miss maurice was not in the house when geoffrey ludlow and his wife made that visit to lord caterham which had so plainly manifested margaret's imprudence and inexperience. the housekeeper and one of the housemaids had come to the assistance of the gentlemen, both equally alarmed and one at least calculated to be, of all men living, the most helpless under the circumstances. geoffrey was "awfully frightened," as he told her afterwards, when margaret fainted.
"i shall never forget the whiteness of your face, my darling, and the dreadful sealed look of your eyelids. i thought in a moment that was how you would look if you were dead; and what should i do if i ever had to see _that_ sight!"
this loving speech geoffrey made to his wife as they drove homewards,--she pale, silent, and coldly abstracted; he full of tender anxiety for her comfort and apprehension for her health,--sentiments which rendered him, to say the truth, rather a trying companion in a carriage; for he was constantly pulling the glasses up and down, fixing them a button-hole higher or lower, rearranging the blinds, and giving the coachman contradictory orders. these proceedings were productive of no apparent annoyance to margaret, who lay back against the cushions with eyes open and moody, and her underlip caught beneath her teeth. she maintained unbroken silence until they reached home, and then briefly telling geoffrey that she was going to her room to lie down, she left him.
"she's not strong," said geoffrey, as he proceeded to disembarrass himself of his outdoor attire, and to don his "working-clothes,"--"she's not strong; and it's very odd she's not more cheerful. i thought the child would have made it all right; but perhaps it will when she's stronger." and geoff sighed as he went to his work, and sighed again once or twice as he pursued it.
meanwhile lord caterham was thinking over the startling incident which had just occurred. he was an observant man naturally, and the enforced inaction of his life had increased this tendency; while his long and deep experience of physical suffering and weakness had rendered him acutely alive to any manifestations of a similar kind in other people. mrs. ludlow's fainting-fit puzzled him. she had been looking so remarkably well when she came in; there had been nothing feverish, nothing suggestive of fictitious strength or over-exertion in her appearance; no feebleness in her manner or languor in the tone of her voice. the suddenness and completeness of the swoon were strange,--were so much beyond the ordinary faintness which a drive undertaken a little too soon might be supposed to produce,--and the expression of margaret's face, when she had recovered her consciousness, was so remarkable, that lord caterham felt instinctively the true origin of her illness had not been that assigned to it.
"she looked half-a-dozen years older," he thought; "and the few words she said were spoken as if she were in a dream. i must be more mistaken than i have ever been, or there is something very wrong about that woman. and what a good fellow he is!--what a simple-hearted blundering kind fellow! how wonderful his blindness is! i saw in a moment how he loved her, how utterly uninterested she is in him and his affairs. i hope there may be nothing worse than lack of interest; but i am afraid, very much afraid for ludlow."
and then lord caterham's thoughts wandered away from the artist and his beautiful wife to that other subject which occupied them so constantly, and with which every other cogitation or contemplation contrived to mingle itself in an unaccountable manner, on which he did not care to reason, and against which he did not attempt to strive. what did it matter now? he might be ever so much engrossed, and no effort at self-control or self-conquest would be called for; the feelings he cherished unchecked could not harm any one--could not harm himself now. there was great relief; great peace in that thought,--no strife for him to enter on, no struggle in which his suffering body and weary mind must engage. the end would be soon with him now; and while he waited for it, he might love this bright young girl with all the power of his heart.
so lord caterham lay quite still upon the couch on which they had placed margaret when she fainted, and thought over all he had intended to say to geoffrey, and must now seek another opportunity of saying, and turned over in his mind sundry difficulties which he began to foresee in the way of his cherished plan, and which would probably arise in the direction of mrs. ludlow. annie and margaret had not hitherto seen much of each other, as has already appeared; and there was something ominous in the occurrence of that morning which troubled lord caterham's mind and disturbed his preconcerted arrangements. if trouble--trouble of some unknown kind, but, as he intuitively felt, of a serious nature--were hanging over geoffrey ludlow's head, what was to become of his guardianship of annie in the future,--that future which lord caterham felt was drawing so near; that future which would find her without a friend, and would leave her exposed to countless flatterers. he was pondering upon these things when annie entered the room, bright and blooming, after her drive in the balmy summer air, and carrying a gorgeous bouquet of crimson roses.
she was followed by stephens, carrying two tall venetian glasses. he placed them on a table, and then withdrew.
