The Egoist: A Comedy in Narrative

  CHAPTER XV

  THE PETITION FOR A RELEASE

  Neither Clara nor Vernon appeared at the mid-day table. Dr. Middletontalked with Miss Dale on classical matters, like a good-natured giantgiving a child the jump from stone to stone across a brawling mountainford, so that an unedified audience might really suppose, upon seeingher over the difficulty, she had done something for herself. SirWilloughby was proud of her, and therefore anxious to settle herbusiness while he was in the humour to lose her. He hoped to finish itby shooting a word or two at Vernon before dinner. Clara's petition tobe set free, released from him, had vaguely frightened even more thanit offended his pride.

  Miss Isabel quitted the room.

  She came back, saying: "They decline to lunch."

  "Then we may rise," remarked Sir Willoughby.

  "She was weeping," Miss Isabel murmured to him.

  "Girlish enough," he said.

  The two elderly ladies went away together. Miss Dale, pursuing hertheme with the Rev. Doctor, was invited by him to a course in thelibrary. Sir Willoughby walked up and down the lawn, taking a glance atthe West-room as he swung round on the turn of his leg. Growingimpatient, he looked in at the window and found the room vacant.

  Nothing was to be seen of Clara and Vernon during the afternoon. Nearthe dinner-hour the ladies were informed by Miss Middleton's maid thather mistress was lying down on her bed, too unwell with headache to bepresent. Young Crossjay brought a message from Vernon (delayed bybirds' eggs in the delivery), to say that he was off over the hills,and thought of dining with Dr. Corney.

  Sir Willoughby despatched condolences to his bride. He was not wellable to employ his mind on its customary topic, being, like the dome ofa bell, a man of so pervading a ring within himself concerning himself,that the recollection of a doubtful speech or unpleasant circumstancetouching him closely deranged his inward peace; and as dubious andunpleasant things will often occur, he had great need of a worshipper,and was often compelled to appeal to her for signs of antidotalidolatry. In this instance, when the need of a worshipper was sharplyfelt, he obtained no signs at all. The Rev. Doctor had fascinated MissDale; so that, both within and without, Sir Willoughby was uncomforted.His themes in public were those of an English gentleman; horses, dogs,game, sport, intrigue, scandal, politics, wines, the manly themes; witha condescension to ladies' tattle, and approbation of a racy anecdote.What interest could he possibly take in the Athenian Theatre and thegirl whose flute-playing behind the scenes, imitating the nightingale,enraptured a Greek audience! He would have suspected a motive in MissDale's eager attentiveness, if the motive could have been conceived.Besides, the ancients were not decorous; they did not, as we make ourmoderns do, write for ladies. He ventured at the dinner-table tointerrupt Dr. Middleton once:--

  "Miss Dale will do wisely, I think, sir, by confining herself to yourpresent edition of the classics."

  "That," replied Dr. Middleton, "is the observation of a student of thedictionary of classical mythology in the English tongue."

  "The Theatre is a matter of climate, sir. You will grant me that."

  "If quick wits come of climate, it is as you say, sir."

  "With us it seems a matter of painful fostering, or the need of it,"said Miss Dale, with a question to Dr. Middleton, excluding SirWilloughby, as though he had been a temporary disturbance of the flowof their dialogue.

  The ladies Eleanor and Isabel, previously excellent listeners to thelearned talk, saw the necessity of coming to his rescue; but you cannotconverse with your aunts, inmates of your house, on general subjects attable; the attempt increased his discomposure; he considered that hehad ill-chosen his father-in-law; that scholars are an impolite race;that young or youngish women are devotees of power in any form, andwill be absorbed by a scholar for a variation of a man; concluding thathe must have a round of dinner-parties to friends, especially ladies,appreciating him, during the Doctor's visit. Clara's headache above,and Dr. Middleton's unmannerliness below, affected his instincts in away to make him apprehend that a stroke of misfortune was impending;thunder was in the air. Still he learned something, by which he was toprofit subsequently. The topic of wine withdrew the doctor from hisclassics; it was magical on him. A strong fraternity of taste wasdiscovered in the sentiments of host and guest upon particular winesand vintages; they kindled one another by naming great years of thegrape, and if Sir Willoughby had to sacrifice the ladies to the topic,he much regretted a condition of things that compelled him to sinagainst his habit, for the sake of being in the conversation andprobing an elderly gentleman's foible.

