a long rest. " Oh, yes ; we will hurry nothing, " said Mrs. Meyrick. " Rely upon it, she shall be taken tender care of. If you like to give me your address abroad, I will write to let you know how we get on. It is not fair that we should have all the pleasure of her salvation to ourselves. And be- sides, I want to make believe that I am doing something for you as well as for Mirah. " " That is no make-believe. What should I have done without you last night? Everything would have gone wrong. I shall tell Hans that the best of having him for a friend is, knowing his mother. " After that they joined the girls in the other room, where Mirah was seated placidly, while the others were telling her what they knew about Mr. Deronda, his goodness to Hans, and all the virtues that Hans had reported of him. " Kate burns a pastille before his portrait every day, " said Mab. " And I carry his signature in a little black-silk bag round my neck to keep off the cramp. And Amy says the multiplication-table in his name. We must all do something extra in honour of him, now he has brought you to us. " " I suppose he is too great a person to want any- thing, " said Mirah, smiling at Mab and appealing to the graver Amy. " He is perhaps very high in the world?" " He is very much above us in rank, " said Amy. " He is related to grand people. I dare say he leans on some of the satin cushions we prick our jers over. " MAIDENS CHOOSING. 305 " I am glad he is of high rank, " said Mirah, with her usual quietness. " Now, why are you glad of that ? " said Amy, rather suspicious of this sentiment, and on the watch for Jewish peculiarities which had not appeared. " Because I have always disliked men of high rank before. " " Oh, Mr. Deronda is not so very high, " said Kate. " He need not hinder us from thinking ill of the whole peerage and baronetage if we like. " When he entered, Mirah rose with the same look of grateful reverence that she had lifted to him the evening before : impossible to see a crea- ture freer at once from embarrassment and boldness. Her theatrical training had left no recognizable trace ; probably her manners had not much changed since she played the forsaken child at nine years of age ; and she had grown up in her simplicity and truthfulness like' a little flower-seed that absorbs the chance confusion of its surroundings into its own definite mould of beauty. Deronda felt that he was making acquaintance with something quite new to him in the form of womanhood. For Mirah was not childlike from ignorance : her ex- perience of evil and trouble was deeper and stranger than his own. He felt inclined to watch her and listen to her as if she had come from a far-off shore inhabited by a race different from our own. But for that very reason he made his visit brief : with his usual activity of imagination as to how his conduct might affect others, he shrank from what might seem like curiosity, or the assumption of a right to know as much as he pleased of one to whom he had done a service. For example he VOL. i. 20 306 DANIEL DERONDA. would have liked to hear her sing, but he would have felt the expression of such a wish to be a rudeness in him, since she could not refuse, and he would all the while have a sense that she was being treated like one whose accomplishments were to be ready on demand. And whatever reverence could be shown to woman, he was bent on showing to this girl. Why ? He gave himself several good reasons ; but whatever one does with a strong un- hesitating outflow of will, has a store of motive that it would be hard to put into words. Some deeds seem little more than interjections which give vent to the long passion of a life. So Deronda soon took his farewell for the two months during which he expected to be absent from London, and in a few days he was on his way with Sir Hugo and Lady Mallinger to Leubronn. He had fulfilled his intention of telling them about Mirah. The baronet was decidedly of opinion that the search for the mother and brother had better be let alone. Lady Mallinger was much interested in the poor girl, observing that there was a Society for the Conversion of the Jews, and that it was to be hoped Mirah would embrace Christianity ; but perceiving that Sir Hugo looked at her with amuse- ment, she concluded that she had said something foolish. Lady Mallinger felt apologetically about herself as a woman who had produced nothing but daughters in a case where sons were required, and hence regarded the apparent contradictions of the world as probably due to the weakness of her own understanding. But when she was much puzzled, it was her habit to say to herself, " I will ask Daniel. " Deronda was altogether a convenience jn the family; and Sir Hugo too, after intending MAIDENS CHOOSING. 307 to do the best for him, had begun to feel that the pleasantest result would be to have this substitute for a son always ready at his elbow. This was the history of Deronda, so far as he knew it, up to the time of that visit to Leubronn in which he saw Gwendolen Harleth at the gaming- table. CHAPTER XXL " It is a common sentence that Knowledge is power ; but who hath duly considered or set forth the power of Ignorance ? Knowledge slowly builds up what Ignorance in an hour pulls down. Knowledge, through patient and frugal centuries, enlarges discovery and makes record of it ; Ignorance, wanting its day's dinner, lights a fire with the record, and gives a flavour to its one roast with the burnt souls of many generations. Knowledge, instructing the sense, refining and multiplying needs, transforms itself into skill and makes life various with a new six days' work ; comes Ignorance drunk on the seventh, with a firkin of oil and a match and an easy ' Let there not be ' and the many-coloured creation is shrivelled up in blackness. Of a truth, Knowledge is power, but it is a power reined by scruple, having a conscience of what must be and what may be ; wheraos Ignorance is a blind giant who, let him but wax unbound, would make it a sport to seize the pillars that hold up the long-wrought fabric of human good, and turn all the places of joy dark as a buried Babylon. And looking at life parcel-wise, in the growth of a single lot, who having a practised vision may not see that igno- rauce of the true bond between events, and false conceit of means whereby sequences may be compelled like that falsity of eye- sight which overlooks the gradations of distance, seeing that which is afar off as if it were within a step or a grasp precipitates the mistaken soul on destruction ! " IT was half -past ten in the morning when Gwendolen Harleth, after her gloomy journey from Leubronn, arrived at the station from which she must drive to Offendene. No carriage or friend was awaiting her, for in the telegram she had sent from Dover she had mentioned a later train, and in her impa- tience of lingering at a London station she had set off without picturing what it would be to arrive unannounced at half an hour's drive from home, at one of those stations which have been fixed on MAIDENS CHOOSING. 309 not as near anywhere but as equidistant from everywhere. Deposited as a feme, sole with her large trunks, and having to wait while a vehicle was being got from the large-sized lantern called the Eailway Inn, Gwendolen felt that the dirty paint in the waiting-room, the dusty decanter of flat water, and the texts in large letters calling on her to repent and be converted, were part of the dreary prospect opened by her family troubles; and she hurried away to the outer door looking towards the lane and fields. But here the very gleams of sunshine seemed melancholy, for the autumnal leaves and grass were shivering, and the wind was turning up the feathers of a cock and two croaking hens which had doubtless parted with their grown-up offspring and did not know what to do with themselves. The railway official also seemed without resources, and his innocent demeanour in observing Gwendolen and her trunks was rendered intolerable by the cast in his eye ; especially since, being a new man, he did not know her, and must conclude that she was not very high in the world. The vehicle a dirty old barouche was within sight, and was being slowly prepared by an elderly labourer. Con- temptible details these, to make part of a history ; yet the turn of most lives is hardly to be accounted for without them. They are continually entering with cumulative force into a mood until it gets the mass and momentum of a theory or a motive. Even philosophy is not quite free from such de- termining influences ; and to be dropt solitary at an ugly irrelevant-looking spot with a sense of no income on the mind, might well prompt a man to discouraging speculation on the origin of things 310 DANIEL DERONDA. and the reason of a world where a subtle thinker found himself so badly off. How much more might such trifles tell on a young lady equipped for society with a fastidious taste, an Indian shawl over her arm, some twenty cubic feet of trunks by her side, and a mortal dislike to the new conscious- ness of poverty which was stimulating her imagi- nation of disagreeables ? At any rate, they told heavily on poor Gwendolen, and helped to quell her resistant spirit. What was the good of living in the midst of hardships, ugliness, and humilia- tion ? This was the beginning of being at home again, and it was a sample of what she had to expect. Here was the theme on which her discontent rung its sad changes during her slow drive in the uneasy barouche, with one great trunk squeezing the meek driver, and the other fastened with a rope on the seat in front of her. Her ruling vision all the way from Leubronn had been that the family would go abroad again ; for of course there must be some little income left, her mamma did not mean that they would have literally nothing. To go to a dull place abroad and live poorly, was the dismal future that threatened her : she had seen plenty of poor English people abroad, and imagined herself plunged in the despised dulness of their ill-plenished lives, with Alice, Bertha, Fanny, and Isabel all growing up in tediousness around her, while she advanced towards thirty, and her mamma got more and more melancholy. But she did not mean to submit, and let misfor- tune do what it would with her : she had not yet quite believed in the misfortune ; but weariness and disgust with this wretched arrival had begun MAIDENS CHOOSING. 311 to affect her like an uncomfortable waking worse than the uneasy dreams which had gone before. The self-delight with which she had kissed her image in the glass had faded before the sense of futility in being anything whatever charming, clever, resolute what was the good of it all ? Events might turn out anyhow, and men were hateful. Yes, men were hateful. Those few words were rilled out with very vivid memories. But in these last hours a certain change had come over their meaning. It is one thing to hate stolen goods, and another thing to hate them the more because their being stolen hinders us from making use of them. Gwendolen had begun to be angry with Grandcourt for being what had hindered her from marrying him, angry with him as the cause of her present dreary lot. Bat the slow drive was nearly at an end, and the lumbering vehicle coming up the avenue was within sight of the windows. A figure appearing under the portico brought a rush of new and less selfish feeling in Gwendolen, and when springing from the carriage she saw the dear beautiful face with fresh lines of sadness in it, she threw her arms round her mother's neck, and for the moment felt all sorrows only in relation to her mother's feeling about them. Behind, of course, were the sad faces of the four superfluous girls, each, poor thing like those other many thousand sisters of us all having her peculiar world which was of no importance to any one else, but all of them feeling Gwendolen's pres- ence to be somehow a relenting of misfortune : where Gwendolen was, something interesting would happen; even her hurried submission to their 312 DANIEL DERONDA. kisses, and " Now go away, girls, " carried the sort of comfort which all weakness finds in decision and authoritativeness. Good Miss Merry, whose air of meek depression, hitherto held unaccount- able in a governess affectionately attached to the family, was now at the general level of circum- stances, did not expect any greeting, but busied herself with the trunks and the coachman's pay; while Mrs. Davilow and Gwendolen hastened up- stairs and shut themselves in the black and yellow bedroom. " Never mind, mamma dear, " said Gwendolen, tenderly pressing her handkerchief against the tears that were rolling down Mrs. Davilow 's cheeks. "Never mind. I don't mind. I will do some- thing. I will be something. Things will come right. It seemed worse because I was away. Come now ! you must be glad because I am here. " Gwendolen felt every word of that speech. A rush of compassionate tenderness stirred all her capability of generous resolution ; and the self- confident projects which had vaguely glanced be- fore her during her journey sprang instantaneously into new definiteness. Suddenly she seemed to perceive how she could be " something. " It was one of her best moments ; and the fond mother, forgetting everything below that tide-mark, looked at her with a sort of adoration. She said, " Bless you, my good, good darling ! I can be happy, if you can ! " But later in the day there was an ebb ; the old slippery rocks, the old weedy places reappeared. Naturally, there was a shrinking of courage as misfortune ceased to be a mere announcement, and began to disclose itself as a grievous tyrannical MAIDENS CHOOSING. 