But as this could not be, any other person was welcome to win her; and a smart young fellow, well-looking and well-educated, like our friend Arthur Pendennis, was quite free to propose for her if he had a mind, and would have been received with open arms by Lady Clavering as a son-in-law, had he had the courage to come forward as a competitor for Miss Amory's hand.
Mr. Pen, however, besides other drawbacks, chose to entertain an extreme diffidence about himself. He was ashamed of his late failures, of his idle and nameless condition, of the poverty which he had brought on his mother by his folly, and there was as much of vanity as remorse in his present state of doubt and distrust. How could he ever hope for such a prize as this brilliant Blanche Amory, who lived in a fine park and mansion, and was waited on by a score of grand domestics, while a maid-servant brought in their meager meal at Fairoaks, and his mother was obliged to pinch and manage to make both ends meet? Obstacles seemed to him insurmountable, which would have vanished had he marched manfully upon them; and he preferred despairing, or dallying with his wishes--or perhaps he had not positively shaped them as yet--to attempting to win gallantly the object of his desire. Many a young man fails by that species of vanity called shyness, who might, for the asking, have his will.
But we do not pretend to say that Pen had, as yet, ascertained his; or that he was doing much more than thinking about falling in love. Miss Amory was charming and lively. She fascinated and cajoled him by a thousand arts or natural graces or flatteries. But there were lurking reasons and doubts, besides shyness and vanity, withholding him. In spite of her cleverness, and her protestations, and her fascinations, Pen's mother had divined the girl, and did not trust her. Mrs. Pendennis saw Blanche light-minded and frivolous, detected many wants in her which offended the pure and pious-minded lady; a want of reverence for her parents, and for things more sacred, Helen thought: worldliness and selfishness couched under pretty words and tender expressions. Laura and Pen battled these points strongly at first with the widow--Laura being as yet enthusiastic about her new friend, and Pen not far-gone enough in love to attempt any concealment of his feelings. He would laugh at these objections of Helen's, and say, "Psha, mother, you are jealous about Laura--all women are jealous."
But when, in the course of a month or two, and by watching the pair with that anxiety with which brooding women watch over their sons'
affections--and in acknowledging which, I have no doubt there is a sexual jealousy on the mother's part, and a secret pang--when Helen saw that the intimacy appeared to make progress, that the two young people were perpetually finding pretexts to meet, and that Miss Blanche was at Fairoaks or Mr. Pen at the Park every day, the poor widow's heart began to fail her--her darling project seemed to vanish before her; and giving way to her weakness, she fairly told Pen one day what her views and longings were; that she felt herself breaking, and not long for this world, and that she hoped and prayed before she went, that she might see her two children one. The late events, Pen's life and career and former passion for the actress, had broken the spirit of this tender lady. She felt that he had escaped her, and was in the maternal nest no more; and she clung with a sickening fondness to Laura, Laura who had been left to her by Francis in Heaven.
Pen kissed and soothed her in his grand, patronizing way. He had seen something of this, he had long thought his mother wanted to make this marriage--did Laura know any thing of it? (Not she--Mrs.
Pendennis said--not for worlds would she have breathed a word of it to Laura)--"Well, well, there was time enough, his mother wouldn't die,"
Pen said laughingly: "he wouldn't hear of any such thing, and as for the muse, she is too grand a lady to think about poor little me--and as for Laura, who knows that she would have me. She would do any thing you told her, to be sure. But am I worthy of her?"
"Oh, Pen, you might be," was the widow's reply; not that Mr. Pen ever doubted that he was; and a feeling of indefinable pleasure and self-complacency came over him as he thought over this proposal, and imaged Laura to himself as his memory remembered her for years past, always fair and open, kindly and pious, cheerful, tender, and true. He looked at her with brightening eyes as she came in from the garden at the end of this talk, her cheeks rather flushed, her looks frank and smiling--a basket of roses in her hand.
She took the finest of them and brought it to Mrs. Pendennis, who was refreshed by the odor and color of these flowers; and hung over her fondly, and gave it to her.
"And I might have this prize for the asking!" Pen thought, with a thrill of triumph, as he looked at the kindly girl. "Why, she is as beautiful and as generous as her roses." The image of the two women remained forever after in his mind, and he never recalled it but the tears came into his eyes.