  Late at night he heard the house-bell, and meeting Vernon in the hall,invited him to enter the laboratory and tell him Dr. Corney's last.Vernon was brief, Corney had not let fly a single anecdote, he said,and lighted his candle.

  "By the way, Vernon, you had a talk with Miss Middleton?"

  "She will speak to you to-morrow at twelve."

  "To-morrow at twelve?"

  "It gives her four-and-twenty hours."

  Sir Willoughby determined that his perplexity should be seen; butVernon said good-night to him, and was shooting up the stairs beforethe dramatic exhibition of surprise had yielded to speech.

  Thunder was in the air and a blow coming. Sir Willoughby's instinctswere awake to the many signs, nor, though silenced, were they hushed byhis harping on the frantic excesses to which women are driven by thepassion of jealousy. He believed in Clara's jealousy because he reallyhad intended to rouse it; under the form of emulation, feebly. He couldnot suppose she had spoken of it to Vernon. And as for the seriousnessof her desire to be released from her engagement, that was littlecredible. Still the fixing of an hour for her to speak to him after aninterval of four-and-twenty hours, left an opening for the incredibleto add its weight to the suspicious mass; and who would have fanciedClara Middleton so wild a victim of the intemperate passion! Hemuttered to himself several assuaging observations to excuse a younglady half demented, and rejected them in a lump for their nonsensicalinapplicability to Clara. In order to obtain some sleep, he consentedto blame himself slightly, in the style of the enamoured historian oferring beauties alluding to their peccadilloes. He had done it to edifyher. Sleep, however, failed him. That an inordinate jealousy argued anoverpowering love, solved his problem until he tried to fit theproposition to Clara's character. He had discerned nothing southern inher. Latterly, with the blushing Day in prospect, she had contractedand frozen. There was no reading either of her or of the mystery.

  In the morning, at the breakfast-table, a confession of sleeplessnesswas general. Excepting Miss Dale and Dr. Middleton, none had slept awink. "I, sir," the Doctor replied to Sir Willoughby, "slept like alexicon in your library when Mr. Whitford and I are out of it."

  Vernon incidentally mentioned that he had been writing through thenight.

  "You fellows kill yourselves," Sir Willoughby reproved him. "For mypart, I make it a principle to get through my work withoutself-slaughter."

  Clara watched her father for a symptom of ridicule. He gazed mildly onthe systematic worker. She was unable to guess whether she would havein him an ally or a judge. The latter, she feared. Now that she hadembraced the strife, she saw the division of the line where she stoodfrom that one where the world places girls who are affianced wives; herfather could hardly be with her; it had gone too far. He loved her, buthe would certainly take her to be moved by a maddish whim; he would nottry to understand her case. The scholar's detestation of adisarrangement of human affairs that had been by miracle contrived torun smoothly, would of itself rank him against her; and with the worldto back his view of her, he might behave like a despotic father. Howcould she defend herself before him? At one thought of Sir Willoughby,her tongue made ready, and feminine craft was alert to prompt it; butto her father she could imagine herself opposing only dumbness andobstinacy.

  "It is not exactly the same kind of work," she said.

  Dr Middleton rewarded her with a bushy eyebrow's beam of his revoltinghumo
ur at the baronet's notion of work.

  So little was needed to quicken her that she sunned herself in thebeam, coaxing her father's eyes to stay with hers as long as she could,and beginning to hope he might be won to her side, if she confessed shehad been more in the wrong than she felt; owned to him, that is, hererror in not earlier disturbing his peace.

  "I do not say it is the same," observed Sir Willoughby, bowing to theiralliance of opinion. "My poor work is for the day, and Vernon's, nodoubt, for the day to come. I contend, nevertheless, for thepreservation of health as the chief implement of work."

  "Of continued work; there I agree with you," said Dr. Middleton,cordially.

  Clara's heart sunk; so little was needed to deaden her.