313 inmate. At first that ugly drive at an end it was still Offendene that Gwendolen had come home to, and all surroundings of immediate con- sequence to her were still there to secure her personal ease ; the roomy stillness of the large solid house while she rested; all the luxuries of her toilet cared for without trouble to her ; and a little tray with her favourite food brought to her in private. For she had said, " Keep them all away from us to-day, mamma. Let you and me be alone together. " When Gwendolen came down into the drawing- room, fresh as a newly dipped swan, and sat lean- ing against the cushions of the settee beside her mamma, their misfortune had not yet turned its face and breath upon her. She felt prepared to hear everything, and began in a tone of deliberate intention, " What have you thought of doing exactly, mamma ? " " Oh, my dear, the next thing to be done is to move away from this house. Mr. Haynes most fortunately is as glad to have it now as he would have been when we took it. Lord Brackenshaw 's agent is to arrange everything with him to the best advantage for us : Bazley, you know ; not at all an ill-natured man. " " I cannot help thinking that Lord Brackenshaw would let you stay here rent-free, mamma," said Gwendolen, whose talents had not been applied to business so much as to discernment of the admira- tion excited by her charms. " My dear child, Lord Brackenshaw is in Scot- land, and knows nothing about us. Neither your uncle nor I would choose to apply to him. Be- 314 DANIEL DERONDA. sides, what could we do in this house without servants, and without money to warm it? The sooner we are out the better. We have nothing to carry but our clothes, you know ? " " I suppose you mean to go abroad, then ? " said Gwendolen. After all, this is what she had famil- iarized her mind with. " Oh, no, dear, no. How could we travel ? You never did learn anything about income and ex- penses," said Mrs. Davilow, trying to smile, and putting her hand on Gwendolen's as she added mournfully, " That makes it so much harder for you, my pet. " " But where are we to go ? " said Gwendolen, with a trace of sharpness in her tone. She felt a new current of fear passing through her. " It is all decided. A little furniture is to be got in from the rectory, all that can be spared. " Mrs. Davilow hesitated. She dreaded the reality for herself less than the shock she must give Gwendolen, who looked at her with tense expec- tancy, but was silent. " It is Sawyer's Cottage we are to go to. " At first Gwendolen remained silent, paling with anger, justifiable anger, in her opinion. Then she said with haughtiness, * That is impossible. Something else than that ought to have been thought of. My uncle ought not to allow that. I will not submit to it " " My sweet child, what else could have been thought of ? Your uncle, I am sure, is as kind as he can be ; but he is suffering himself : he has his family to bring up. And do you quite understand ? You must remember we have nothing. We shall have absolutely nothing except what he and my MAIDENS CHOOSING. 315 sister give us. They have been as wise and active as possible, and we must try to earn something. I and the girls are going to work a table-cloth border for the Ladies' Charity at "Winchester, and a communion cloth that the parishioners are to present to Pennicote Church. " Mrs. Davilow went into these details timidly; but how else was she to bring the fact of their position home to this poor child, who, alas ! must submit at present, whatever might be in the back- ground for her ; and she herself had a superstition that there must be something better in the back- ground. " But surely somewhere else than Sawyer's Cottage might have been found, " Gwendolen per- sisted, taken hold of (as if in a nightmare) by the image of this house where an exciseman had lived. " No, indeed, dear. You know houses are scarce, and we may be thankful to get anything so pri- vate. It is not so very bad. There are two little parlours and four bedrooms. You shall sit alone whenever you like. " The ebb of sympathetic care for her mamma had gone so low just now, that Gwendolen took no notice of these deprecatory words. " I cannot conceive that all your property is gone at once, mamma. How can you be sure in so short a time ? It is not a week since you wrote to me." " The first news came much earlier, dear. But I would not spoil your pleasure till it was quite necessary. " " Oh, how vexatious ! " said Gwendolen, colour- ing with fresh anger. " If I had known, I could 316 DANIEL DERONDA. have brought home the money I had won ; and for want of knowing, I stayed and lost it. I had nearly two hundred pounds, and it would have done for us to live on a little while, till I could carry out some plan. " She paused an instant, and then added more impetuously, " Everything has gone against me. People have come near me only to blight me. " Among the " people " she was including De- ronda. If he had not interfered in her life, she would have gone to the gaming-table again with a few napoleons, and might have won back her losses. " We must resign ourselves to the will of Provi- dence, my child, " said poor Mrs. Davilow, startled by this revelation of the gambling, but not daring to say more. She felt sure that " people " meant Grandcourt, about whom her lips were sealed. And Gwendolen answered immediately, " But I don't resign myself. I shall do what I can against it. What is the good of calling peo- ple's wickedness Providence? You said in your letter it was Mr. Lassmann's fault we had lost our money. Has he run away with it all ? " " No, dear, you don't understand. There were great speculations : he meant to gain. It was all about mines and things of that sort. He risked too much. " " I don't call that Providence : it was his im- providence with our money, and he ought to be punished. Can't we go to law and recover our fortune ? My uncle ought to take measures, and not sit down by such wrongs. We ought to go to law." " My dear child, law can never bring back MAIDENS CHOOSING. 317 money lost in that way. Your uncle says it is milk spilt upon the ground. Besides, one must have a fortune to get any law : there is no law for people who are ruined. And our money has only gone along with other people's. We are not the only sufferers : others have to resign themselves besides us. " " But I don't resign myself to live at Sawyer's Cottage and see you working for sixpences and shillings because of that. I shall not do it. I shall do what is more befitting our rank and education. " " I am sure your uncle and all of us will approve of that, dear, and admire you the more for it," said Mrs. Davilow, glad of an unexpected opening for speaking on a difficult subject. " I did n't mean that you should resign yourself to worse when anything better offered itself. Both your uncle and aunt have felt that your abilities and educa- tion were a fortune for you, and they have already heard of something within your reach. " " What is that, mamma ? " Some of Gwen- dolen's anger gave way to interest, and she was not without romantic conjectures. " There are two situations that offer themselves. One is in a bishop's family, where there are 'three daughters, and the other is in quite a high class of school ; and in both, your French and music and dancing and then your manners and habits as a lady, are exactly what is wanted. Each is a hun- dred a-year and just for the present, " Mrs. Davilow had become frightened and hesitating, " to save you from the petty, common way of living that we must go to you would perhaps accept one of the two. " 3i8 DANIEL DERONDA. " What ! be like Miss Graves at Madame Meunier's? No." " I think, myself, that Dr. Mompert's would be more suitable. There could be 110 hardship in a bishop's family. " " Excuse me, mamma. There are hardships everywhere for a governess. And I don't see that it would be pleasanter to be looked down on in a bishop's family than in any other. Besides, you know very well I hate teaching. Fancy me shut up with three awkward girls something like Alice ! I would rather emigrate than be a governess. " What it precisely was to emigrate, Gwendolen was not called on to explain. Mrs. Davilow was mute, seeing no outlet, and thinking with dread of the collision that might happen when Gwendolen had to meet her uncle and aunt. There was an air of reticence in Gwendolen's haughty resistant speeches, which implied that she had a definite plan in reserve ; and her practical ignorance, con- tinually exhibited, could not nullify the mother's belief in the effectiveness of that forcible will and daring which had held the mastery over herself. " I have some ornaments, mamma, and I could sell them," said Gwendolen. " They would make a sum: I want a little sum just to go on with. I dare say Marshall at Wanchester would take them : I know he showed me some bracelets once that he said he had bought from a lady. Jocosa might go and ask him. Jocosa is going to leave us, of course. But she might do that first." "She would do anything she could, poor dear soul. I have not told you yet she wanted me to take all her savings her three hundred pounds. I tell her to set up a little school It will be hard MAIDENS CHOOSING. 319 for her to go into a new family now she has been so long with us." " Oh, recommend her for the bishop's daughters," said Gwendolen, with a sudden gleam of laughter in her face. " I am sure she will do better than I should." "Do take care not to say such things to your uncle," said Mrs. Davilow. "He will be hurt at your despising what he has exerted himself about. But I dare say you have something else in your mind that he might not disapprove, if you consulted him." " There is some one else I want to consult first- Are the Arrowpoints at Quetcham still, and is Herr Klesmer there ? But I dare say you know nothing about it, poor dear mamma. Can Jeffries go on horseback with a note ? " " Oh, my dear, Jeffries is not here, and the dealer has taken the horses. But some one could go for us from Leek's farm. The Arrowpoints are at Quetcham, I know. Miss Arrowpoint left her card the other day : I could not see her. But I don't know about Herr Klesmer. Do you want to send before to-morrow ? " " Yes, as soon as possible. I will write a note," said Gwendolen, rising. " What can you be thinking of, Gwen ? " said Mrs. Davilow, relieved in the midst of her wonder- ment by signs of alacrity and better humour. " Don't mind what, there 's a dear good mamma," said Gwendolen, reseating herself a moment to give atoning caresses. " I mean to do something. Never mind what, until it is all settled. And then you shall be comforted. The dear face ! it is ten years older in these three weeks. Now, now, now ! 320 DANIEL DERONDA. don't cry " Gwendolen, holding her mamma's head with both hands, kissed the trembling eyelids. " But inind you don't contradict me or put hin- drances in my way. I must decide for myself. I cannot be dictated to by my uncle or any one else. My life is my own affair. And I think " here her tone took an edge of scorn "I think I can do better for you than let you live in Sawyer's Cottage." In uttering this last sentence Gwendolen again rose, and went to a desk, where she wrote the follow- ing note to Klesmer : "Miss Harleth presents her compliments to Heir Klesmer, and ventures to request of him the very great favour that he will call upon her if possible to-morrow. Her reason for presuming so far on his kindness is of a very serious nature. Unfortunate family circum- stances have obliged her to take a course in which she can only turn for advice to the great knowledge and judgment of Herr Klesmer." " Pray get this sent to Quetcham at once, mamma," said Gwendolen, as she addressed the letter. " The man must be told to wait for an answer. Let no time be lost." For the moment the absorbing purpose was to get the letter despatched ; but when she had been assured on this point, another anxiety arose and kept her in a state of uneasy excitement. If Klesmer hap- pened not to be at Quetcham, what could she do next ? Gwendolen's belief in her star, so to speak, had had some bruises. Things had gone against her. A splendid marriage which presented itself within reach had shown a hideous flaw. The chances of roulette had not adjusted themselves to her claims ; MAIDENS CHOOSING. 321 and a man of whom she knew nothing had thrust himself between her and her intentions. The con- duct of those uninteresting people who managed the business of the world had been culpable just in the points most injurious to her in particular. Gwen- dolen Harleth, with all her beauty and conscious force, felt the close threats of humiliation : for the first time the conditions of this world seemed to her like a hurrying roaring crowd in which she had got astray, no more cared for and protected than a myr- iad of other girls, in spite of its being a peculiar hardship to her. If Klesmer were not at Quetcham that would be all of a piece with the rest: the unwelcome negative urged itself as a probability, and set her brain working at desperate alterna- tives which might deliver her from Sawyer's Cottage or the ultimate necessity of " taking a situation," a phrase that summed up for her the disagreeables most wounding to her pride, most irksome to her tastes ; at least so far as her experience enabled her to imagine disagreeables. Still Klesmer might be there, and Gwendolen thought of the result in that case with a hopeful- ness which even cast a satisfactory light over her peculiar troubles, as what might well enter into the biography of celebrities and remarkable persons. And if she had heard her immediate acquaintances cross-examined as to whether they thought her remarkable, the first who said " No " would have surprised her. VOL. I. 21 CHAPTER XXII. " We please our fancy with ideal webs Of innovation, but our life meanwhile Is in the loom, where busy passion plies The shuttle to and fro, a'nd gives our deeds The accustomed pattern." GWENDOLEN'S note, coming " pat betwixt too early and too late," was put into Klesmer's hands just when he was leaving Quetcham, and in order to meet her appeal to his kindness he with some in- convenience to himself spent the night at Wan- chester. There were reasons why he would not remain at Quetcham. That magnificent mansion, fitted with regard to the greatest expense, had in fact become too hot for him, its owners having, like some great politicians, been astonished at an insurrection against the es- tablished order of things, which we plain people after the event can perceive to have been prepared under their very noses. There were as usual many guests in the house, and among them one in whom Miss Arrowpoint foresaw a new pretender to her hand : a political man of good family who confidently expected a peer- age, and felt on public grounds that he required a larger fortune to support the title properly. Heir- esses vary, and persons interested in one of them beforehand are prepared to find that she is too yel- low or too red, tall and toppling or short and square, violent and capricious or moony and insipid ; but iu MAIDENS CHOOSING. 