A Country Gentleman and his Family

CHAPTER XLIII

Lizzie had a tiresome argument with her grandmother that night, who could not understand why she should be so bent on going into Highcombe by the first train. To see Miss Chatty married, that was reasonable enough; but Miss Chatty would not be married till eleven at the earliest, perhaps later. Mrs. Bagley knew that gentlefolks ran it almost too late, as late as was possible, which was the fashion, or else because they didn't like to get up so early as poor folks, – and why should Lizzie start by the seven o'clock train? But Lizzie was determined and got her way, declaring that she would stay up all night and do her work before she started sooner than not go. It would not have mattered much had she done so, for there was no sleep for Lizzie that night. She had not any certainty of being right to support her in what she was going to do. She thought of disturbing all the wedding preparations, stopping the bride with her veil on and the orange blossoms in her hair, and all the guests assembled – for what? because of – one who made no claim, who would never make any claim, who had not been heard of for more than six years. That was the flaw which disturbed Lizzie. It was not quite out seven years. Had that mystic period been accomplished she felt that she could have left Chatty to the protection of God. But at the outside it was only six and a half, and he had heard of her through Lizzie herself – though she inwardly resolved that no inducement on earth would make her appear before judge and jury to tell that. No! she would rather fly than tell it. And then her mind came back to the picture of the bride in her glistening white silk or satin, with the veil over her head, and the orange blossoms – to stop all that, to turn away the carriages from the door, and set herself up as knowing better than a gentleman like Mr. Cavendish, and perhaps making a fool of herself, and not being believed or listened to after all!

These thoughts tormented Lizzie all through the night: she got up very early, while it was still dark, and lighted the fire, and put everything straight for her grandmother, and made herself a cup of tea, which she needed much to settle her agitated nerves. Old Mrs. Bagley got up, too, disturbed by the sound of some one stirring, not without grumbling at being awoke so early. Lizzie came and kissed her before she went away. "Oh, Granny, say God bless you!" she cried; "for I'm all shaking and trembling, and I don't know what may come to me to-day." "Lord bless the child!" said Mrs. Bagley, "what's a-coming to her? A body would think as it's you as is going to be married to-day; but God bless you's easy said, and meant from the 'art, and never comes amiss; and God bless Miss Chatty too, the dear, and give her a happy weddin' and a happy life." Lizzie felt that she could not say Amen. It seemed to choke her, when she tried to utter that word, for it was little happiness poor Miss Chatty would have, if she did what she was going to do. She hurried to the station, which was a long walk in the fresh morning, feeling the air chill and sharp. It was a long way to the station, and then the railway made a round, so that an active person would have found it almost as quick to walk straight to Highcombe, and it was between eight and nine when Lizzie at last found herself before the door of Mrs. Warrender's house. She thought it looked wonderfully quiet for the morning of a wedding, the shutters still closed over the drawing-room windows. But it would be vain to attempt to describe her dismay when she heard the explanation of this tranquillity. Not here, but in London! Didn't she know? the housemaid said, who was a girl from Underwood. She thought everybody had known. And Lizzie had the sickening consciousness that had she inquired a little more closely she might have discovered for herself, and saved herself this trouble. She was taken in by the sympathising housemaid to have a second cup of tea at least, if not breakfast, and to hear all about the preparations and the dresses, which Betsey, though sadly disappointed to miss the glories of the wedding, had yet seen, and could describe. And there was not a train to London till nearly ten. She asked herself in her dismay whether it was worth going then, whether perhaps it were not Providence that had stopped her; but then, with a returning obstinacy of purpose, determined that she would not be beaten, that whatever hindered she would not be kept back.