  Accuse her of an overweening antagonism to her betrothed; yet rememberthat though the words had not been uttered to give her good reason forit, nature reads nature; captives may be stript of everything save thatpower to read their tyrant; remember also that she was not, as she wellknew, blameless; her rage at him was partly against herself.

  The rising from table left her to Sir Willoughby. She swam away afterMiss Dale, exclaiming: "The laboratory! Will you have me for acompanion on your walk to see your father? One breathes earth andheaven to-day out of doors. Isn't it Summer with a Spring Breeze? Iwill wander about your garden and not hurry your visit, I promise."

  "I shall be very happy indeed. But I am going immediately," saidLaetitia, seeing Sir Willoughby hovering to snap up his bride.

  "Yes; and a garden-hat and I am on the march."

  "I will wait for you on the terrace."

  "You will not have to wait."

  "Five minutes at the most," Sir Willoughby said to Laetitia, and shepassed out, leaving them alone together.

  "Well, and my love!" he addressed his bride almost huggingly; "and whatis the story? and how did you succeed with old Vernon yesterday? Hewill and he won't? He's a very woman in these affairs. I can't forgivehim for giving you a headache. You were found weeping."

  "Yes, I cried," said Clara.

  "And now tell me about it. You know, my dear girl, whether he does ordoesn't, our keeping him somewhere in the neighbourhood--perhaps notin the house--that is the material point. It can hardly be necessary inthese days to urge marriages on. I'm sure the country is over . . .Most marriages ought to be celebrated with the funeral knell!"

  "I think so," said Clara.

  "It will come to this, that marriages of consequence, and none butthose, will be hailed with joyful peals."

  "Do not say such things in public, Willoughby."

  "Only to you, to you! Don't think me likely to expose myself to theworld. Well, and I sounded Miss Dale, and there will be no violentobstacle. And now about Vernon?"

  "I will speak to you, Willoughby, when I return from my walk with MissDale, soon after twelve."

  "Twelve!" said he

  "I name an hour. It seems childish. I can explain it. But it is named,I cannot deny, because I am a rather childish person perhaps, and haveit prescribed to me to delay my speaking for a certain length of time.I may tell you at once that Mr. Whitford is not to be persuaded by me,and the breaking of our engagement would not induce him to remain."

  "Vernon used those words?"

  "It was I."

  "'The breaking of our engagement!' Come into the laboratory, my love."

  "I shall not have time."

  "Time shall stop rather than interfere with our conversation! 'Thebreaking . . .'! But it's a sort of sacrilege to speak of it."

  "That I feel; yet it has to be spoken of"

  "Sometimes? Why? I can't conceive the occasion. You know, to me, Clara,plighted faith, the affiancing of two lovers, is a piece of religion. Irank it as holy as marriage; nay, to me it is holier; I really cannottell you how; I can only appeal to you in your bosom to understand me.We read of divorces with comparative indifference. They occur betweencouples who have rubbed off all romance."

  She could have asked him in her fit of ironic iciness, on hearing himthus blindly challenge her to speak out, whether the romance might behis piece of religion.

  He propitiated the more unwarlike sentiments in her by ejaculating,"Poor souls! let them go their several ways. Married people no longerlovers are in the category of the unnameable. But the hint of thebreaking of an engagement--our engagement!--between us? Oh!"

  "Oh!" Clara came out with a swan's note swelling over mechanicalimitation of him to dolorousness illimitable. "Oh!" she breathed short,"let it be now. Do not speak till you have heard me. My head may not beclear by-and-by. And two scenes--twice will be beyond my endurance. Iam penitent for the wrong I have done you. I grieve for you. All theblame is mine. Willoughby, you must release me. Do not let me hear aword of that word; jealousy is unknown to me . . . Happy if I couldcall you friend and see you with a worthier than I, who might by-and-bycall me friend! You have my plighted troth . . . given in ignorance ofmy feelings. Reprobate a weak and foolish girl's ignorance. I havethought of it, and I cannot see wickedness, though the blame is great,shameful. You have none. You are without any blame. You will not sufferas I do. You will be generous to me? I have no respect for myself whenI beg you to be generous and release me."