323 every case it is taken for granted that she will con- sider herself an appendage to her fortune, and marry where others think her fortune ought to go. Nature, however, not only accommodates herself ill to our favourite practices by making " only children " daughters, but also now and then endows the mis- placed daughter with a clear head and a strong will. The Arrowpoints had already felt some anxiety ow- ing to these endowments of their Catherine. She would not accept the view of her social duty which required her to marry a needy nobleman or a com- moner on the ladder towards nobility ; and they were not without uneasiness concerning her persistence in declining suitable offers. As to the possibility of her being in love with Klesmer they were not at all uneasy, a very common sort of blindness. For in general mortals have a great power of being as- tonished at the presence of an effect towards which they have done everything, and at the absence of an effect towards which they have done nothing but desire it. Parents are astonished at the ignorance of their sons, though they have used the most time- honoured and expensive means of securing it ; hus- bands and wives are mutually astonished at the loss of affection which they have taken no pains to keep ; and all of us in our turn are apt to be astonished that our neighbours do not admire us. In this way it happens that the truth seems highly improbable. The truth is something different from the habitual lazy combinations begotten by our wishes. The Arrowpoints' hour of astonishment was come. When there is a passion between an heiress and a proud independent-spirited man, it is difficult for them to come to an understanding ; but the difficul- 324 DANIEL DERONDA. ties are likely to be overcome unless the proud man secures himself by a constant alibi. Brief meetings after studied absence are potent in disclosure : but more potent still is frequent companionship, with full sympathy in taste, and admirable' qualities on both sides ; especially where the one is in the posi- tion of teacher, and the other is delightedly conscious of receptive ability which also gives the teacher delight. The situation is famous in history, and has no less charm now than it had in the days of Abelard. But this kind of comparison had not occurred to the Arrowpoints when they first engaged Klesnier to come down to Quetcham. To have a first-rate musician in your house is a privilege of wealth; Catherine's musical talent demanded every advan- tage ; and she particularly desired to use her quieter time in the country for more thorough study. Kles- mer was not yet a Liszt, understood to be adored by ladies of all European countries with the excep- tion of Lapland ; and even with that understanding it did not follow that he would make proposals to an heiress. No musician of honour would do so. Still less was it conceivable that Catherine would give him the slightest pretext for such daring. The large check that Mr. Arrowpoint was to draw in Klesmer's name seemed to make him as safe an inmate as a footman. Where marriage is incon- ceivable, a girl's sentiments are safe. Klesmer was eminently a man of honour ; but marriages rarely begin with formal proposals, and moreover, Catherine's limit of the conceivable did not exactly correspond with her mother's. Outsiders might have been more apt to think that Klesmer's position was dangerous for himself MAIDENS CHOOSING. 325 if Miss Arrowpoint had been an acknowledged beauty ; not taking into account that the most powerful of all beauty is that which reveals itself after sympathy and not before it. There is a charm of eye and lip which comes with every little phrase that certifies delicate perception or fine judg- ment, with every unostentatious word or smile that shows a heart awake to others; and no sweep of garment or turn of figure is more satisfying than that which enters as a restoration of confidence that one person is present on whom no intention will be lost. What dignity of meaning goes on gathering in frowns and laughs which are never observed in the wrong place; what suffused ador- ableness in a human frame where there is a mind that can flash out comprehension and hands that can execute finely ! The more obvious beauty, also adorable sometimes, one may say it without blasphemy, begins by being an apology for folly, and ends like other apologies in becoming tiresome by iteration ; and that Klesmer, though very suscep- tible to it, should have a passionate attachment to Miss Arrowpoint, was no more a paradox than any other triumph of a manifold sympathy over a monotonous attraction. We object less to be taxed with the enslaving excess of our passions than with our deficiency in wider passion ; but if the truth were known, our reputed intensity is often the dul- ness of not knowing what else to do with ourselves. Tannhauser, one suspects, was a knight of ill- furnished imagination, hardly of larger discourse than a heavy Guardsman; Merlin had certainly seen his best days, and was merely repeating him- self, when he fell into that hopeless captivity ; and we know that Ulysses felt so manifest an ennui 326 DANIEL DERONDA. under similar circumstances that Calypso herself furthered his departure. There is indeed a report that he afterwards left Penelope ; but since she was habitually absorbed in worsted work, and it was probably from her that Teleinachus got his mean, pettifogging disposition, always anxious about the property and the daily consumption of meat, no inference can be drawn from this already dubious scandal as to the relation between companionship and constancy. Klesmer was as versatile and fascinating as a young Ulysses on a sufficient acquaintance, one whom nature seemed to have first made generously and then to have added music as a dominant power using all the abundant rest, and, as in Mendelssohn, finding expression for itself not only in the highest finish of execution, but in that fervour of creative work and theoretic belief which pierces the whole future of a life with the light of congruous, devoted purpose. His foibles of arrogance and vanity did not exceed such as may be found in the best Eng- lish families ; and Catherine Arrowpoint had no corresponding restlessness to clash with his : not- withstanding her native kindliness she was perhaps too coolly firm and self-sustained. But she was one of those satisfactory creatures whose inter- course has the charm of discovery ; whose integrity of faculty and expression begets a wish to know what they will say on all subjects or how they will perform whatever they undertake ; so that they end by raising not only a continual expectation, but a continual sense of fulfilment, the systole and diastole of blissful companionship. In such cases the outward presentment easily becomes what the image is to the worshipper. It was not long before MAIDENS CHOOSING. 327 the two became aware that each was interesting to the other ; but the " how far " remained a matter of doubt. Klesmer did not conceive that Miss Arrow- point was likely to think of him as a possible lover, and she was not accustomed to think of herself as likely to stir more than a friendly regard, or to fear the expression of more from any man who was not enamoured of her fortune. Each was content to suffer some unshared sense of denial for the sake of loving the other's society a little too well ; and under these conditions no need had been felt to restrict Klesmer's visits for the last year either in country or in town. He knew very well that if Miss Arrowpoint had been poor he would have made ardent love to her instead of sending a storm through the piano, or folding ^his arms and pouring out a hyperbolical tirade about something as imper- sonal as the north pole ; and she was not less aware that if it had been possible for Klesmer to wish for her hand she would have found overmastering rea- sons for giving it to him. Here was the safety of full cups, which are as secure from overflow as the half-empty, always supposing no disturbance. Nat- urally, silent feeling had not remained at the same point any more than the stealthy dial-hand, and in the present visit to Quetcham, Klesmer had begun to think that he would not come again; while Catherine was more sensitive to his frequent brusquerie, which she rather resented as a needless effort to assert his footing of superior in every sense except the conventional. Meanwhile enters the expectant peer, Mr. Bult, an esteemed party man who, rather neutral in private life, had strong opinions concerning the districts of the Niger, was much at home also in 328 DANIEL DERONDA. the Brazils, spoke with decision of affairs in the South Seas, was studious of his Parliamentary and itinerant speeches, and had the general solidity and suffusive pinkness of a healthy Briton on the cen- tral table-land of life. Catherine, aware of a tacit understanding that he was an undeniable husband for an heiress, had nothing to say against him but that he was thoroughly tiresome to her. Mr. Bult was amiably confident, and had no idea that his insensibility to counterpoint could ever be reckoned against him. Klesmer he hardly regarded in the light of a serious human being who ought to have a vote ; and he did not mind Miss Arrowpoint's addiction to music any more than her probable expenses in antique lace. He was consequently a little amazed at an after-dinner outburst of Kles- mer's on the lack of idealism in English politics, which left all mutuality between distant races to be determined simply by the need of a market: the crusades, to his mind, had at least this excuse, that they had a banner of sentiment round which gen- erous feelings could rally : of course, the scoundrels rallied too, but what then ? they rally in equal force round your advertisement van of "Buy cheap, sell dear." On this theme Klesmer's eloquence, gesticulatory and other, went on for a little while like stray fireworks accidentally ignited, and then sank into immovable silence. Mr. Bult was not surprised that Klesmer's opinions should be flighty, but was astonished at his command of English idiom and his ability to put a point in a way that would have told at a constituents' dinner, to be accounted for probably by his being a Pole, or a Czech, or something of that fermenting sort, in a state of political refugeeism which had obliged him MAIDENS CHOOSING. 329 to make a profession of his music ; and that even- ing in the drawing-room he for the first time went up to Klesmer at the piano, Miss Arrowpoint being near, and said, " I had no idea before that you were a political man." Klesmer's only answer was to fold his arms, put out his nether lip, and stare at Mr. Bult. "You must have been used to public speaking. You speak uncommonly well, though I don't agree with you. From what you said about sentiment, I fancy you are a Panslavist." " No ; my name is Elijah. I am the Wandering Jew," said Klesmer, flashing a smile at Miss Arrow- point, and suddenly making a mysterious wind-like rush backwards and forwards on the piano. Mr. Bult felt this buffoonery rather offensive and Polish, but Miss Arrowpoint being there did not like to move away. " Herr Klesmer has cosmopolitan ideas," said Miss Arrowpoint, trying to make the best of the situa- tion. "He looks forward to a fusion of races." "With all my heart," said Mr. Bult, willing to be gracious. "I was sure he had too much talent to be a mere musician." " Ah, sir, you are under some mistake there," said Klesmer, firing up. " No man has too much talent to be a musician. Most men have too little. A creative artist is no more a mere musician than a great statesman is a mere politician. We are not ingenious puppets, sir, who live in a box and look out on the world only when it is gaping for amuse- ment. We help to rule the nations and make the age as much as any other public men. We count ourselves on level benches with legislators. And a 330 DANIEL DERONDA. man who speaks effectively through music is com- pelled to something more difficult than parliamentary eloquence." With the last word Klesmer wheeled from the piano and walked away. Miss Arrowpoint coloured, and Mr. Bult observed with his usual phlegmatic stolidity, " Your pianist does not think small beer of himself." " Herr Klesmer is something more than a pianist," said Miss Arrowpoint, apologetically. " He is a great musician in the fullest sense of the word. He will rank with Schubert and Mendelssohn." "Ah, you ladies understand these things," said Mr. Bult, none the less convinced that these things were frivolous because Klesmer had shown himself a coxcomb. Catherine, always sorry when Klesmer gave him- self airs, found an opportunity the next day in the music-room to say, " Why were you so heated last night with Mr. Bult ? He meant no harm." " You wish me to be complaisant to him ? " said Klesmer, rather fiercely. " I think it is hardly worth your while to be other than civil." " You find no difficulty in tolerating him, then ? you have a respect for a political platitudinarian as insensible as an ox to everything he can't turn into political capital. You think his monumental obtuseness suited to the dignity of the English gentleman." " I did not say that." " You mean that I acted without dignity and you are offended with me." "Now you are slightly nearer the truth," said Catherine, smiling. MAIDENS CHOOSING. 331 " Then I had better put my burial-clothes in my portmanteau and set off at once." "I don't see that. If I have to bear your criticism of my operetta, you should not mind my criticism of your impatience." " But I do mind it. You would have wished me to take his ignorant impertinence about a ' mere musician' without letting hini know his place. I am to hear my gods blasphemed as well as myself insulted. But I beg pardon. It is impossible you should see the matter as I do. Even you can't understand the wrath of the artist : he is of another caste for you." " That is true," said Catherine, with some betrayal of feeling. " He is of a caste to which I look up, a caste above mine." Klesmer, who had been seated at a table looking over scores, started up and walked to a little dis- tance, from which he said, " That is finely felt, I am grateful. But I had better go, all the same. I have made up my mind to go, for good and all. You can get on exceedingly well without me : your operetta is on wheels, it will go of itself. And your Mr. Bult's company fits me ' wie die Faust ins Auge.' I am neglecting my engagements. I must go off to St. Petersburg." There was no answer. " You agree with me that I had better go ? " said Klesmer, with some irritation. "Certainly; if that is what your business and feeling prompt. I have only to wonder that you have consented to give us so much of your time in the last year. There must be treble the interest to you anywhere else. I have never thought of your consenting to come here as anything else than a sacrifice." 