Before very many weeks' intimacy with her new acquaintance, however, Miss Laura was obliged to give in to Helen's opinion, and own that the muse was selfish, unkind, and inconstant. Of course Blanche confided to her bosom friend all the little griefs and domestic annoyances; how the family could not comprehend her, and she moved among them an isolated being; how her poor mamma's education had been neglected, and she was forced to blush for her blunders; how Sir Francis was a weak person deplorably unintellectual, and only happy when smoking his odious cigars; how, since the birth of her little brother, she had seen her mother's precious affection, which she valued more than any thing in life, estranged from her once darling daughter; how she was alone, alone, alone in the world.
But these griefs, real and heart-rending though they might be to a young lady of exquisite sensibility, did not convince Laura of the propriety of Blanche's conduct in many small incidents of life. Little Frank, for instance, might be very provoking, and might have deprived Blanche of her mamma's affection, but this was no reason why Blanche should box the child's ears because he upset a glass of water over her drawing, and why she should call him many opprobrious names in the English and French language; and the preference accorded to little Frank was certainly no reason why Blanche should give herself imperial airs of command toward the boy's governess, and send that young lady upon messages through the house to bring her book or to fetch her pocket-handkerchief. When a domestic performed an errand for honest Laura, she was always thankful and pleased; whereas she could not but perceive that the little muse had not the slightest scruple in giving her commands to all the world round about her, and in disturbing any body's ease or comfort, in order to administer to her own. It was Laura's first experience in friendship; and it pained the kind creature's heart, to be obliged to give up as delusions, one by one, those charms and brilliant qualities in which her fancy had dressed her new friend, and to find that the fascinating little fairy was but a mortal, and not a very amiable mortal, after all. What generous person is there that has not been so deceived in his time?--what person, perhaps, that has not so disappointed others in his turn?
[Illustration][**moved up from 249]
After the scene with little Frank, in which that refractory son and heir of the house of Clavering, had received the compliments in French and English, and the accompanying box on the ear from his sister, Miss Laura, who had plenty of humor, could not help calling to mind some very touching and tender verses which the muse had read to her out of Mes Larmes, and which began, "My pretty baby brother, may angels guard thy rest," in which the muse, after complimenting the baby upon the station in life which it was about to occupy, and contrasting it with her own lonely condition, vowed, nevertheless, that the angel boy would never enjoy such affection as hers was, or find in the false world before him any thing so constant and tender as a sister's heart. "It may be," the forlorn one said, "it may be, you will slight it, my pretty baby sweet, you will spurn me from your bosom, I'll cling around your feet! Oh let me, let me love you! the world will prove to you as false as 'tis to others, but _I_ am ever true." And behold the muse was boxing the darling brother's ears instead of kneeling at his feet, and giving Miss Laura her first lesson in the Cynical philosophy--not quite her first, however--something like this selfishness and waywardness, something like this contrast between practice and poetry, between grand versified aspirations and every-day life, she had witnessed at home in the person of our young friend Mr. Pen.
But then Pen was different. Pen was a man. It seemed natural, somehow, that he should be self-willed, and should have his own way. And under his waywardness and selfishness, indeed there was a kind and generous heart. O it was hard that such a diamond should be changed away against such a false stone as this. In a word, Laura began to be tired of her admired Blanche. She had assayed her, and found her not true; and her former admiration and delight, which she had expressed with her accustomed generous artlessness, gave way to a feeling, which we shall not call contempt, but which was very near it; and which caused Laura to adopt toward Miss Amory, a grave and tranquil tone of superiority, which was at first by no means to the muse's liking. Nobody likes to be found out, or having held a high place, to submit to step down.
The consciousness that this event was impending did not serve to increase Miss Blanche's good humor, and as it made her peevish and dissatisfied with herself, it probably rendered her even less agreeable to the persons round about her. So there arose one fatal day a battle-royal between dearest Blanche and dearest Laura, in which the friendship between them was all but slain outright. Dearest Blanche had been unusually capricious and wicked on this day. She had been insolent to her mother; savage with little Frank; odiously impertinent in her behavior to the boy's governess; and intolerably cruel to Pincott, her attendant. Not venturing to attack her friend (for the little tyrant was of a timid feline nature, and only used her claws upon those who were weaker than herself) she maltreated all these, and especially poor Pincott, who was menial, confidante, companion (slave always), according to the caprice of her young mistress.