  "But was this the . . ." Willoughby preserved his calmness, "this,then, the subject of your interview with Vernon?"

  "I have spoken to him. I did my commission, and I spoke to him."

  "Of me?"

  "Of myself. I see how I hurt you; I could not avoid it. Yes, of you, asfar as we are related. I said I believed you would release me. I saidI could be true to my plighted word, but that you would not insist.Could a gentleman insist? But not a step beyond; not love; I have none.And, Willoughby, treat me as one perfectly worthless; I am. I shouldhave known it a year back. I was deceived in myself. There should belove."

  "Should be!" Willoughby's tone was a pungent comment on her.

  "Love, then, I find I have not. I think I am antagonistic to it. Whatpeople say of it I have not experienced. I find I was mistaken. It islightly said, but very painful. You understand me, that my prayer isfor liberty, that I may not be tied. If you can release and pardon me,or promise ultimately to pardon me, or say some kind word, I shall knowit is because I am beneath you utterly that I have been unable to giveyou the love you should have with a wife. Only say to me, go! It is youwho break the match, discovering my want of a heart. What people thinkof me matters little. My anxiety will be to save you annoyance."

  She waited for him; he seemed on the verge of speaking.

  He perceived her expectation; he had nothing but clownish tumultwithin, and his dignity counselled him to disappoint her.

  Swaying his head, like the oriental palm whose shade is a blessing tothe perfervid wanderer below, smiling gravely, he was indirectly askinghis dignity what he could say to maintain it and deal this mad youngwoman a bitterly compassionate rebuke. What to think, hung remoter. Thething to do struck him first.

  He squeezed both her hands, threw the door wide open, and said, withcountless blinkings: "In the laboratory we are uninterrupted. I was ata loss to guess where that most unpleasant effect on the senses camefrom. They are always 'guessing' through the nose. I mean, theremainder of breakfast here. Perhaps I satirized them too smartly--ifyou know the letters. When they are not 'calculating'. More offensivethan debris of a midnight banquet! An American tour is instructive,though not so romantic. Not so romantic as Italy, I mean. Let usescape."

  She held back from his arm. She had scattered his brains; it waspitiable: but she was in the torrent and could not suffer a pause or achange of place.

  "It must be here; one minute more--I cannot go elsewhere to beginagain. Speak to me here; answer my request. Once; one word. If youforgive me, it will be superhuman. But, release me."

  "Seriously," he rejoined, "tea-cups and coffee-cups, breadcrumbs.egg-shells, caviare, butter, beef, bacon! Can we? The room reeks."

  "Then I will go for my walk with Miss Dale. And you will speak to mewhen I return?"
/>
  "At all seasons. You shall go with Miss Dale. But, my dear! my love!Seriously, where are we? One hears of lover's quarrels. Now I neverquarrel. It is a characteristic of mine. And you speak of me to mycousin Vernon! Seriously, plighted faith signifies plighted faith, asmuch as an iron-cable is iron to hold by. Some little twist of themind? To Vernon, of all men! Tush! she has been dreaming of a hero ofperfection, and the comparison is unfavourable to her Willoughby. But,my Clara, when I say to you, that bride is bride, and you are mine,mine!"

  "Willoughby, you mentioned them,--those separations of two married. Yousaid, if they do not love . . . Oh! say, is it not better--instead oflater?"

  He took advantage of her modesty in speaking to exclaim. "Where are wenow? Bride is bride, and wife is wife, and affianced is, in honour,wedded. You cannot be released. We are united. Recognize it; united.There is no possibility of releasing a wife!"

  "Not if she ran . . . ?"

  This was too direct to be histrionically misunderstood. He had drivenher to the extremity of more distinctly imagining the circumstance shehad cited, and with that cleared view the desperate creature gloried inlaunching such a bolt at the man's real or assumed insensibility asmust, by shivering it, waken him.

  But in a moment she stood in burning rose, with dimmed eyesight. Shesaw his horror, and, seeing, shared it; shared just then only by seeingit; which led her to rejoice with the deepest of sighs that some shamewas left in her.

