Copley. "But I suppose that is one of the debts that _you_ will pay, Dolly."
Dolly forced herself to speak very quietly, though every nerve and fibre was trembling and quivering. She said, "How, mother?"
"I suppose you know. Mr. St. Leger knows, at any rate; and your father too, it seems."
"Mother," said Dolly, sitting up a little straighter, "do you think I will pay debts in _that_ way?"
"What other way will you pay them, then, child? what do you and your father expect? What _can_ you do, if you have not the money?" Mrs.
Copley spoke bitterly. Dolly waited a little, perhaps to bite down or swallow down some feeling.
"Mother," she said, somewhat lower, "do you think father would want me to pay his debts so?"
"Want to?" echoed Mrs. Copley. "I tell you, Dolly, when people get into difficulties the question is not what they _want_ to do. They have to pocket their likings, and eat humble pie. But how has your father got into difficulties?" she burst out with an expression of frightened distress. "He always had plenty. Dolly!--tell me!--what do you know about it? what is it? How _could_ he get into difficulties! Oh, if we had staid at home! Dolly, how is it possible? We have always had plenty--money running like water--all my life; and now, how _could_ your father have got into difficulties?"
Perhaps the difficulty was but transient and would soon pass over, Dolly faintly suggested.
"It don't look like it," said Mrs. Copley miserably, "and your father don't look like it. Here we are down in this desert, you and I, to keep us out of the way, and where we will cost as near nothing as can be; and we can't pay that! Do you know nothing about it, Dolly? how it has come about?"
"I couldn't ask father such a question, mother, you know."
"And what is to become of me!" Mrs. Copley went on; "when travelling is the thing I need. And what is to become of you, Dolly? Nobody to be seen, or to see you, but St. Leger. Have you made up your mind to be content with him? Will you have him, Dolly? and is that the way your father is going to take care of you?"
Poor Mrs. Copley, having so long swallowed her troubles in secret, dreading to give pain to Dolly, now that her mouth was once opened poured them forth relentlessly. Why not? the subject was broached at last, and having spoken, she might go on to speak. And poor Dolly, full of her own anxieties, did not know where to begin to quiet those of her mother.
"Mr. St. Leger is nothing to me," she said, however, in answer to Mrs.
Copley's last suggestions.
"He thinks he is."
"Then he is very foolish," said Dolly, reddening.
"It is you that are foolish, and you just do not know any better. I don't think, Dolly, that it would be at all a bad thing for you;--perhaps it would be the very best; though I'd rather have you marry one of our own people; but St. Leger is rich, very rich, I suppose; and your father has got mixed up with them somehow, and I suppose that would settle everything. St. Leger is handsome, too; he has a nice face; he has beautiful eyes; and he is a gentleman."
"His face wants strength."
"That's no matter. I begin to believe, Dolly, that you have wit enough for two."
"I am not speaking of wit; I mean _strength;_ and I should never like any man that hadn't it; not like him in the way you mean, mother."
"Strength? what sort of strength?"
"I mean manliness; power to do right; power over himself and others; power over the wrong, to put it down, and over the right, to lift it up and give it play. I don't know that I can tell you what I mean, mother; but that is my notion of a man."
"You are romantic, I am afraid, Dolly. You have been reading novels too much."
"What novels, mother? I have not read any, except Scott's and Miss Austen's and 'The Scottish Chiefs.'"
"Well, you have got romantic ideas, I am afraid. Your talk sounds romantic. You won't find that sort of man."
"I don't care," said Dolly. "But if I don't, I'll never marry any other sort."
"And that is a delusion too," said Mrs. Copley. "You will do just as other girls do. Nobody marries her fancy. And besides, St. Leger thinks he has got you; and I don't know but he and your father will manage it so. He don't ask _my_ advice."
Now this was not quite true; for the subject of Mr. St. Leger had been discussed more than once between Dolly's parents; though certainly Mrs.
Copley did see that matters were out of her hand and beyond her guidance now. Dolly was glad to have the conversation turn to something else; but the several subjects of it hardly left her head any more.
It is blessedly true, that at seventeen there is a powerful spring of elasticity in the mind, and an inexhaustible treasury of hope; also it is true that Mrs. Copley was not wrong in her estimate of Dolly when she adjudged her to have plenty of "wit;" otherwise speaking, resources and acuteness. That was all true; nevertheless, Dolly's seventeen-year-old heart and head were greatly burdened with what they had to carry just now. Experience gave her no help, and the circumstances forbade her to depend upon the experience of her mother.
Mrs. Copley's nerves must not be excited. So Dolly carried her burden alone, and found it very heavy; and debated her questions with herself, and could find an answer to never a one of them. How should she give her mother the rest and distraction of travelling? The doctor said, and Dolly believed, that it would be the best thing for her. But she could not even get speech of her father to consult over the matter with him Mr. Copley was caught in embarrassments of his own, worse than nervous ones. What could Dolly do, to break him off from his present habits, those she knew and those she dimly feared? Then when, as was inevitable, the image of Mr. St. Leger presented itself, as affording the readiest solution of all these problems, Dolly bounded back. Not _that_, of all possible outcomes of the present state of things. Dolly would neither be bought nor sold; would not in that way even be her parents' deliverer. She was sure she could not do that. What else could she do?