332 DANIEL DERONDA. " Why should I make the sacrifice ? " said Kles- mer, going to seat himself at the piano, and touching the keys so as to give with the delicacy of an echo in the far distance a melody which he had set to Heine's "Ich hab' dich geliebet und liebe dich noch." " That is the mystery," said Catherine, not wanting to affect anything, but from mere agitation. From the same cause she was tearing a piece of paper into minute morsels, as if at a task of utmost multipli- cation imposed by a cruel fairy. " You can conceive no motive ? " said Klesmer, folding his' arms. " None that seems in the least probable." " Then I shall tell you. It is because you are to me the chief woman in the world, the throned lady whose colours I carry between my heart and my armour." Catherine's hands trembled so much that she could no longer tear the paper ; still less could her lips utter a word. Klesmer went on, " This would be the last impertinence in me, if I meant to found anything upon it. That is out of the question. I mean no such thing. But you once said it was your doom to suspect every man who courted you of being an adventurer, and what made you angriest was men's imputing to you the folly of believing that they courted you for your own sake. Did you not say so ? " " Very likely," was the answer, in a low murmur. " It was a bitter word. Well, at least one man who has seen women as plenty as flowers in May, has lingered about you for your own sake. And since he is one whom you can never marry, you will believe him. That is an argument in favour of some other man. But don't give yourself for a MAIDENS CHOOSING. 333 meal to a minotaur like Bult. I shall go now and pack. I shall make my excuses to Mrs. Arrow- point." Klesmer rose as he ended, and walked quickly towards the door. " You must take this heap of manuscript, then," said Catherine, suddenly making a desperate effort. She had risen to fetch the heap from another table. Klesmer came back, and they had the length of the folio sheets between them. "Why should I not marry the man who loves me, if I love him ? " said Catherine. To her the effort was something like the leap of a woman from the deck into the lifeboat. "It would be too hard impossible you could not carry it through. I am not worth what you would have to encounter. I will not accept the sacrifice. It would be thought a mesalliance for you, and I should be liable to the worst accusations." " Is it the accusations you are afraid of ? I am afraid of nothing but that we should miss the pass- ing of our lives together." The decisive word had been spoken : there was no doubt concerning the end willed by each : there only remained the way of arriving at it, and Cather- ine determined to take the straightest possible. She went to her father and mother in the library, and told them that she had promised to marry Klesmer. Mrs. Arrowpoint's state of mind was pitiable. Imagine Jean Jacques, after his essay on the corrupting influence of the arts, waking up among children of nature who had no idea of grilling the raw bone they offered him for breakfast with the primitive flint knife ; or Saint Just, after fervidly denouncing all recognition of pre-eminence, recteiv- ing a vote of thanks for the unbroken mediocrity of 334 DANIEL DERONDA. his speech, which warranted the dullest patriots io delivering themselves at equal length. Something of the same sort befell the authoress of " Tasso," when what she had safely demanded of the dead Leonora was enacted by her own Catherine. It is hard for us to live up to our own eloquence, and keep pace with our winged words, while we are treading the solid earth and are liable to heavy dining. Besides, it has long been understood that the proprieties of literature are not those of prac- tical life. Mrs. Arrowpoint naturally wished for the best of everything. She not only liked to feel herself at a higher level of literary sentiment than the ladies with whom she associated ; she wished not to be below them in any point of social consid- eration. While Klesmer was seen in the light of a patronized musician, his peculiarities were pictu- resque and acceptable ; but to see him by a sudden flash in the light of her son-in-law gave her a burning sense of what the world would say. And the poor lady had been used to represent her Cath- erine as a model of excellence. Under the first shock she forgot everything but her anger, and snatched at any phrase that would serve as a weapon. " If Klesmer has presumed to offer himself to you, your father shall horsewhip him off the premises. Pray speak, Mr. Arrowpoint." The father took his cigar from his mouth, and rose to the occasion by saying, " This will never do, Cath." " Do ! " cried Mrs. Arrowpoint ; " who in their senses ever thought it would do? You might as well say poisoning and strangling will not do. It is a comedy you have got up, Catherine. Else you are mad." MAIDENS CHOOSING. 335 " I am quite sane and serious, mamma, and Herr .Klesmer is not to blame. He never thought of my marrying him. I found out that he loved me, and loving him, I told him I would marry him." "Leave that unsaid, Catherine," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, bitterly. " Every one else will say it for you. You will be a public fable. Every one will say that you must have made the offer to a man who has been paid to come to the house who is nobody knows what a gypsy, a Jew, a mere bubble of the earth." " Never mind, mamma," said Catherine, indignant in her turn. " We all know he is a genius as Tasso was." "Those times were not these, nor is Klesmer Tasso," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, getting more heated. " There is no sting in that sarcasm, except the sting of undutifulness." " I am sorry to hurt you, mamma. But I will not give up the happiness of my life to ideas that I don't believe in and customs I have no respect for." " You have lost all sense of duty, then ? You have forgotten that you are our only child, that it lies with you to place a great property in the right hands ? " " What are the right hands ? My grandfather gained the property in trade." " Mr. Arrowpoint, will you sit by and hear this without speaking ? " " I am a gentleman, Cath. We expect you to marry a gentleman," said the father, exerting himself. " And a man connected with the institutions of this country," said the mother. " A woman in youi 336 DANIEL DERONDA. position has serious duties. Where duty and nation clash, she must follow duty." " I don't deny that," said Catherine, getting colder in proportion to her mother's heat. " But one may say very true things and apply them falsely. People can easily take the sacred word duty as a name for what they desire any one else to do." " Your parent's desire makes no duty for you, then?" " Yes, within reason. But before I give up the happiness of my life " " Catherine, Catherine, it will not be your happi- ness," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, in her most raven-like tones. " Well, what seems to me my happiness before I give it up, I must see some better reason than the wish that I should marry a nobleman, or a man who votes with a party that he may be turned into a nobleman. I feel at liberty to marry the man I love and think worthy, unless some higher duty forbids." " And so it does, Catherine, though you are blinded and cannot see it. It is a woman's duty not to lower herself. You are lowering yourself. Mr. Arrowpoint, will you tell your daughter what is her duty ? " "You must see, Catherine, that Klesmer is not the man for you," said Mr. Arrowpoint. " He won't do at the head of estates. He has a deuced foreign look, is an unpractical man." " I really can't see what that has to do with it, papa. The land of England has often passed into the hands of foreigners, Dutch soldiers, sons of foreign women of bad character : if our land were sold to-morrow, it would very likely pass into MAIDENS CHOOSING. 337 the hands of some foreign merchant on 'Change. It is in everybody's mouth that successful swindlers may buy up half the land in the country. How can I stem that tide ? " " It will never do to argue about marriage, Cath," said Mr. Arrowpoiut. " It 's no use getting up the subject like a parliamentary question. We must do as other people do. We must think of the nation and the public good." "I can't see any public good concerned here, papa," said Catherine. " Why is it to be expected of an heiress that she should carry the property gained in trade into the hands of a certain class ? That seems to me a ridiculous mish-mash of super- annuated customs and false ambition. I should call it a public evil. People had better make a new sort of public good by changing their ambitions." " That is mere sophistry, Catherine," said Mrs. Arrowpoint. " Because you don't wish to marry a nobleman, you are not obliged to marry a mounte- bank or a charlatan." "I cannot understand the application of such words, mamma." " No, I dare say not," rejoined Mrs. Arrowpoint, with significant scorn. "You have got to a pitch at which we are not likely to understand each other." " It can't be done, Cath," said Mr. Arrowpoint, wishing to substitute a better-humoured reasoning for his wife's impetuosity. " A man like Klesmer can't marry such a property as yours. It can't be done." " It certainly will not be done," said Mrs. Arrow- point, imperiously. " Where is the man ? Let him be fetched." VOL. i. 22 338 DANIEL DERONDA. " I cannot fetch him to be insulted," said Cathe- rine. " Nothing will be achieved by that." " I suppose you would wish him to know that in marrying you he will not marry your fortune," said Mrs. Arrowpoint. " Certainly ; if it were so, I should wish him to know it." " Then you had better fetch him." Catherine only went into the music-room and said, " Come : " she felt no need to prepare Klesmer. " Heir Klesmer," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, with a rather contemptuous stateliness, " it is unnecessary to repeat what has passed between us and our daugh- ter. Mr. Arrowpoint will tell you our resolution." " Your marrying is quite out of the question," said Mr. Arrowpoint, rather too heavily weighted with his task, and standing in an embarrassment unrelieved by a cigar. " It is a wild scheme altogether. A man has been called out for less." "You have taken a base advantage of our confidence," burst in Mrs. Arrowpoint, unable to carry out her purpose and leave the burthen of speech to her husband. Klesmer made a low bow in silent irony. " The pretension is ridiculous. You had better give it up and leave the house at once," continued Mr. Arrowpoint. He wished to do without men- tioning the money. " I can give up nothing without reference to your daughter's wish," said Klesmer. " My engagement is to her." " It is useless to discuss the question," said Mrs. Arrowpoint. " We shall never consent to the mar- riage. Jf Catherine disobeys us, we shall disinherit MAIDENS CHOOSING. 339 her. You will not marry her fortune. It is right you should know that." " Madam, her fortune has been the only thing I have had to regret about her. But I must ask her if she will not think the sacrifice greater than I am worthy of." " It is no sacrifice to me," said Catherine, "except that I am sorry to hurt my father and mother. I have always felt my fortune to be a wretched fatality of my life." " You mean to defy us, then ? " said Mrs. Arrowpoint. " I mean to marry Herr Klesmer," said Catherine, firmly. " He had better not count on our relenting," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, whose manners suffered from that impunity in insult which has been reckoned among the privileges of women. " Madam," said Klesmer, " certain reasons forbid me to retort. But understand that I consider it out of the power either of you or of your fortune to con- fer on me anything that I value. My rank as an artist is of my own winning, and I would not exchange it for any other. I am able to maintain your daughter, and I ask for no change in my life but her companionship." " You will leave the house, however," said Mrs. Arrowpoint, " I go at once," said Klesmer, bowing and quitting the room. " Let there be no misunderstanding, mamma," said Catherine; "I consider myself engaged to Herr Klesmer, and I intend to marry him." The mother turned her head away, and waved her hand in sign of dismissal. 340 DANIEL DERONDA. " It 's all very fine," said Mr. Arrowpoint, when Catherine was gone ; " but what the deuce are we to do with the property ? " "There is Harry Brendall. He can take the name." "Harry Brendall will get through it all in no time," said Mr. Arrowpoint, relighting his cigar. And thus, with nothing settled but the determi- nation of the lovers, Klesmer had left Quetcham, CHAPTER XXIII. " Among the heirs of Art, as at the division of the promised land, each has to win his portion by hard fighting : the bestowal is after the manner of prophecy, and is a title without possession. To carry the map of an ungotteu estate in your pocket is a poor sort of copyhold. And -in fancy to cast his shoe over Edom is little warrant that a man shall ever set the sole of his foot on an acre of his own there." " The most obstinate beliefs that mortals entertain about them- selves are such as they have no evidence for beyond a constant, spontaneous pulsing of their self-satisfaction, as it were a hidden seed of madness, a confidence that they can move the world with- out precise notion of standing-place or lever. " " PRAY go to church, mamma," said Gwendolen the next morning. " I prefer seeing Herr Klesmer alone." (He had written in reply to her note that he would be with her at eleven.) "That is hardly correct, I think," said Mrs. Davilow, anxiously. " Our affairs are too serious for us to think of such nonsensical rules," said Gwendolen, contemptu- ously. " They are insulting as well as ridiculous." " You would not mind Isabel sitting with you ? She would be reading in a corner." " No, she could not : she would bite her nails and stare. It would be too irritating. Trust my judg- ment, mamma. I must be alone. Take them all to church." Gwendolen had her way, of course ; only that Miss Merry and two of the girls stayed at home, to give the house a look of habitation by sitting at the dining-room windows. 342 t)ANIEL DERONDA. It was a delicious Sunday morning. The melan- choly waning sunshine of autumn rested on the leaf- strewn grass and came mildly through the windows in slanting bands of brightness over the old furni- ture, and the glass panel that reflected the furniture ; over the tapestried chairs with their faded flower- wreaths, the dark enigmatic pictures, the superan- nuated organ at which Gwendolen had pleased herself with acting Saint Cecilia on her first joyous arrival, the crowd of pallid, dusty knick-knacks seen through the open doors of the antechamber where she had achieved the wearing of her Greek dress as Hermioue. This last memory was just now very busy in her ; for had not Klesmer then been struck with admiration of her pose and expression ? What- ever he had said, whatever she imagined him to have thought, was at this moment pointed with keenest interest for her: perhaps she had never before in her life felt so inwardly dependent, so con- sciously in need of another person's opinion. There was a new fluttering of spirit within her, a new element of deliberation in her self-estimate, which had hitherto been a blissful gift of intuition. Still it was the recurrent burthen of her inward soliloquy that Klesmer had seen but little of her, and any unfavourable conclusion of his must have too narrow a foundation. She really felt clever enough for anything. To fill up the time she collected her volumes and pieces of music, and laying them on the top of the piano, set herself to classify them. Then catching the reflection of her movements in the glass panel, she was diverted to the contemplation of the image there and walked towards it. Dressed in black, without a single ornament, and with the warm MAIDENS CHOOSING. 