"look, arthur," said annie; "we've been to fulham, and i got these fresh cut, all for your own self, at the nursery-gardens. none of those horrid formal tied-up bouquets for you, or for me either, with the buds stuck on with wires, and nasty fluffy bits of cotton sticking to the leaves. i went round with the man, and made him cut each rose as i pointed it out; and they're such beauties, arthur! here's one for you to wear and smell and spoil; but the others i'm going to keep fresh for ever so long."
she went over to the couch and gave him the rose, a rich crimson full-formed flower, gorgeous in colour and exquisite in perfume. he took it with a smile and held it in his hand.
"why don't you put it in your button-hole, lord caterham?" said annie, with a pretty air of pettishness which became her well.
"why?" said lord caterham. "do you think i am exactly the style of man to wear posies and breast-knots, little annie?" his tone was sad through its playfulness.
"nonsense, arthur," she began; "you--" then she looked at him, and stopped suddenly, and her face changed. "have you been worse to-day? you look very pale. have you been in pain? did you want me?"
"no, no, my child," said lord caterham; "i am just as usual. go on with your flowers, annie,--settle them up, lest they fade. they are beautiful indeed, and we'll keep them as long as we can."
she was not reassured, and she still stood and gazed earnestly at him.
"i am all right, annie,--i am indeed. my head is even easier than usual. but some one has been ill, if i haven't. your friends the ludlows were here to-day. did no one tell you as you came in?"
"no, i did not see any one; i left my bonnet in the ante-room and came straight in here. i only called to stephens to bring the flower-glasses. was mrs. ludlow ill, arthur? did she come to see me?"
"i don't think so--she only came, i think, because i wanted to see ludlow, and he took advantage of the circumstance to have a drive with her. have you seen her since the child was born?"
"no, i called, but only to inquire. but was she ill? what happened?"
"well, she was ill--she fainted. ludlow and i were just beginning to talk, and, at her own request, leaving her to amuse herself with the photographs and things lying about--and she had just asked me some trifling question, something about lionel's portrait--whose it was, i think--when she suddenly fainted. i don't think there could be a more complete swoon; she really looked as though she were dead."
"what did you do? was geoffrey frightened?"
"yes, we were both frightened. stephens came, and two of the women. ludlow was terrified; but she soon recovered, and she would persist in going home, though i tried to persuade her to wait until you returned. but she would not listen to it, and went away with ludlow in a dreadful state of mind; he thinks he made her take the drive too soon, and is frightfully penitent."
"well but, arthur," said annie, seriously and anxiously, "i suppose he did. it must have been that which knocked her up. she has no mother or sister with her, you know, to tell her about these things."
"my dear annie," said lord caterham, "she has a doctor and a nurse, i suppose; and she has common-sense, and knows how she feels, herself--does she not? she looked perfectly well when she came in, and handsomer than when i saw her before--and i don't believe the drive had any thing to do with the fainting-fit."
miss maurice looked at lord caterham in great surprise. his manner and tone were serious, and her feelings, easily roused when her old friend was concerned, were excited now to apprehension. she left off arranging the roses; she dried her finger-tips on her handkerchief, and placing a chair close beside caterham's couch, she sat down and asked him anxiously to explain his meaning.
"i can't do that very well, annie," he said, "for i am not certain of what it is; but of this i am certain, my first impression of mrs. ludlow is correct. there is something wrong about her, and ludlow is ignorant of it. all i said to you that day is more fully confirmed in my mind now. there is some dark secret in the past of her life, and the secret in the present is, that she lives in that past, and does not love her husband."
"poor geoffrey," said annie, in whose eyes tears were standing--"poor geoffrey, and how dearly he loves her!"