She got to London just at the hour when the wedding party were to leave for church, and found them gone when she arrived at the house. Lizzie's habits did not consist with taking cabs. She had toiled along from the station, hot and weary, on foot. "If you want to catch them up you had better take an 'ansom," said one of the white-neckclothed men who were busy preparing the wedding breakfast. Lizzie scarcely knew what a hansom was; but she submitted to be put into one, and to get with much difficulty a shilling out of her purse to pay it. The sudden whirl, the jar and noise, the difficult getting out and in, the struggle to pursue that shilling into a corner of her purse among the pennies and sixpences, aided in confusing her brain utterly. She rushed up the steps of the church, which were crowded with idlers, not knowing what she did. The organ was pealing through the place, making a little storm of sound under the gallery, as she rushed in desperate, meeting the fine procession, the bride in all that glory which Lizzie had dreamt of, which she had been so reluctant to spoil; her white dress rustling over the red cloth that had been laid down in the aisle, her white veil flowing over her modest countenance, her arm in that of her bridegroom; all whiteness, peace, and sweet emotion, joy touched with trembling and a thousand soft regrets. Chatty came along slowly, her soft eyes cast down, her soul floating in that ecstasy which is full of awe and solemn thoughts. Dick's eyes were upon her, and the eyes of all, but hers saw nothing save the wonderful event that had come to pass, the boundary between the old and the new upon which she stood. And Lizzie had forgotten everything that could be called reason or coherence in her thoughts. She forgot her doubts, her scruples, her sense of the misery she might make, her uncertainty as to whether it might be needful at all. At this moment of bewildering excitement she had but one idea. She fell down upon her knees before them in the aisle, and caught at Chatty's white dress and the folds of her floating veil. "Oh, Miss Chatty, stop, stop, leave go of his arm: for he is married already, and his wife is living." She lifted her eyes, and there appeared round her a floating sea of horror-stricken faces, faces that she knew in the foreground, and floating farther off, as if in the air, in the distance, one she knew still better. Lizzie gave a shriek which rang through the church. "His wife is living, and she is here."

CHAPTER XLIV

The wedding morning had been confusing and full of many occupations, as wedding mornings always are. Chatty, left in the quiet of her room, had received innumerable little visits: from her mother, who came and came again, with a cheerful front, but her heart very low, merely to look at her, to give her a kiss in passing, to make sure that she was still there: and from Minnie, very busy, wanting to have a finger in everything, to alter her dress at the last moment, and the way in which her veil was put on. "For it is quite different from mine," Minnie cried, "and it stands to reason that there cannot be two ways of putting on a veil." Then there would come a young sister of Dick's, very shy, very anxious to make friends, admiring Chatty and her orange blossoms, with that sense of probable future occurrences in her own life of the same description which makes sympathy so warm. Then Mrs. Wilberforce, who though disapproving much of the wedding in London, was yet mollified by her husband's share in it, and association with the bishop; and Lady Markland, who gave the bride a kiss of tender sympathy and said nothing to her, which Chatty felt to be the kindest of all. Minnie, on the other hand, had a great inclination from the depths of her own experience to give her sister advice. "You must remember, Chatty, that a man is not just like one of us. When you are travelling you must be sure to recollect that – they can't do with a bun or a cup of coffee or that sort of thing, they must always have something substantial to eat. You see they take so much more out of themselves than we do. And they like you to be ready to the minute, though you have often got to wait for them – and – "

"But, dear Minnie, men are not all alike," said Mrs. Wilberforce, "no more than women are. Don't you think you had better leave her to find out for herself? She will learn soon enough," she added with a sigh, softly shaking her head, as though the experience could not but be melancholy when it came; "men, like everything else, are changing every day. The chivalry one used to meet with is quite gone – but what can you expect in these times?"

"I don't like this puffing at all," said Minnie; "if I were you, I would have it taken off. Oh, I am not at all of your opinion about the times. We are Liberal on both sides. The Thynnes have always gone in for progress and advancement; and when you think how much everything has improved – "

"If you call it improvement!" said Mrs. Wilberforce with something like a groan; but whether this was in reference to things in general, or to the removal of the tulle puffing over which Minnie was holding her hand, it would be difficult to say.