This girl who had been sitting in the room with the young ladies, being driven thence in tears, occasioned by the cruelty of her mistress, and raked with a parting sarcasm as she went sobbing from the door, Laura fairly broke out into a loud and indignant invective--wondered how one so young could forget the deference owing to her elders as well as to her inferiors in station; and professing so much sensibility of her own, could torture the feelings of others so wantonly. Laura told her friend that her conduct was absolutely wicked, and that she ought to ask pardon of Heaven on her knees for it. And having delivered herself of a hot and voluble speech whereof the delivery astonished the speaker as much almost as her auditor, she ran to her bonnet and shawl, and went home across the park, in a great flurry and perturbation, and to the surprise of Mrs. Pendennis, who had not expected her until night.
Alone with Helen, Laura gave an account of the scene, and gave up her friend henceforth. "O mamma," she said, "you were right; Blanche, who seems so soft and so kind, is, as you have said, selfish and cruel. She who is always speaking of her affections can have no heart. No honest girl would afflict a mother so, or torture a dependent; and--and, I give her up from this day, and I will have no other friend but you."
On this the two ladies went through the osculatory ceremony which they were in the habit of performing, and Mrs. Pendennis got a great secret comfort from the little quarrel--for Laura's confession seemed to say, "That girl can never be a wife for Pen, for she is light-minded and heartless, and quite unworthy of our noble hero. He will be sure to find out her unworthiness for his own part, and then he will be saved from this flighty creature, and awake out of his delusion."
But Miss Laura did not tell Mrs. Pendennis, perhaps did not acknowledge to herself, what had been the real cause of the day's quarrel. Being in a very wicked mood, and bent upon mischief every where, the little wicked muse of a Blanche had very soon begun her tricks. Her darling Laura had come to pass a long day; and as they were sitting in her own room together, had chosen to bring the conversation round to the subject of Mr. Pen.
"I am afraid he is sadly fickle," Miss Blanche observed; "Mrs. Pybus, and many more Clavering people, have told us all about the actress."
"I was quite a child when it happened, and I don't know any thing about it," Laura answered, blushing very much.
"He used her very ill," Blanche said, wagging her little head. "He was false to her."
"I am sure he was not," Laura cried out; "he acted most generously by her: he wanted to give up every thing to marry her. It was she that was false to him. He nearly broke his heart about it: he--"
"I thought you didn't know any thing about the story, dearest,"
interposed Miss Blanche.
"Mamma has said so," said Laura.
"Well, he is very clever," continued the other little dear. "What a sweet poet he is! Have you ever read his poems?"
"Only the 'Fisherman and the Diver,' which he translated for us, and his prize Poem, which didn't get the prize; and, indeed, I thought it very pompous and prosy," Laura said, laughing.
"Has he never written _you_ any poems, then, love?" asked Miss Amory.
"No, my dear," said Miss Bell.
Blanche ran up to her friend, kissed her fondly, called her my dearest Laura at least three times, looked her archly in the face, nodded her head, and said, "Promise to tell no-o-body, and I will show you something."
And tripping across the room daintily, to a little mother-of-pearl inlaid desk, she opened it with a silver key, and took out two or three papers crumpled and rather stained with green, which she submitted to her friend. Laura took them and read them. They were love-verses sure enough--something about Undine--about a Naiad--about a river. She looked at them for a long time; but, in truth, the lines were not very distinct before her eyes.
"And you have answered them, Blanche?" she asked, putting them back.
"O no! not for worlds, dearest," the other said: and when her dearest Laura had _quite_ done with the verses, she tripped back, and popped them again into the pretty desk.
Then she went to her piano, and sang two or three songs of Rossini, whose flourishes of music her flexible little voice could execute to perfection, and Laura sate by, vaguely listening, as she performed these pieces. What was Miss Bell thinking about the while? She hardly knew; but sate there silent as the songs rolled by. After this concert the young ladies were summoned to the room where luncheon was served; and whither they of course went with their arms round each other's waists.
