About the time of my introduction to Mr. Mannion--or, to speak more
correctly, both before and after that period--certain peculiarities in
Margaret's character and conduct, which came to my knowledge by pure
accident, gave me a little uneasiness and even a little displeasure.
Neither of these feelings lasted very long, it is true; for the
incidents which gave rise to them were of a trifling nature in
themselves. While I now write, however, these domestic occurrences are
all vividly present to my recollection. I will mention two of them as
instances. Subsequent events, yet to be related, will show that they
are not out of place at this part of my narrative.
One lovely autumn morning, I called rather before the appointed time
at North Villa. As the servant opened the front garden-gate, the idea
occurred to me of giving Margaret a surprise, by entering the drawing
room unexpectedly, with a nosegay gathered for her from her own
flower-bed. Telling the servant not to announce me, I went round to
the back garden, by a gate which opened into it at the side of the
house. The progress of my flower-gathering led me on to the lawn under
one of the drawing-room windows, which was left a little open. The
voices of my wife and her mother reached me from the room. It was this
part of their conversation which I unintentionally overheard:--
"I tell you, mamma, I must and will have the dress, whether papa
chooses or not."
This was spoken loudly and resolutely; in such tones as I had never
heard from Margaret before.
"Pray--pray, my dear, don't talk so," answered the weak, faltering
voice of Mrs. Sherwin; "you know you have had more than your year's
allowance of dresses already."
"I won't be allowanced. _His_ sister isn't allowanced: why should I
be?"
"My dear love, surely there is some difference--"
"I'm sure there isn't, now I am his wife. I shall ride some day in my
carriage, just as his sister does. _He_ gives me my way in everything;
and so ought you."
"It isn't _me,_ Margaret: if I could do anything, I'm sure I would;
but I really couldn't ask your papa for another new dress, after his
having given you so many this year, already."
"That's the way it always is with you, mamma--you can't do this, and
you can't do that--you are so excessively tiresome! But I will have
the dress, I'm determined. He says his sister wears light blue crape
of an evening; and I'll have light blue crape, too--see if I don't!
I'll get it somehow from the shop, myself. Papa never takes any
notice, I'm sure, what I have on; and he needn't find out anything
about what's gone out of the shop, until they 'take stock,' or
whatever it is he calls it. And then, if he flies into one of his
passions--"
"My dear! my dear! you really ought not to talk so of your papa--it is
very wrong, Margaret, indeed--what would Mr. Basil say if he heard
you?"
I determined to go in at once, and tell Margaret that I had heard
her--resolving, at the same time, to exert some firmness, and
remonstrate with her, for her own good, on much of what she had said,
which had really surprised and displeased me. On my unexpected
entrance, Mrs. Sherwin started, and looked more timid than ever.
Margaret, however, came forward to meet me with her wonted smile, and
held out her hand with her wonted grace. I said nothing until we had
got into our accustomed corner, and were talking together in whispers
as usual. Then I began my remonstrance--very tenderly, and in the
lowest possible tones. She took precisely the right way to stop me in
full career, in spite of all my resolution. Her beautiful eyes filled
with tears directly--the first I had ever seen in them: caused, too,
by what I had said!--and she murmured a few plaintive words about the
cruelty of being angry with her for only wanting to please me by being
dressed as my sister was, which upset every intention I had formed but
the moment before. I involuntarily devoted myself to soothing her for
the rest of the morning. Need I say how the matter ended? I never
mentioned the subject more; and I made her a present of the new dress.
Some weeks after the little home-breeze which I have just related, had
died away into a perfect calm, I was accidentally witness of another
domestic dilemma in which Margaret bore a principal share. On this
occasion, as I walked up to the house (in the morning again), I found
the front door open. A pail was on the steps--the servant had
evidently been washing them, had been interrupted in her work, and had
forgotten to close the door when she left it. The nature of the
interruption I soon discovered as I entered the hall.
"For God's sake, Miss!" cried the housemaid's voice, from the
dining-room, "for God's sake, put down the poker! Missus will be here
directly; and it's _her_ cat!"