And thus the morning went by. Chatty took it all very sweetly, responding with smiles to every one, feeling the hours pass like a dream until it was time to go into the dream chariot, and be carried away to the fulfilment of the dream. In the large, dull, London drawing-room below, meanwhile, guests were assembling, guests in rustling garments of many-coloured silk, with bonnets which were enough to drive any ordinary mortal out of her senses, a little tulle tossed up with flowers or feathers into the most perfect little crown for a fair head, a little velvet with nodding plumes that made the wearer at once into a duchess. The duchess herself was present, but she was dowdy, as duchesses have a right to be. And then the arrivals, the carriages that came gleaming up, the horses that pranced and curved their beautiful necks, as highbred as the ladies! Geoff, who had come with his mother, posted himself at one of the windows inside the filmy white curtains to watch the people coming. He suddenly called out "mother" when it was almost time to start, and the brougham was already waiting at the door for the bridegroom. Lady Markland was standing close by the window talking to Dick, who, as bridegrooms often are, was agitated and required support and encouragement. "What is it, Geoff?" she asked in the midst of what she was saying, without turning from her companion.

"Oh, look here. I say, there is the lady that was at the big house at Underwood, the lady that picked me up the day I ran away – the one that was at the Elms. Look, mamma. Ah, you're just too late," cried Geoff, "you are always too late. She's gone now."

It was Dick and not Lady Markland who came forward to the window. "The lady who was at the Elms?" he said, and Geoff, looking up, saw a face that was like ashes looking not at him, but out of the window, with wide staring eyes.

"Look there – just going away – in a big veil – don't you see her? but I saw her face quite plain – the same lady that took me up beside her on the big tall phaeton. I did not like her much," the boy added in an undertone.

"I think" – in a still lower voice, almost a whisper – "you are mistaken, Geoff; that lady is dead."

"I saw her all the same," said the boy.

And here some of the jocular persons who make weddings more dreadful than they need to be came forward and touched Dick on the arm. "Come along, old fellow," he said; "no skulking, it's too late to draw back. The bridegroom's carriage stops the way."

There are resolute people in the world, who can look as they please, who can receive a mortal blow, and smile all the time, or worse, look gravely self-possessed, as if nothing had ever happened to them, or could happen to the end of time. Dick Cavendish was not of this heroic kind, but yet he managed to make himself look as a bridegroom ought, as he went through the little crowd and made his way downstairs. He said to himself it was not possible; had not her death been certified beyond doubt, had not Saunders attended the funeral and brought that photograph and the poor little ring? Was the certainty of all these facts to be shaken by the random recollection of a foolish child; or a chance resemblance which that child might imagine in a passer-by? He said to himself that there could be no greater folly than to pay any attention to such a piece of absurdity. But as he went out, and all the way along as he drove, hearing without paying any attention to the occasional remarks of his best man, who was with him, his eyes were searching among the wayfarers, the little crowd round the door, the other little crowd round the church. Just as he stepped inside the portico, turning round for a last look, he saw something approaching in a hansom – something rather than some one, a gray veil covering an unseen face. Was it some woman peacefully going about her own business, or was it – ? He went in, feeling the faces in the church turn round to look at him, wondering if his face was like the face of a man who was going to marry Chatty, or of one who was standing by the side of a grave? When he got up to the altar and took his place to wait for his bride there was a moment of silence, during which no intrusive fool could talk to him. And in the quiet he stood and closed his eyes and felt himself – oh, not here at the altar, waiting for Chatty in her orange flowers, but by the side of the dark pit into which the coffin was descending, straining his eyes to see through the lid if indeed the other was there. But then again, with an effort, he shook his miserable nightmare off. It was not possible he could be deceived. What motive could any one have to deceive him? Saunders had seen her buried, and had brought the photograph and that ring. The ring was conclusive; unless a horrible trick had been played upon him there was no room for doubt, and to whose interest could it be to play him a trick of this dreadful kind?