"yes," said lord caterham, "that's the worst of it; that, and his unsuspiciousness,--he does not see what the most casual visitor to their house sees; he does not perceive the weariness of spirit that is the first thing, next to her beauty, which every one with common perception must recognise. she takes no pains--she does not make the least attempt to hide it. why, to-day, when she recovered, when her eyes opened--such gloomy eyes they were!--and ludlow was kneeling here,"--he pointed down beside the couch he lay on--"bending over her,--did she look up at him?--did she meet the gaze fixed on her and smile, or try to smile, to comfort and reassure him? not she: i was watching her; she just opened her eyes and let them wander round, turned her head from him, and let it fall against the side of the couch as if she never cared to lift it more."
"poor geoffrey!" said annie again; this time with a sob.
"yes, indeed, annie," he went on; "i pity him, as much as i mistrust her. he has never told you any thing about her antecedents, has he?--and i suppose she has not been more communicative?"
"no," replied annie; "i know nothing more than i have told you. she has always been the same when i have seen her--trying, i thought, to seem and be happier than at first, but very languid still. geoffrey said sometimes that she was rather out of spirits, but he seemed to think it was only delicate health--and i hoped so too, though i could not help fearing you were right in all you said that day. o, arthur, isn't it hard to think of geoffrey loving her so much, and working so hard, and getting so poor a return?"
"it is indeed, annie," said lord caterham, with a strange wistful look at her; "it is very hard. but i fear there are harder things than that in store for ludlow. he is not conscious of the extent of his misfortune, if even he knows of its existence at all. i fear the time is coming when he must know all there is to be known, whatever it may be. that woman has a terrible secret in her life, annie, and the desperate weariness within her--how she let it show when she was recovering from the swoon!--will force it into the light of day before long. her dreary quietude is the calm before the storm."
"i suppose i had better write this evening and inquire for her," said annie, after a pause; "and propose to call on her. it will gratify geoffrey."
"do so," said lord caterham; "i will write to ludlow myself."
annie wrote her kind little letter, and duly received a reply. mrs. ludlow was much better, but still rather weak, and did not feel quite able to receive miss maurice's kindly-proffered visit just at present.
"i am very glad indeed of that, annie," said lord caterham, to whom she showed the note; "you cannot possibly do ludlow any good, my child; and something tells me that the less you see of her the better."
for some days following that on which the incident and the conversation just recorded took place, lord caterham was unable to make his intended request to geoffrey ludlow that the latter would call upon him, that they might renew their interrupted conversation. one of those crises in the long struggle which he maintained with disease and pain, in which entire prostration produced a kind of truce, had come upon him; and silence, complete inaction, and almost a suspension of his faculties, marked its duration. the few members of the household who had access to him were familiar with this phase of his condition; and on this occasion it attracted no more notice than usual, except from annie, who remarked additional gravity in the manner of the physician, and who perceived that the state of exhaustion of the patient lasted longer, and when he rallied was succeeded by less complete restoration to even his customary condition than before. she mentioned these results of her close observation to lady beauport; but the countess paid very little attention to the matter, assuring annie that she knew caterham much too well to be frightened; that he would do very well if there were no particular fuss made about him; and that all doctors were alarmists, and said dreadful things to increase their own importance. annie would have called her attention to the extenuating circumstance that lord caterham's medical attendant had not said any thing at all, and that she had merely interpreted his looks; but lady beauport was so anxious to tell her something illustrative of "poor lionel's" beauty, grace, daring, or dash--no matter which or what--that annie found it impossible to get in another word.
a day or two later, when lord caterham had rallied a good deal, and was able to listen to annie as she read to him, and while she was so engaged, and he was looking at her with the concentrated earnestness she remarked so frequently in his gaze of late,--algy barford was announced. algy had been constantly at the house to inquire for lord caterham; but to-day stephens had felt sure his master would be able and glad to see algy. every body liked that genial soul, and servants in particular--a wonderful test of popularity and its desert. he came in very quietly, and he and annie exchanged greetings cordially. she liked him also. after he had spoken cheerily to caterham, and called him "dear old boy" at least a dozen times in as many sentences, the conversation was chiefly maintained between him and miss maurice. she did not think much talking would do for arthur just then, and she made no movement towards leaving the room, as was her usual custom. algy was a little subdued in tone and spirits: it was impossible even to him to avoid seeing that caterham was looking much more worn and pale than usual; and he was a bad hand at disguising a painful impression, so that he was less fluent and discursive than was his wont, and decidedly ill at ease.