And it could not have been jealousy or anger on Laura's part which had made her silent; for, after they had tripped along the corridor and descended the steps, and were about to open the door which leads into the hall, Laura paused, and looking her friend kindly and frankly in the face, kissed her with a sisterly warmth.
Something occurred after this--Master Frank's manner of eating, probably, or mamma's blunders, or Sir Francis smelling of cigars--which vexed Miss Blanche, and she gave way to that series of naughtinesses whereof we have spoken, and which ended in the above little quarrel.
CHAPTER XXVI.
A HOUSE FULL OF VISITORS.
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The difference between the girls did not last long. Laura was always too eager to forgive and be forgiven, and as for Miss Blanche, her hostilities, never very long or durable, had not been provoked by the above scene. Nobody cares about being accused of wickedness. No vanity is hurt by that sort of charge: Blanche was rather pleased than provoked by her friend's indignation, which never would have been raised but for a cause which both knew, though neither spoke of.
And so, Laura, with a sigh, was obliged to confess that the romantic part of her first friendship was at an end, and that the object of it was only worthy of a very ordinary sort of regard.
As for Blanche, she instantly composed a copy of touching verses, setting forth her desertion and disenchantment. It was only the old story she wrote, of love meeting with coldness, and fidelity returned by neglect; and some new neighbors arriving from London about this time, in whose family there were daughters, Miss Amory had the advantage of selecting an eternal friend from one of these young ladies, and imparting her sorrows and disappointments to this new sister. The tall footmen came but seldom now with notes to the sweet Laura; the pony-carriage was but rarely dispatched to Fairoaks to be at the orders of the ladies there. Blanche adopted a sweet look of suffering martyrdom when Laura came to see her. The other laughed at her friend's sentimental mood, and treated it with a good humor that was by no means respectful.
But if Miss Blanche found new female friends to console her, the faithful historian is also bound to say, that she discovered some acquaintances of the other sex who seemed to give her consolation too.
If ever this artless young creature met a young man, and had ten minutes' conversation with him in a garden walk, in a drawing-room window, or in the intervals of a waltz, she confided in him, so to speak--made play with her beautiful eyes--spoke in a tone of tender interest, and simple and touching appeal, and left him, to perform the same pretty little drama in behalf of his successor.
When the Claverings first came down to the Park, there were very few audiences before whom Miss Blanche could perform: hence Pen had all the benefits of her glances, and confidences, and the drawing-room window, or the garden walk all to himself. In the town of Clavering, it has been said, there were actually no young men: in the near surrounding country, only a curate or two, or a rustic young squire, with large feet, and ill-made clothes. To the dragoons quartered at Chatteries the baronet made no overtures: it was unluckily his own regiment: he had left it on bad terms with some officers of the corps--an ugly business about a horse bargain--a disputed play account--blind-Hookey--a white feather--who need ask?--it is not our business to inquire too closely into the bygones of our characters, except in so far as their previous history appertains to the development of this present story.
But the autumn, and the end of the parliamentary session, and the London season, brought one or two country families down to their houses, and filled tolerably the neighboring little watering-place of Baymouth, and opened our friend Mr. Bingley's Theater Royal at Chatteries, and collected the usual company at the Assizes and Race-balls there. Up to this time, the old county families had been rather shy of our friends of Clavering Park. The Fogys of Drummington: the Squares of Tozely Park; the Welbores of The Barrow, &c. All sorts of stories were current among these folks regarding the family at Clavering;--indeed, nobody ought to say that people in the country have no imagination, who heard them talk about new neighbors. About Sir Francis and his lady, and her birth and parentage, about Miss Amory, about Captain Strong, there had been endless histories which need not be recapitulated; and the family of the Park had been three months in the country before the great people around began to call.
But at the end of the season, the Earl of Trehawke, Lord Lieutenant of the County, coming to Eyrie Castle, and the Countess Dowager of Rockminster, whose son was also a magnate of the land, to occupy a mansion on the Marine Parade at Baymouth--these great folks came publicly immediately, and in state, to call upon the family of Clavering Park; and the carriages of the county families speedily followed in the track, which had been left in the avenue by their lordly wheels.