343 whiteness of her skin set off between her light- brown coronet of hair and her square-cut bodice, she might have tempted an artist to try again the Roman trick of a statue in black, white, and tawny marble. Seeing her image slowly advancing, she thought, " I am beautiful," not exultingly, but with grave decision. Being beautiful was, after all, the condition on which she most needed exter- nal testimony. If any one objected to the turn of her nose or the form of her neck and chin, she had not the sense that she could presently show her power of attainment in these branches of feminine perfection. There was not much time to fill up in this way before the sound of wheels, the loud ring, and the opening doors assured her that she was not by any accident to be disappointed. This slightly increased her inward flutter. In spite of her self-confidence, she dreaded Klesmer as part of that unmanageable world which was independent of her wishes, some- thing vitriolic that would not cease to burn because you smiled or frowned at it. Poor thing ! she was at a higher crisis of her woman's fate than in her past experience with Grandcourt. The questioning, then, was whether she should take a particular man as a husband. The inmost fold of her questioning now was whether she need take a husband at all, ; whether she could not achieve substantiality for herself, and know gratified ambition without bondage. Klesmer made his most deferential bow in the wide doorway of the antechamber, showing also the deference of the finest gray kerseymere trousers and perfect gloves (the " masters of those who know " are happily altogether human). Gwendolen met 344 DANIEL DERONDA. him with unusual gravity, and holding out her hand, said, " It is most kind of you to come, Herr Klesmer. I hope you have not thought me presumptuous." " I took your wish as a command that did me honour," said Klesmer, with answering gravity. He was really putting by his own affairs in order to give his utmost attention to what Gwendolen might have to say ; but his temperament was still in a state of excitation from the events of yesterday, likely enough to give his expressions a more than usually biting edge. Gwendolen for once was under too great a strain of feeling to remember formalities. She continued standing near the piano, and Klesmer took his stand at the other end of it, with his back to the light and his terribly omniscient eyes upon her. No affectation was of use, and she began without delay. " I wish to consult you, Herr Klesmer. We have lost all our fortune ; we have nothing. I must get my own bread, and I desire to provide for my mamma, so as to save her from any hardship. The only way I can think of and I should like it better than anything is to be an actress to go on the stage. But of course I should like to take a high position, and I thought if you thought I could," here Gwendolen became a little more nervous, "it would be better for me to be a singer to study singing also." Klesmer put down his hat on the piano, and folded his arms as if to concentrate himself. "I know," Gwendolen resumed, turning from pale to pink and back again, "I know that my method of singing is very defective; but I have been ill taught I could be better taught ; I could study. MAIDENS CHOOSING. 345 And you will understand my wish : to sing and act too, like Grisi, is a much higher position. Naturally, I should wish to take as high a rank as I can. And I can rely on your judgment. I am sure you will tell me the truth." Gwendolen somehow had the conviction that now she made this serious appeal the truth would be favourable. Still Klesmer did not speak. He drew off his gloves quickly, tossed them into his hat, rested his hands on his hips, and walked to the other end of the room. He was tilled with compassion for this girl : he wanted to put a guard on his speech. When he turned again, he looked at her with a mild frown of inquiry, and said with gentle though quick utterance, " You have never seen anything, I think, of artists and their lives ? I mean of musicians, actors, artists of that kind ? " " Oh, no," said Gwendolen, not perturbed by a reference to this obvious fact in the history of a young lady hitherto well provided for. " You are, pardon me," said Klesmer, again paus- ing near the piano, " in coming to a conclusion on such a matter as this, everything must be taken into consideration, you are perhaps twenty ? " " I am twenty-one," said Gwendolen, a slight fear rising in her. " Do you think I am too old ? " Klesmer pouted his under lip and shook his long fingers upward in a manner totally enigmatic. " Many persons begin later than others," said Gwendolen, betrayed by her habitual consciousness of having valuable information to bestow. Klesmer took no notice, but said with more studied gentleness than ever, " You have probably not thought of an artistic career until now : you did 3 4 6 DANIEL DERONDA. not entertain the notion, the longing what shall I say ? you did not wish yourself an actress, or any- thing of that sort, till the present trouble ? " " Not exactly ; but I was fond of acting. I have acted ; you saw me, if you remember you saw me here in charades, and as Hermione," said Gwendolen, really fearing that Klesmer had forgotten. " Yes, yes," he answered quickly, " I remember I remember perfectly," and again walked to the other end of the room. It was difficult for him to refrain from this kind of movement when he was in any argument either audible or silent. Gwendolen felt that she was being weighed. The delay was unpleasant. But she did not yet conceive that the scale could dip on the wrong side, and it seemed to her only graceful to say, " I shall be very much obliged to you for taking the trouble to give me your advice, whatever it may be." "Miss Harleth," said Klesmer, turning towards her and speaking with a slight increase of accent, " I will veil nothing from you in this matter. I should reckon myself guilty if I put a false visage on things, made them too black or too white. The gods have a curse for him who willingly tells another the wrong road. And if I misled one who is so young, so beautiful who, I trust, will find her happiness along the right road, I should regard my- self as a Bosewicht." In the last word Klesmer's voice had dropped to a loud whisper. Gwendolen felt a sinking of heart under this unex- pected solemnity, and kept a sort of fascinated gaze on Klesmer's face, while he went on. " You are a beautiful young lady you have been brought up in ease you have done what you would you have not said to yourself, ' I must know this MAIDENS CHOOSING. 347 exactly,' ' I must understand this exactly,' ' I must do this exactly " in uttering these three terrible musts, Klesmer lifted up three long fingers in suc- cession. " In sum, you have not been called upon to be anything but a charming young lady, whom it is an impoliteness to find fault with." He paused an instant ; then resting his fingers on his hips again, and thrusting out his powerful chin, he said, " Well, then, with that preparation you wish to try the life of the artist ; you wish to try a life of arduous, unceasing work, and uncertain praise. Your praise would have to be earned, like your bread ; and both would come slowly, scantily what do I say ? they might hardlv come at all." This tone of discouragement, which Klesmer half hoped might suffice without anything more un- pleasant, roused some resistance in Gwendolen. With a slight turn of her head away from him, and an air of pique, she said, " I thought that you, being an artist, would con- sider the life one of the most honourable and de- lightful. And if I can do nothing better ? I suppose I can put up with the same risks as other people do." " Do nothing better ? " said Klesmer, a little fired. " No, my dear Miss Harleth, you could do nothing better neither man nor woman could do anything better if you could do what was best or good of its kind. I am not decrying the life of the true artist. I am exalting it. I say, it is out of the reach of any but choice organizations, natures framed to love perfection and to labour for it; ready, like all true lovers, to endure, to wait, to say, 348 DANIEL DERONDA. I am not yet worthy, but she Art, my mistress is worthy, and I will live to merit her. An honourable life ? Yes. But the honour comes from the inward vocation and the hard-won achievement : there is no honour in donning the life as a livery." Some excitement of yesterday had revived in Klesmer, and hurried him into speech a little aloof from his immediate friendly purpose. He had wished as delicately as possible to rouse in Gwen- dolen a sense of her unfitness for a perilous, difficult course ; but it was his wont to be angry with the pretensions of incompetence, and he was in danger of getting chafed. Conscious of this, he paused suddenly. But Gwendolen's chief impression was that he had not yet denied her the power of doing what would be good of its kind. Klesmer's fervour seemed to be a sort of glamour such as he was prone to throw over things in general ; and what she desired to assure him of was that she was not afraid of some preliminary hardships. The belief that to present herself in public on the stage must produce an effect such as she had been used to feel certain of in private life, was like a bit of her flesh, it was not to be peeled off readily, but must come with blood and pain. She said, in a tone of some insistence, "I am quite prepared to bear hardships at first. Of course no one can become celebrated all at once. And it is not necessary that every one should be first-rate, either actresses or singers. If you would be so kind as to tell me what steps I should take, I shall have the courage to take them. I don't mind going up hill. It will be easier than the dead level of being a governess. I will take any steps you recommend." MAIDENS CHOOSING. 349 Klesmer was more convinced now that he must speak plainly. " I will tell you the steps, not that I recommend, but that will be forced upon you. It is all one, so far, what your goal may be, excellence, celebrity, second, third rateness, it is all one. You must go to town under the protection of your mother. You must put yourself under training, musical, dra- matic, theatrical: whatever you desire to do you have to learn " Here Gwendolen looked as if she were going to speak, but Klesmer lifted up his hand and said decisively : " I know. You have exercised your talents you recite you sing from the drawing-room standpunkt. My dear Fraulein, you must unlearn all that. You have not yet conceived what excellence is : you must unlearn your mistaken admirations. You must know what you have to strive for, and then you must subdue your mind and body to unbroken discipline. Your mind, I say. For you must not be thinking of celebrity : put that candle out of your eyes, and look only at ex- cellence. You would of course earn nothing, you could get no engagement for a long while. You would need money for yourself and your family. But that," here Klesmer frowned and shook his fingers as if to dismiss a triviality " that could perhaps be found." Gwendolen turned pink and pale during this speech. Her pride had felt a terrible knife-edge, and the last sentence only made the smart keener. She was conscious of appearing moved, and tried to escape from her weakness by suddenly walking to a seat and pointing out a chair to Klesmer. He did not take it, but turned a little in order to face her and leaned against the piano. At that moment she 350 DANIEL DERONDA. wished that she had not sent for him : this first experience of being taken on some other ground than that of her social rank and her beauty was becoming bitter to her. Klesmer, preoccupied with a serious purpose, went on without change of tone. " Now, what sort of issue might be fairly expected from all this self-denial? You would ask that. It is right that your eyes should be open to it. I will tell you truthfully. The issue would be uncertain, and most probably would not be worth much." At these relentless words Klesmer -put out his lip and looked through his spectacles with the air of a monster impenetrable by beauty. Gwendolen's eyes began to burn, but the dread of showing weakness urged her to added self-control. She compelled herself to say in a hard tone, " You think I want talent, or am too old to begin." Klesmer made a sort of hum, and then descended on an emphatic " Yes ! The desire and the training should have begun seven years ago or a good deal earlier. A mountebank's child who helps her father to earn shillings when she is six years old, a child that inherits a singing throat from a long line of choristers and learns to sing as it learns to talk, has a likelier beginning. Any great achievement in acting or in music grows with the growth. Whenever an artist has been able to say, ' I came, I saw, I conquered,' it has been at the end of patient practice. Genius at first is little more than a great capacity for receiving discipline. Singing and acting, like the fine dexterity of the juggler with his cups and balls, require a shaping of the organs towards a finer and finer certainty of effect. MAIDENS CHOOSING. 