"how is your painting getting on, miss maurice?" he said, when a pause became portentous.
"she has been neglecting it in my favour," said lord caterham. "she has not even finished the portrait you admired so much, algy."
"o!--ah!--'the muse of painting,' wasn't it? it is a pity not to finish it, miss maurice. i think you would never succeed better than in that case,--you admire the original so much."
"yes," said annie, with rather an uneasy glance towards caterham, "she is really beautiful. arthur thinks her quite as wonderful as i do; but i have not seen her lately--she has been ill. by the bye, arthur, geoffrey ludlow wrote to me yesterday inquiring for you; and only think what he says!--'i hope my wife's illness did not upset lord caterham; but i am afraid it did." annie had taken a note from the pocket of her apron, andread these words in a laughing voice.
"hopes his wife's illness did not upset lord caterham!" repeated algy barford in a tone of whimsical amazement. "what may that mean, dear old boy? why are you supposed to be upset by the peerless lady of the unspeakable eyes and the unapproachable hair?"
annie laughed, and caterham smiled as he replied, "only because mrs. ludlow fainted here in this room very suddenly, and very 'dead,' one day lately; and as mrs. ludlow's fainting was a terrible shock to ludlow, he concludes that it was also a terrible shock to me,--that's all."
"well, but," said algy, apparently seized with an unaccountable access of curiosity, "why did mrs. ludlow faint? and what brought her here to faint in your room?"
"it was inconsiderate, i confess," said caterham, still smiling; "but i don't think she meant it. the fact is, i had asked ludlow to come and see me; and he brought his wife; and--and she has not been well, and the drive was too much for her, i suppose. at all events, ludlow and i were talking, and not minding her particularly, when she said something to me, and i turned round and saw her looking deadly pale, and before i could answer her she fainted."
"right off?" asked algy, with an expression of dismay so ludicrous that annie could not resist it, and laughed outright.
"right off, indeed," answered caterham; "down went the photograph-book on the floor, and down she would have gone if ludlow had been a second later, or an inch farther away! yes; it was a desperate case, i assure you. how glad you must feel that you wer'n't here, algy,--eh? what would you have done now? resorted to the bellows, like the artful dodger, or twisted her thumbs, according to the famous prescription of mrs. gamp?"
but algy did not laugh, much to lord caterham's amusement, who believed him to be overwhelmed by the horrid picture his imagination conjured up of the position of the two gentlemen under the circumstances.
"but," said algy, with perfect gravity, "why did she faint? what did she say? people don't tumble down in a dead faint because they're a little tired, dear old boy--do they?"
"perhaps not in general, algy, but it looks like it in mrs. ludlow's case. all i can tell you is that the faint was perfectly genuine and particularly 'dead,' and that there was no cause for it, beyond the drive and the fatigue of looking over the photographs in that book. i am very tired of photographs myself, and i suppose most people are the same, but i haven't quite come to fainting over them yet."
algy barford's stupefaction had quite a rousing effect on lord caterham, and annie maurice liked him and his odd ways more than ever. he made some trifling remark in reply to caterham's speech, and took an early opportunity of minutely inspecting the photograph-book which he had mentioned.
"so," said algy to himself, as he walked slowly down st. barnabas square; "she goes to see caterham, and faints at sight of dear old lionel's portrait, does she? ah, it's all coming out, algy; and the best thing you can do, on the whole is to keep your own counsel,--that's about it, dear old boy!"