And then came the little rustle and thrill of the arriving train. And something white came up, a succession of whitenesses streaming one after the other, with no sound but the delicate rustle, that soft touch upon the air that might almost have been wings. They stood together, both but half conscious of what was going on round them: Chatty, sweetly wrapped in a maze of soft-coming fancies of wonder and pleasure and awe and regret; while he, touched to the heart by her presence, yet only half conscious of it, went through the whole in a kind of trance, mingling the words spoken with interlinings of unspeakable dumb reasonings, self-assurances, self-exhortations. Nobody knew anything about all this. The ceremony went on, just as such ceremonies go on every day in the year. The priest said the words and paused while they were repeated; by one voice firmly and strongly, by the other low and unassured, yet clear. And then there was the flutter of tension relieved, the gathering round of the little crowd, the little procession to the vestry, where everything was signed, the kissings and good wishes. Dick had no mother, but his elder sister was there, who kissed him in her place, and his younger sister, who was a bridesmaid, and hung about Chatty with all a girl's enthusiasm. What could be more simple, more natural and true? There was no shadow there of any dread, but everything happy, honest, pure. He recovered his soul a little in the midst of that group; though when Geoff with his little sharp face, in which there always seemed more knowledge than belonged to his age, caught his eye, a slight shiver ran over him. He felt as if Geoff knew all about it; and might, for anything he could tell, have some horrible secret to bring forth.

And then they set out again, the husband with his wife on his arm, to go away. The touch of Chatty's hand on his arm seemed to restore his confidence. She was his, in spite of all that Fate could do – in spite of everything, he thought. They walked together, he feeling more and more the pride and triumph of the moment, she moving softly, still in her dream, yet beginning too to feel the reality, past the altar where they had knelt a little while before, going down the aisle, facing the spectators who still lingered well pleased to see the bride. And then in a moment the blow fell. Some one seemed to rise up before them, out of the ground, out of the vacancy, forming before his horror-stricken eyes. And then there rose that cry which everybody could hear – which paralysed the bridal procession and brought the clergyman startled out of the vestry, and thrilled the careless lookers-on. "He has a wife living. She is living, and she is here!" Had he heard these words before in a dream? Had he known all along that he would hear them, ringing in his ears on his wedding day? "His wife is living – and she is here!"

"What is it? what is it?" cried the wedding guests, crowding upon each other, those who were nearest at least, while those at the end of the procession paused with the smile on their lips to stare and wonder at the sudden disturbance. Chatty was the most self-possessed of all. She said softly: "Lizzie, Lizzie! Something has happened to her," and put out her disengaged hand in its white glove to raise her from her knees.

"Miss Chatty, it's you that something has happened to – Oh stop, oh stop! there she is! Don't – don't let Miss Chatty go away with him, don't let her go away with him!" Lizzie cried.

"The woman is mad!" said some one behind. And so it might have been thought; when suddenly those immediately following who had closed up behind Chatty heard the bridegroom's voice, extremely agitated, yet with a nervous firmness, say audibly: "It is not true. Lizzie, the woman you speak of is dead. I know for certain that she is dead."

"Look there!" the intruder cried.

And he turned round in the sight of them all, the bride half turning too with the voluntary impulse, and saw behind the sea of anxious wondering faces another, which seemed to float in a mist of horror, from under the half-lifted cloud of a gray veil. He saw this face; and the rest of the wedding guests saw his, blanched with dread and misery, and knew every one that the marriage was stopped, and Chatty no wife, and he a dishonoured man.

Her eyes had followed his, she had not looked at him, but still held his arm, giving him a support he was incapable of giving her. The face in the background was not unknown to Chatty. She remembered it well, and with what a compunction of pity she had looked at it when she met that poor creature on the road at home, and wanted in her heart to take the lost one to her mother. She did not understand at all what was going on about her, nor what Mrs. Warrender meant, who came closely up behind, and took hold of her arm, detaching her from Dick. "Chatty, let us get home, my darling. Come, come with me. Theo will take us home," the mother said.

Then Chatty, turning round wondering, saw her bridegroom's face. She looking at him earnestly for the moment, holding his arm tighter, and then said with a strange, troubled, yet clear voice: "Dick – what does it mean? Dick!"

"Come home, come home, my dearest," cried Mrs. Warrender, trying to separate them.

"Come back to the vestry, Cavendish," cried Theo with threatening tones; and then arose a loud murmur of other suggestions, a tumult most unusual, horrifying, yet exciting to the spectators who closed around. The clergyman came out still in his surplice, hurrying towards the spot "Whatever the interruption is," he said, "don't stay there, for Heaven's sake. Come back if you will, or go home, but don't let us have a disturbance in the church."