351 Your muscles your whole frame must go like a watch, true, true, true, to a hair. That is the work of spring-time, before habits have been determined." " I did not pretend to genius," said Gwendolen, still feeling that she might somehow do what Klesmer wanted to represent as impossible. "I only supposed that I might have a little talent, enough to improve." " I don't deny that," said Klesmer. " If you had been put in the right track some years ago and had worked well, you might now have made a public singer, though I don't think your voice would have counted for much in public. For the stage your personal charms and intelligence might then have told without the present drawback of inexperience, lack of discipline, lack of instruction." Certainly Klesmer seemed cruel, but his feeling was the reverse of cruel. Our speech even when we are most single-minded can never take its line absolutely from one impulse; but Klesmer' s was as far as possible directed by compassion for poor Gwendolen's ignorant eagerness to enter on a course of which he saw all the miserable details with a definiteness which he could not if he would have conveyed to her mind. Gwendolen, however, was not convinced. Her self-opinion rallied, and since the counsellor whom she had called in gave a decision of such severe peremptoriness, she was tempted to think that his judgment was not only fallible but biassed. It occurred to her that a simpler and wiser step for her to have taken would have been to send a letter through the post to the manager of a London the- atre, asking him to make an appointment. She 352 DANIEL DERONDA. would make no further reference to her singing: Klesmer, she saw, had set himself against her singing. But she felt equal to arguing with him about her going on the stage, and she answered in a resistant tone, "I understand, of course, that no one can be a finished actress at once. It may be impossible to tell beforehand whether I should succeed ; but that seems to me a reason why I should try. I should have thought that I might have taken an engage- ment at a theatre meanwhile, so as to earn money and study at the same time." " Can't be done, my dear Miss Harleth I speak plainly it can't be done. I must clear your mind of these notions, which have no more resemblance to reality than a pantomime. Ladies and gentlemen think that when they have made their toilet and drawn on their gloves they are as presentable on the stage as in a drawing-room. No manager thinks that. With all your grace and charm, if you were to present yourself as an aspirant to the stage, a manager would either require you to pay as an amateur for being allowed to perform, or he would tell you to go and be taught, trained to bear your- self on the stage, as a horse, however beautiful, must be trained for the circus ; to say nothing of that study which would enable you to personate a char- acter consistently, and animate it with the natural language of face, gesture, and tone. For you to get an engagement fit for you straight away is out of the question." " I really cannot understand that," said Gwen- dolen, rather haughtily then, checking herself, she added in another tone "I shall be obliged to you if you will explain how it is that such poor MAIDENS CHOOSING. 353 actresses get engaged. I have been to the theatre several times, and I am sure there were actresses who seemed to me to act not at all well and who were quite plain." " Ah, my dear Miss Harleth, that is the easy criticism of the buyer. We who buy slippers toss away this pair and the other as clumsy ; but there went an apprenticeship to the making of them. Excuse me: you could not at present teach one of those actresses ; but there is certainly much that she could teach you. For example, she can pitch her voice so as to be heard : ten to one you could not do it till after many trials. Merely to stand and move on the stage is an art, requires practice. It is understood that we are not now talking of a comparse in a petty theatre who earns the wages of a needlewoman. That is out of the question for you." " Of course I must earn more than that," said Gwendolen, with a sense of wincing rather than of being refuted ; " but I think I could soon learn to do tolerably well all those little things you have mentioned. I am not so very stupid. And even in Paris I am sure I saw two actresses playing important ladies' parts who were not at all ladies and quite ugly. I suppose I have no particular talent, but I must think it is an advantage, even on the stage, to be a lady and not a perfect fright." " Ah, let us understand each other," said Klesmer, with a flash of new meaning. " I was speaking of what you would have to go through if you aimed at becoming a real artist, if you took music and the drama as a higher vocation in which you would strive after excellence. On that head, what I have said stands fast. You would find after VOL. i. 23 354 DANIEL DERONDA. your education in doing things slackly for one-and- twenty years great difficulties in study : you would find mortifications in the treatment you would get when you presented yourself on the footing of skill. You would be subjected to tests ; people would no longer feign not to see your blunders. You would at first only be accepted on trial. You would have to bear what I may call a glaring insig- nificance : any success must be won by the utmost patience. You would have to keep your place in a crowd, and after all it is likely you would lose it and get out of sight. If you determine to face these hardships and still try, you will have the dignity of a high purpose, even though you may have chosen unfortunately. You will have some merit, though you may win no prize. You have asked my judgment on your chances of winning. I don't pretend to speak absolutely; but measur- ing probabilities, my judgment is you will hardly achieve more than mediocrity." Klesmer had delivered himself with emphatic rapidity, and now paused a moment. Gwendolen was motionless, looking at her hands, which lay over each other on her lap, till the deep-toned, long-drawn "But" with which he resumed, had a startling effect, and made her look at him again. " But there are certainly other ideas, other dis- positions with which a young lady may take up an art that will bring her before the public. She may rely on the unquestioned power of her beauty as a passport. She may desire to exhibit herself to an admiration which dispenses with skill. This goes a certain way on the stage : not in music ; but on the stage, beauty is taken when there is nothing more commanding to be had. Not without some MAIDENS CHOOSING. 355 drilling, however: as I have said before, techni- calities have in any case to be mastered. But these excepted, we have here nothing to do with art. The woman who takes up this career is not an artist : she is usually one who thinks of enter- ing on a luxurious life by a short and easy road perhaps by marriage that is her most bril- liant chance, and the rarest. Still, her career will not be luxurious to begin with : she can hardly earn her own poor bread independently at once, and the indignities she will be liable to are such as I will not speak of." "I desire to be independent," said Gwendolen, deeply stung and confusedly apprehending some scorn for herself in Klesmer's words. "That was my reason for asking whether I could not get an immediate engagement. Of course I cannot know how things go on about theatres. But I thought that I could have made myself independent. I have no money, and I will not accept help from any one." Her wounded pride could not rest without mak- ing this disclaimer. It was intolerable to her that Klesmer should imagine her to have expected other help from him than advice. "That is a hard saying for your friends," said Kles- mer, recovering the gentleness of tone with which he had begun the conversation. " I have given you pain. That was inevitable. I was bound to put the truth, the unvarnished truth, before you. I have not said I will not say you will do wrong to choose the hard, climbing path of an endeavour- ing artist. You have to compare its difficulties with those of any less hazardous any more private course which opens itself to you. If you take that 356 DANIEL DERONDA. more courageous resolve, I will ask leave to shake hands with you on the strength of our free-masonry, where we are all vowed to the service of Art, and to serve her by helping every fellow-servant." Gwendolen was silent, again looking at her hands. She felt herself very far away from taking the re- solve that would enforce acceptance ; and after waiting an instant or two, Klesmer went on with deepened seriousness. " When there is the duty of service, there must be the duty of accepting it. The question is not one of personal obligation. And in relation to practical matters immediately affecting your future, excuse my permitting myself to mention in confidence an affair of my own. I am expecting an event which would make it easy for me to exert myself on your behalf in furthering your opportunities of instruction and residence in London under the care, that is, of your family without need for anxiety on your part If you resolve to take art as a bread-study, you need only undertake the study at first; the bread will be found without trouble. The event I mean is my marriage, in fact, you will receive this as a matter of confidence, my marriage with Miss Arrowpoint, which will more than double such right as I have to be trusted by you as a friend. Your friendship will have greatly risen in value for her by your having adopted that generous labour." Gwendolen's face had begun to burn. That Kles- mer was about to marry Miss Arrowpoint caused her no surprise, and at another moment she would have amused herself in quickly imagining the scenes that must have occurred at Quetcham. But what engrossed her feeling, what filled her imagination MAIDENS CHOOSING. 357 now, was the panorama of her own immediate future that Klesmer's words seemed to have unfolded. The suggestion of Miss Arrowpoint as a patroness was only another detail added to its repulsiveness ; Klesmer's proposal to help her seemed an additional irritation after the humiliating judgment he had passed on her capabilities. His words had really bitten into her self-confidence, and turned it into the pain of a bleeding wound ; and the idea of present- ing herself before other judges was now poisoned with the dread that they also might be harsh : they also would not recognize the talent she was con- scious of. But she controlled herself, and rose from her seat before she made any answer. It seemed natural that she should pause. She went to the piano and looked absently at leaves of music, pinch- ing up the corners. At last she turned towards Klesmer and said, with almost her usual air of proud equality, which in this interview had not been hitherto perceptible,' " I congratulate you sincerely, Herr Klesmer. I think I never saw any one more admirable than Miss Arrowpoint. And I have to thank you for every sort of kindness this morning. But I can't decide now. If I make the resolve you have spoken of, I will use your permission I will let you know. But I fear the obstacles are too great. In any case, I am deeply obliged to you. It was very bold of me to ask you to take this trouble." Klesmer's inward remark was, " She will never let me know." But with the most thorough respect in his manner, he said, " Command me at any time. There is an address on this card which will always find me with little delay." When he had taken up his hat and was going to 358 DANIEL DERONDA. make his bow, Gwendolen's better self, conscious of an ingratitude which the clear-seeing Klesmer must have penetrated, made a desperate effort to find its way above the stifling layers of egoistic disappoint- ment and irritation. Looking at him with a glance of the old gayety, she put out her hand, and said with a smile, " If I take the wrong road, it will not be because of your flattery." "God forbid that you should take any road but one where you will find and give happiness ! " said Klesmer, fervently. Then, in foreign fashion, he touched her fingers lightly with his lips, and in another minute she heard the sound of his depart- ing wheels getting more distant on the gravel. Gwendolen had never in her life felt so miserable. No sob came, no passion of tears, to relieve her. Her eyes were burning ; and the noonday only brought into more dreary clearness the absence of interest from her life. All memories, all objects, the pieces of music displayed, the open piano the very reflection of herself in the glass seemed no better than the packed-up shows of a departing fair. For the first time since her consciousness began, she was having a vision of herself on the common level, and had lost the innate sense that there were reasons why she should not be slighted, elbowed, jostled, treated like a passenger with a third-class ticket, in spite of private objections on her own part. She did not move about ; the prospects begotten by dis- appointment were too oppressively preoccupying ; she threw herself into the shadiest corner of a set- tee, and pressed her fingers over her burning eyelids. Every word that Klesmer had said seemed to have been branded into her memory, as most words are which bring with them a new set of impressions MAIDENS CHOOSING. 359 and make an epoch for us. Only a few hours before, the dawning smile of self-contentment rested on her lips as she vaguely imagined a future suited to her wishes : it seemed but the affair of a year or so for her to become the most approved Juliet of the time ; or, if Klesmer encouraged her idea of being a singer, to proceed by more gradual steps to her place in the opera, while she won money and applause by occasional performances. Why not ? At home, at school, among acquaintances, she had been used to have her conscious superiority admitted ; and she had moved in a society where everything, from low arithmetic to high art, is of the amateur kind politely supposed to fall short of perfection only because gentlemen and ladies are not obliged to do more than they like, otherwise they would probably give forth abler writings and show them- selves more commanding artists than any the world is at present obliged to put up with. The self-confident visions that had beguiled her were not of a highly exceptional kind ; and she had at least shown some rationality in consulting the per- son who knew the most and had flattered her the least. In asking Klesmer's advice, however, she had rather been borne up by a belief in his latent admiration than bent on knowing anything more unfavourable that might have lain behind his slight objections to her singing; and the truth she had asked for with an expectation that it would be agreeable, had come like a lacerating thong. " Too old should have begun seven years ago you will not, at best, achieve more than medi- ocrity hard, incessant work, uncertain praise bread coming slowly, scantily, perhaps not at all mortifications, people no longer feigning not to see 360 DANIEL DERONDA. your blunders glaring insignificance " all these phrases rankled in her ; and even more galling was the hint that she could only be accepted on the stage as j, beauty who hoped to get a husband. The " indignities " that she might be visited with had no very definite form for her, but the mere association of anything called " indignity " with herself roused a resentful alarm. And along with the vaguer images which were raised by those bit- ing words, came the more precise conception of disagreeables which her experience enabled her to imagine. How could she take her mamma and the four sisters to London, if it were not possible for her to earn money at once ? And as for submitting to be a protegee, and asking her mamma to submit with her to the humiliation of being supported by Miss Arrowpoint, that was as bad as being a governess ; nay, worse ; for suppose the end of all her study to be as worthless as Klesmer clearly expected it to be, the sense of favours received and never repaid, would embitter the miseries of disappointment. Klesmer doubtless had magnificent ideas about helping artists ; but how could he know the feelings of ladies in such matters ? It was all over : she had entertained a mistaken hope ; and there was an end of it. " An end of it ! " said Gwendolen, aloud, starting from her seat as she heard the steps and voices of her mamma and sisters coming in from church. She hurried to the piano and began gathering together her pieces of music with assumed diligence, while the expression on her pale face and in her burning eyes was what would have suited a woman enduring a wrong which she might not resent, but would probably revenge. MAIDENS CHOOSING. 