She carried these questions about with her, out into the garden, and up into her room; and many a hot tear she shed over them, when she could be long enough away from her mother to let the tears dry and the signs of them disappear before she met Mrs. Copley's eyes again. To her eyes Dolly was unfailingly bright and merry; a most sweet companion and most entertaining society; lively, talkative, and busy with endless plans for her mother's amusement. Meanwhile she wrote to her father, begging him to come down to Brierley; she said she wanted to talk to him.
Three days after that letter came Lawrence St. Leger. Mr. Copley could not spare the time, he reported.
"Spare the time from what?" Dolly asked.
"Oh, business, of course. It is always business."
"What sort? Not consul business."
"All sorts," said Lawrence. "He couldn't come. So he sent me. What is the thing, Miss Dolly? He said something was up."
"I wanted to talk to my father," Dolly said coldly.
"Won't I do?"
"Not at all. I had business to discuss."
"The journey, eh?"
"That was one thing," Dolly was obliged to allow.
"Well, look here. About that, I've a plan. I think I can arrange it with Mr. Copley, if you and your mother would be willing to set off with me, and let Mr. Copley join us somewhere--say at Baden Baden, or Venice, or where you like. He could come as soon as he was ready, you know."
"But you know," said Dolly quietly, "I specially want _him_, himself."
"But then your mother wants the journey. She really does. The doctor says so, you know, and I think he's right. And Mr. Copley won't leave London just now. He could send his secretary, you know. That's all right."
"I must see father before I can do anything," said Dolly evasively. "I will write a letter for you to carry back to him. And I will go do it at once."
"And I will take a look at what Peter is doing," said the young man.
"Such fellows always want looking after."
Dolly had looked after Peter herself. She paused before an upper window in her way to her room, to cast a glance down into the garden. Old Peter was there, at some work she had set him; and before him stood Lawrence, watching him, and she supposed making remarks; but at any rate, his air was the air of a master and of one very much at home.
Dolly saw it, read it, stood still to read it, and turned from the window with her heart too full of vexation and perturbation to write her letter then. She felt a longing for somebody to talk to, even though she could by no means lay open all her case for counsel; the air of the house was too close for her; her breath could not be drawn free in that neighbourhood. She must see somebody; and no one had poor Dolly to go to but the housekeeper, Mrs. Jersey. Nobody, near or far. So she slipped out of the house and took a roundabout way to the great mansion. She dared not take a straight way and cross the bridge, lest she should be seen and followed; so she made a circuit, and got into the park woods only after some time of warm walking through lanes and over fields. Till then she had hurried; now, safe from interruption, she went slowly, and pondered what she was going to do or say. Pondered everything, and could not with all her thinking make the confusion less confusion. It was a warm, still, sultry day; the turf was dry, the air was spicy under the great trees; shadow and sunshine alternately crossed her path, or more correctly, her path crossed them. A certain sense of contrast smote her as she went. Around her were the tokens of a broad security, sheltering protection, quiet and immovable possession, careless wealth; and within her a tumult of fear, uncertainty, exposure, and craving need. Life seemed a very unequal thing to the little American girl. Her step became slower. What was she going to say to Mrs. Jersey? It was impossible to determine; nevertheless, Dolly felt that she must see her and speak to her. That was a necessity.
Through the trees she caught at last sight of the grand old house. The dog knew her by this time and she did not fear him. She found the housekeeper busy with some sewing and glad to welcome her. Mrs. Jersey was that always. To-day she looked a little closer than usual at her visitor, discerning that Dolly's mind was not just in its wonted poise.
And besides, she loved to look at her.
Yet it is not easy to describe that for which our eyes seek and dwell upon a face or form. It is easy to say brown eyes and lightly curled, waving, beautiful hair; but hair is beautiful in different ways, and so faces. Can we put Dolly's charm into words? Mrs. Jersey saw a delicate, graceful, active figure, to begin with; delicate without any suspicion of weakness; active, in little quick, gracious movements, which it was fascinating to watch; and when not in motion, lovely in its childlike unconsciousness of repose. Her hair was exceedingly beautiful, not on account of its mass or colour so much as for the great elegance of its growth and curly arrangement or disarrangement around the face and neck; and the face was a blending of womanly and childlike. It could seem by turns most of the one or most of the other; but the clear eyes had at all times a certain deep _inwardness_, along with their bright, intelligent answer to the moment's impression, and also a certain innocent outlook, which was very captivating. And then, at a moment's notice, Dolly's face from being grave and thoughtful, would dimple all up with some flash of fun, and make you watch its change back to gravity again, with an intensified sense both of its merry and of its serious charm. She smiled at Mrs. Jersey now as she came in, but the housekeeper saw that the eyes had more care in their thoughtfulness than she was accustomed to see in them.