  "Ran? ran? ran?" he said as rapidly as he blinked. "How? where? whatidea . . . ?"

  Close was he upon an explosion that would have sullied his conceptionof the purity of the younger members of the sex hauntingly.

  That she, a young lady, maiden, of strictest education, should, andwithout his teaching, know that wives ran!--know that by running theycompelled their husbands to abandon pursuit, surrender possession!--andthat she should suggest it of herself as a wife!--that she shouldspeak of running!

  His ideal, the common male Egoist ideal of a waxwork sex, would havebeen shocked to fragments had she spoken further to fill in theoutlines of these awful interjections.

  She was tempted: for during the last few minutes the fire of hersituation had enlightened her understanding upon a subject far from heras the ice-fields of the North a short while before; and the prospectoffered to her courage if she would only outstare shame and seem athome in the doings of wickedness, was his loathing and dreading so vilea young woman. She restrained herself; chiefly, after the firstbridling of maidenly timidity, because she could not bear to lower theidea of her sex even in his esteem.

  The door was open. She had thoughts of flying out to breathe in aninterval of truce.

  She reflected on her situation hurriedly askance:

  "If one must go through this, to be disentangled from an engagement,what must it be to poor women seeking to be free of a marriage?"

  Had she spoken it, Sir Willoughby might have learned that she was notso iniquitously wise of the things of this world as her mere sex'sinstinct, roused to the intemperateness of a creature struggling withfetters, had made her appear in her dash to seize a weapon, indicatedmoreover by him.

  Clara took up the old broken vow of women to vow it afresh: "Never toany man will I give my hand."

  She replied to Sir Willoughby, "I have said all. I cannot explain whatI have said."

  She had heard a step in the passage. Vernon entered.

  Perceiving them, he stated his mission in apology: "Doctor Middletonleft a book in this room. I see it; it's a Heinsius."

  "Ha! by the way, a book; books would not be left here if they were notbrought here, with my compliments to Doctor Middleton, who may do as hepleases, though, seriously, order is order," said Sir Willoughby. "Comeaway to the laboratory, Clara. It's a comment on human beings thatwherever they have been there's a mess, and you admirers of them," hedivided a sickly nod between Vernon and the stale breakfast-table,"must make what you can of it. Come, Clara."

  Clara protested that she was engaged to walk with Miss Dale.

  "Miss Dale is waiting in the hall," said Vernon.

  "Miss Dale is waiting?" said Clara.

  "Walk with Miss Dale; walk with Miss Dale," Sir Willoughby remarked,pressingly. "I will beg her to wait another two minutes. You shallfind her in the hall when you come down."

  He rang the bell and went out.

  "Take Miss Dale into your confidence; she is quite trustworthy," Vernonsaid to Clara.

  "I have not advanced one step," she replied.

  "Recollect that you are in a position of your own choosing; and if,after thinking over it, you mean to escape, you must make up your mindto pitched battles, and not be dejected if you are beaten in all ofthem; there is your only chance."

  "Not my choosing; do not say choosing, Mr. Whitford. I did not choose.I was incapable of really choosing. I consented."

  "It's the same in fact. But be sure of what you wish."

  "Yes," she assented, taking it for her just punishment that she shouldbe supposed not quite to know her wishes. "Your advice has helped meto-day."

  "Did I advise?"

  "Do you regret advising?"

  "I should certainly regret a word that intruded between you and him."

  "But you will not leave the Hall yet? You will not leave me without afriend? If papa and I were to leave to-morrow, I foresee endlesscorrespondence. I have to stay at least some days, and wear through it,and then, if I have to speak to my poor father, you can imagine theeffect on him."

  Sir Willoughby came striding in, to correct the error of his going out.

  "Miss Dale awaits you, my dear. You have bonnet, hat?--No? Have youforgotten your appointment to walk with her?"

  "I am ready," said Clara, departing.

  The two gentlemen behind her separated in the passage. They had notspoken.

  She had read of the reproach upon women, that they divide thefriendships of men. She reproached herself but she was in action,driven by necessity, between sea and rock. Dreadful to think of! shewas one of the creatures who are written about.