361 "Well, my darling," said gentle Mrs. Davilow, entering, " I see by the wheel-marks that Klesmer has been here. Have you been satisfied with the interview ? " She had some guesses as to its object, but felt timid about implying them. " Satisfied, mamma ? oh, yes," said Gwendolen, in a high, hard tone, for which she must be excused, because she dreaded a scene of emotion. If she did not set herself resolutely to feign proud indifference, she felt that she must fall into a passionate outburst of despair, which would cut her mamma more deeply than all the rest of their calamities. " Your uncle and aunt were disappointed at not seeing you," said Mrs. Davilow, coming near the piano, and watching Gwendolen's movements. " I only said that you wanted rest." "Quite right, mamma," said Gwendolen, in the same tone, turning to put away some music. " Am I not to know anything now, Gwendolen ? Am I always to be in the dark ? " said Mrs. Davi- low, too keenly sensitive to her daughter's manner and expression not to fear that something painful had occurred. " There is really nothing to tell now, mamma," said Gwendolen, in a still higher voice. " I had a mistaken idea about something I could do. Herr Klesmer has undeceived me. That is all." " Don't look and speak in that way, my dear child : I cannot bear it," said Mrs. Davilow, break- ing down. She felt an undefinable terror. Gwendolen looked at her a moment in silence, bitting her irner lip ; then she went up to her, and putting her hands on her mamma's shoulders, said, with a drop of her voice to the lowest undertone, " Mamma, don't speak to me now. It is useless to 362 DANIEL DERONDA. cry and waste our strength over what can't be altered. You will live at Sawyer's Cottage, and I am going to the bishop's daughters. There is no more to be said. Things cannot be altered, and who cares ? It makes no difference to any one else what we do. We must try not to care ourselves. We must not give way. I dread giving way. Help me to be quiet." Mrs. Davilow was like a frightened child under her daughter's face and voice : her tears were arrested, and she went away in silence. CHAPTER XXIV. I question things and do not find One that will answer to my mind ; And all the world appears unkind. WORDSWORTH. GWENDOLEN was glad that she had got through her interview with Klesmer before meeting her uncle and aunt. She had made up her mind now that there were only disagreeables before her, and she felt able to maintain a dogged calm in the face of any humiliation that might be proposed. The meeting did not happen until the Monday, when Gwendolen went to the Rectory with her mamma. They had called at Sawyer's Cottage by the way, and had seen every cranny of the narrow rooms in a midday light, unsoftened by blinds and curtains ; for the furnishing to be done by gleanings from the Rectory had not yet begun. " How shall you endure it, mamma ? " said Gwen- dolen, as they walked away. She had not opened her lips while they were looking round at the bare walls and floors, and the little garden with the cab- bage-stalks, and the yew arbour all dust and cob- webs within. " You and the four girls all in that closet of a room, with the green and yellow paper pressing on your eyes ? And without me ? " "It will be some comfort that you have not to bear it too, dear." " If it were not that I must get some money, I would rather be there than go to be a governess." 364 DANIEL DERONDA. "Don't set yourself against it beforehand, Gwen- dolen. If you go to the palace, you will have every luxury about you. And you know how much you have always cared for that. You will not find it so hard as going up and down those steep narrow stairs, and hearing the crockery rattle through the house, and the dear girls talking." " It is like a bad dream," said Gwendolen, impetu- ously. " I cannot believe that my uncle will let you go to such a place. He ought to have taken some other steps." " Don't be unreasonable, dear child. What could he have done ? " "That was for him to find out. It seems to me a very extraordinary world if people in our posi- tion must sink in this way all at once," said Gwendo- len, the other worlds with which she was conversant being constructed with a sense of fitness that ar- ranged her own future agreeably. It was her temper that framed her sentences un- der this entirely new pressure of evils : she could have spoken more suitably on the vicissitudes in other people's lives, though it was never her aspi- ration to express herself virtuously so much as cleverly, a point to be remembered in extenuation of her words, which were usually worse than she was. And, notwithstanding the keen sense of her own bruises, she was capable of some compunction when her uncle and aunt received her with a more affec- tionate kindness than they had ever shown before. She could not but be struck by the dignified cheer- fulness with which they talked of the necessary economies in their way of living and in the educa- tion of the boys. Mr. Gascoigne's worth of char- MAIDENS CHOOSING. 365 acter, a little obscured by worldly opportunities, as the poetic beauty of women is obscured by the demands of fashionable dressing, showed itself to great advantage under this sudden reduction of for- tune. Prompt and methodical, he had set himself not only to put down his carriage, but to reconsider his worn suits of clothes, to leave off meat for break- fast, to do without periodicals, to get Edwy from school and arrange hours of study for all the boys under himself, and to order the whole establishment on the sparest footing possible. For all healthy people economy lias its pleasures ; and the Rector's spirit had spread through the household. Mrs. Gas- coigne and Anna, who always made papa their model, really did not miss anything they cared about for themselves, and in all sincerity felt that the saddest part of the family losses was the change for Mrs. Davilow and her children. Anna for the first time could merge her resent- ment on behalf of Rex in her sympathy with Gwen- dolen ; and Mrs. Gascoigne was disposed to hope that trouble would have a salutary effect on her niece, without thinking it her duty to add any bit- ters by way of increasing the salutariness. They had both been busy devising how to get blinds and curtains for the cottage out of the household stores ; but with delicate feeling they left these matters in the background, and talked at first of Gwendolen's journey, and the comfort it was to her mamma to have her at home again. In fact, there was nothing for Gwendolen to take as a justification for extending her discontent with events to the persons immediately around her, and she felt shaken into a more alert attention, as if by a call to drill that everybody else was obeying, 366 DANIEL DERONDA. when her uncle began in a voice of firm kindness to talk to her of the efforts he had been making to get her a situation which would offer her as many advantages as possible. Mr. Gascoigne had not for- gotten Grandcourt, but the possibility of further advances from that quarter was something too vague for a man of his good sense to be determined by it : uncertainties of that kind must not now slacken his action in doing the best he could for his niece under actual conditions. " I felt that there was no time to be lost, Gwen- dolen ; for a position in a good family where you will have some consideration is not to be had at a moment's notice. And however long we waited we could hardly find one where you would be bet- ter off than at Bishop Mompert's. I am known to both him and Mrs. Mompert, and that of course is an advantage for you. Our correspondence has gone on favourably ; but I cannot be surprised that Mrs. Mompert wishes to see you before making an abso- lute engagement. She thinks of arranging for you to meet her at Wanchester when she is on her way to town. I dare say you will feel the interview rather trying for you, my dear ; but you will have a little time to prepare your mind." " Do you know why she wants to see me, uncle ? " said Gwendolen, whose mind had quickly gone over various reasons that an imaginary Mrs. Mompert with three daughters might be supposed to enter- tain, reasons all of a disagreeable kind to the person presenting herself for inspection. The Rector smiled. " Don't be alarmed, my dear. She would like to have a more precise idea of you than my report can give. And a mother is natur- ally scrupulous about a companion for her daugh- MAIDENS CHOOSING. 307 ters. I have told her you are very young. But she herself exercises a close supervision over her daugh- ters' education, and that makes her less anxious as to age. She is a woman of taste and also of strict principle, and objects to having a French person in the house. I feel sure that she will think your manners and accomplishments as good as she is likely to find ; and over the religious and moral tone of the education she, and indeed the bishop himself, will preside." Gwendolen dared not answer, but the repression of her decided dislike to the whole prospect sent an unusually deep flush over her face and neck, subsid- ing as quickly as it came. Anna, full of tender fears, put her little hand into her cousin's, and Mr. Gascoigne was too kind a man not to conceive some- thing of the trial which this sudden change must be for a girl like Gwendolen. Bent on giving a cheerful view of things, he went on in an easy tone of remark, not as if answering supposed objections, " I think so highly of the position that I should have been tempted to try and get it for Anna, if she had been at all likely to meet Mrs. Mompert's wants. It is really a home, with a continuance of education in the highest sense ; ' governess ' is a misnomer. The bishop's views are of a more decidedly Low Church colour than my own, he is a close friend of Lord Grampian's ; but though privately strict, he is not by any means narrow in public matters. In- deed, he has created as little dislike in his diocese as any bishop on the bench. He has always re- mained friendly to me, though before his promotion, when he was an incumbent of this diocese, we had a little. controversy about the Bible Society." 3 68 DANIEL DERONDA. The Rector's words were too pregnant with sat- isfactory meaning to himself for him to imagine the effect they produced on the mind of his niece. " Con- tinuance of education," " bishop's views," "pri- vately strict," " Bible Society," it was as if he had introduced a few snakes at large for the in- struction of ladies who regarded them as all alike furnished with poison-bags, and biting or stinging according to convenience. To Gwendolen, already shrinking from the prospect opened to her, such phrases came like the glowing heat of a burning- glass, not at all as the links of persuasive reflec- tion which they formed for the good uncle. She began desperately to seek an alternative. "There was another situation, I think, mamma spoke of ? " she said, with determined self-mastery. " Yes," said the Rector, in rather a depreciatory tone ; " but that is in a school. I should not have the same satisfaction in your taking that. It would be much harder work, you are aware, and not so good in any other respect. Besides, you have not an equal chance of getting it." "Oh dear, no," said Mrs. Gascoigne, "it would be much harder for you, my dear, much less appro- priate. You might not have a bedroom to yourself." And Gwendolen's memories of school suggested other particulars which forced her to admit to her- self that this alternative would be no relief. She turned to her uncle again and said, apparently in acceptance of his ideas, " When is Mrs. Mompert likely to send for me ? " " That is rather uncertain, but she has promised not to entertain any other proposal till she has seen you. She has entered with much feeling into your position. It will be within the next fortnight, MAIDENS CHOOSING. ' 369 probably. But I must be off now. I am going to let part of my glebe uncommonly well." The Eector ended very cheerfully, leaving the room with the satisfactory conviction that Gwendo- len was going to adapt herself to circumstances like a girl of good sense. Having spoken appropriately, he naturally supposed that the effects would be appropriate ; being accustomed as a household and parish authority to be asked to " speak to " refrac- tory persons, with the understanding that the measure was morally coercive. " What a stay Henry is to us all ! " said Mrs. Gascoigne, when her husband had left the room. " He is, indeed," said Mrs. Davilow, cordially. " I think cheerfulness is a fortune in itself. I wish I had it." " And Eex is just like him," said Mrs. Gascoigne. " I must tell you the comfort we have had in a letter from him. I must read you a little bit," she added, taking the letter from her pocket, while Anna looked rather frightened, she did not know why, except that it had been a rule with her not to mention Eex before Gwendolen. The proud mother ran her eyes over the letter, seeking for sentences to read aloud. But apparently she had found it sown with what might seem to be closer allusions than she desired to the recent past, for she looked up, folding the letter, and saying, " However, he tells us that our trouble has made a man of him ; he sees a reason for any amount of work : he means to get a fellowship, to take pupils, to set one of his brothers going, to be everything that is most remarkable. The letter is full of fun just like him. He says, ' Tell mother she has VOL. i. 24 370 DANIEL DERONDA. put out an advertisement for a jolly good hard- working son, in time to hinder me from taking ship; and I offer myself for the place.' The letter came on Friday. I never saw my husband so much moved by anything since Hex was born. It seemed a gain to balance our loss." This letter, in fact, was what had helped both Mrs. Gascoigne and Anna to show Gwendolen an unmixed kindliness; and she herself felt very ami- ably about it, smiling at Anna and pinching her chin as much as to say, " Nothing is wrong with you now, is it?" She had no gratuitously ill- natured feeling or egoistic pleasure in making men miserable. She only had an intense objection to their making her miserable. But when the talk turned on furniture for the cottage, Gwendolen was not roused to show even a languid interest. She thought that she had done as much as could be expected of her .this morning, and indeed felt at an heroic pitch in keeping to herself the struggle that was going on within her. The recoil of her mind from the only definite prospect allowed her, was stronger than even she had imagined beforehand. The idea of presenting herself before Mrs. Mompert in the first instance, to be approved or disapproved, came as pressure on an already painful bruise : even as a governess, it appeared she was to be tested and was liable to rejection. After she had done herself the violence to accept the bishop and his wife, they were still to consider whether they would accept her ; it was at her peril that she was to look, speak, or be silent. And even when she had entered on her dismal task of self-constraint in the society of three girls whom she w.a$ bound incessantly to edify, the same process MAIDENS CHOOSING. 371 of inspection was to go on : there was always to be Mrs. Mompert's supervision ; always something or other would be expected of her to which she had not the slightest inclination ; and perhaps the bishop would examine her on serious topics. Gwen- dolen, lately used to the social successes of a hand- some girl, whose lively venturesomeness of talk has the effect of wit, and who six weeks before would have pitied the dulness of the bishop rather than have been embarrassed by him, saw the life before her as an entrance into a penitentiary. Wild thoughts of running away to be an actress, in spite of Klesmer, came to her with the lure of freedom ; but his words still hung heavily on her soul ; they had alarmed her pride and even her maidenly dig- nity : dimly she conceived herself getting amongst vulgar people who would treat her with rude famil- iarity, odious men, whose grins and smirks would not be seen through the strong grating of polite society. Gwendolen's daring was not in the least that of the adventuress ; the demand to be held a lady was in her very marrow ; and when she had dreamed that she might be the heroine of the gaming-table, it was with the understanding that no one should treat her with the less consideration, or presume to look at her with irony as Deronda had done. To be protected and petted, and to have her suscepti- bilities consulted in every detail, had gone along with her food and clothing as matters of course in her life : even without any such warning as Kles- mer's, she could not have thought it an attractive freedom to be thrown in solitary dependence on the doubtful civility of strangers. The endurance of the episcopal penitentiary was less repulsive than that; though here, too, she would certainly never 372 DANIEL DERONDA. be petted or have her susceptibilities consulted Her rebellion against this hard necessity which had come just to her of all people in the world to her whom all circumstances had concurred in preparing for something quite different was exaggerated instead of diminished as one hour followed another, filled with the imagination of what she might have expected in her lot and what it was actually to be. The family troubles, she thought, were easier for every one than for her, even for poor dear mamma, because she had always used herself to not enjoying. As to hoping that if she went to the Momperts' and was patient a little while, things might get better, it would be stupid to entertain hopes for herself after all that had happened : her talents, it appeared, would never be recognized as anything remarkable, and there was not a single direction in which probability seemed to flatter her wishes. Some beautiful girls, who, like her, had read romances where even plain governesses are centres of attraction and are sought in marriage, might have solaced themselves a little by transporting such pictures into their own future ; but even if Gwendolen's experience had led her to dwell on love-making and marriage as her elysium, her heart was too much oppressed by what was near to her, in both the past and the future, for her to project her anticipations very far off. She had a world-nausea upon her, and saw no reason all through her life why she should wish to live. No religious view of trouble helped her : her troubles had in her opinion all been caused by other people's disagreeable or wicked conduct; and there was really nothing pleasant to be counted on in the world: that was her feeling; everything else she MAIDENS CHOOSING. 373 had heard said about trouble was mere phrase- making not attractive enough for her to have caught it up and repeated it. As to the sweetness of labour and fulfilled claims ; the interest of inward and outward activity ; the impersonal delights of life as a perpetual discovery ; the dues of courage, fortitude, industry, which it is mere baseness not to pay towards the common burthen ; the supreme worth of the teacher's vocation, these, even if they had been eloquently preached to her, could have been no more than faintly apprehended doctrines: the fact which wrought upon her was her invariable observation that for a lady to become a governess to " take a situation " was to descend in life and to be treated at best with a compassionate patronage. And poor Gwendolen had never dis- sociated happiness from personal pre-eminence and Sclat. That where these threatened to forsake her, she should take life to be hardly worth the having, cannot make her so unlike the rest of us, men or women, that we should cast her out of our com- passion; our moments of temptation to a mean opinion of things in general being usually depend- ent on some susceptibility about ourselves and some dulness to subjects which every one else would consider more important. Surely a young creature is pitiable who has the labyrinth of life before her and no clew to whom distrust in her- self and her good fortune has come as a sudden shock, like a rent across the path that she was treading carelessly. In spite of her healthy frame, her irreconcilable repugnance affected her even physically : she felt a sort of numbness and could set about nothing ; the least urgency, even that she should take her meals, 374 DANIEL DERONDA. was an irritation to her; the speech of others on any subject seemed unreasonable, because it did not include her feeling and was an ignorant claim on her. It was not in her nature to busy herself with the fancies of suicide to which disappointed young people are prone ; what occupied and exas- perated her was the sense that there was nothing for her but to live in a way she hated. She avoided going to the Rectory again : it was too intolerable to have to look and talk'as if she were compliant ; and she could not exert herself to show interest about the furniture of that horrible cottage. Miss Merry was staying on purpose to help, and such people as Jocosa liked that sort of thing. Her mother had to make excuses for her not appearing even when Anna came to see her. For that calm which Gwendolen had promised herself to maintain had changed into sick motivelessness : she thought, " I suppose I shall begin to pretend by and by, but why should I do it now?" Her mother watched her with silent distress ; and, lapsing into the habit of indulgent tenderness, she began to think what she imagined that Gwen- dolen was thinking, and to wish that everything should give way to the possibility of making her darling less miserable. One day when she was in the black and yellow bedroom and her mother was lingering there under the pretext of considering and arranging Gwen- dolen's articles of dress, she suddenly roused herself to fetch the casket which contained her ornaments. " Mamma," she began, glancing over the upper layer, " I had forgotten these things. Why did n't you remind me of them ? Do see about getting MAIDENS CHOOSING. 375 them sold. You will not mind about parting with them. You gave them all to me long ago." She lifted the upper tray and looked below. " If we can do without them, darling, I would rather keep them for you," said Mrs. Davilow, seat- ing herself beside Gwendolen with a feeling of relief that she was beginning to talk about some- thing. The usual relation between them had become reversed. It was now the mother who tried to cheer the daughter. " Why, how came you to put that pocket-handkerchief in here ? " It was the handkerchief with the corner torn off which Gwendolen had thrust in with the turquoise necklace. " It happened to be with the necklace I was in a hurry," said Gwendolen, taking the handker- chief away and putting it in her pocket. " Don't sell the necklace, mamma," she added, a new feel- ing having come over her about that rescue of it which had formerly been so offensive. " No, dear, no ; it was made out of your dear father's chain. And I should prefer not selling the other things. None of them are of any great value. All my best ornaments were taken from me long ago." Mrs. Davilow coloured. She usually avoided any reference to such facts about Gwendolen's step- father as that he had carried off his wife's jewellery and disposed of it. After a moment's pause she went on, " And these things have not been reckoned on for any expenses. Carry them with you." "That would be quite useless, mamma," said Gwendolen, coldly. " Governesses don't wear orna- ments. You had better get me a gray frieze livery 376 DANIEL DERONDA. and a straw poke, such as ray aunt's charity chil- dren wear." " No, dear, no ; don't take that view of it. I feel sure the Momperts will like you the better for being graceful and elegant." " I am not at all sure what the Momperts will like me to be. It is enough that I am expected to be what they like," said Gwendolen, bitterly. " If there is anything you would object to less anything that could be done instead of your going to the bishop's, do say so, Gwendolen. Tell me what is in your heart. I will try for anything you wish," said the mother, beseechingly. " Don't keep things away from me. Let us bear them together." "Oh, mamma, there is nothing to tell. I can't do anything better. I must think myself fortunate if they will have me. I shall get some money for you. That is the only thing I have to think of. I shall not spend any money this year: you will have all the eighty pounds. I don't know how far that will go in housekeeping; but you need not stitch your poor fingers to the bone, and stare away all the sight that the tears have left in your dear eyes." Gwendolen did not give any caresses with her words as she had been used to do. She did not even look at her mother, but was looking at the turquoise necklace as she turned it over her fingers. " Bless you for your tenderness, my good dar- ling ! " said Mrs. Davilow, with tears in her eyes. " Don't despair because there are clouds now. You are so young. There may be great happiness in store for you yet." " I don't see any reason for expecting it, mam- MAIDENS CHOOSING. 377 ma," said Gwendolen, in a hard tone ; and Mrs. Davilow was silent, thinking as she had often thought before, " What did happen between her. and Mr. Grandcourt ? " " I will keep this necklace, mamma," said Gwen- dolen, laying it apart and then closing the casket. " But do get the other things sold, even if they will not bring much. Ask my uncle what to do with them. I shall certainly not use them again. I am going to take the veil. I wonder if all the poor wretches who have ever taken it felt as I do." " Don't exaggerate evils, dear." "How can any one know that I exaggerate, when I am speaking of my own feeling ? I did not say what any one else felt." She took out the torn handkerchief from her pocket again, and wrapt it deliberately round the necklace. Mrs. Davilow observed the action with some surprise, but the tone of the last words dis- couraged her from asking any question. The " feeling " Gwendolen spoke of with an air of tragedy was not to be explained by the mere fact that she was going to be a governess : she was possessed by a spirit of general disappointment. It was not simply that she had a distaste for what she was called on to do : the distaste spread itself over the world outside her penitentiary, since she saw nothing very pleasant in it that seemed attain- able by her even if she were free. Naturally her grievances did not seem to her smaller than some of her male contemporaries held theirs to be when they felt a profession too narrow for their powers, and had an & priori conviction that it was not worth while to put forth their latent abilities. Because her education had been less expensive 378 DANIEL DERONDA. than theirs, it did not follow that she should have wider emotions or a keener intellectual vision. Her griefs were feminine ; but to her as a woman they were not the less hard to bear, and she felt an equal right to the Promethean tone. But the movement of mind which led her to keep the necklace, to fold it up in a handkerchief, and rise to put it in her necessaire, where she had first placed it when it had been returned to her, was more peculiar, and what would be called less reasonable. It came from that streak of supersti- tion in her which attached itself both to her confi- dence and her terror, a superstition which lingers in an intense personality even in spite of theory and science; any dread or hope for self being stronger than all reasons for or against it. Why she should suddenly determine not to part with the necklace was not much clearer to her than, why she should sometimes have been frightened to find herself in the fields alone : she had a confused state of emotion about Deronda, was it wounded pride and resentment, or a certain awe and exceptional trust ? It was something vague and yet mastering, which impelled her to this action about the neck- lace. There is a great deal of unmapped country within us which would have to be taken into account in an explanation of our gusts and storms. END OF VOL. I. A 001 449 755 6 PR Al vol.3 flproul Han Library Eliot - The complete works. Daniel Deronda, PR 4650 Al vol.3 SPRO'JL HALL LIBRARY