"I'll kill the vile brute! I'll kill the hateful cat! I don't care
whose it is!--my poor dear, dear, dear bird!" The voice was
Margaret's. At first, its tones were tones of fury; they were
afterwards broken by hysterical sobs.
"Poor thing," continued the servant, soothingly, "I'm sorry for it,
and for you too, Miss! But, oh! do please to remember it was you left
the cage on the table, in the cat's reach--"
"Hold your tongue, you wretch! How dare you hold me?--let me go!"
"Oh, you mustn't--you mustn't indeed! It's missus's cat,
recollect--poor missus's, who's always ill, and hasn't got nothing
else to amuse her."
"I don't care! The cat has killed my bird, and the cat shall be killed
for doing it!--it shall!--it shall!!--it shall!!! I'll call in the
first boy from the street to catch it, and hang it! Let me go! I
_will_ go!"
"I'll let the cat go first, Miss, as sure as my name's Susan!"
The next instant, the door was suddenly opened, and puss sprang past
me, out of harm's way, closely followed by the servant, who stared
breathless and aghast at seeing me in the hall. I went into the
dining-room immediately.
On the floor lay a bird-cage, with the poor canary dead inside (it was
the same canary that I had seen my wife playing with, on the evening
of the day when I first met her). The bird's head had been nearly
dragged through the bent wires of the cage, by the murderous claws of
the cat. Near the fire-place, with the poker she had just dropped on
the floor by her side, stood Margaret. Never had I seen her look so
beautiful as she now appeared, in the fury of passion which possessed
her. Her large black eyes were flashing grandly through her tears--the
blood was glowing crimson in her cheeks--her lips were parted as she
gasped for breath. One of her hands was clenched, and rested on the
mantel-piece; the other was pressed tight over her bosom, with the
fingers convulsively clasping her dress. Grieved as I was at the
paroxysm of passion into which she had allowed herself to be betrayed,
I could not repress an involuntary feeling of admiration when my eyes
first rested on her. Even anger itself looked lovely in that lovely
face!
She never moved when she saw me. As I approached her, she dropped down
on her knees by the cage, sobbing with frightful violence, and pouring
forth a perfect torrent of ejaculations of vengeance against the cat.
Mrs. Sherwin came down; and by her total want of tact and presence of
mind, made matters worse. In brief, the scene ended by a fit of
hysterics.
To speak to Margaret on that day, as I wished to speak to her, was
impossible. To approach the subject of the canary's death afterwards,
was useless. If I only hinted in the gentlest way, and with the
strongest sympathy for the loss of the bird, at the distress and
astonishment she had caused me by the extremities to which she had
allowed her passion to hurry her, a burst of tears was sure to be her
only reply--just the reply, of all others, which was best calculated
to silence me. If I had been her husband in fact, as well as in name;
if I had been her father, her brother, or her friend, I should have
let her first emotions have their way, and then have expostulated with
her afterwards. But I was her lover still; and, to my eyes, Margaret's
tears made virtues even of Margaret's faults.
Such occurrences as these, happening but at rare intervals, formed the
only interruptions to the generally even and happy tenour of our
intercourse. Weeks and weeks glided away, and not a hasty or a hard
word passed between us. Neither, after one preliminary difference had
been adjusted, did any subsequent disagreement take place between Mr.
Sherwin and me. This last element in the domestic tranquillity of
North Villa was, however, less attributable to his forbearance, or to
mine, than to the private interference of Mr. Mannion.
For some days after my interview with the managing clerk, at his own
house, I had abstained from calling his offered services into
requisition. I was not conscious of any reason for this course of
conduct. All that had been said, all that had happened during the
night of the storm, had produced a powerful, though vague impression
on me. Strange as it may appear, I could not determine whether my
brief but extraordinary experience of my new friend had attracted me
towards him, or repelled me from him. I felt an unwillingness to lay
myself under an obligation to him, which was not the result of pride,
or false delicacy, or sullenness, or suspicion--it was an inexplicable
unwillingness, that sprang from the fear of encountering some heavy
responsibility; but of what nature I could not imagine. I delayed and
held back, by instinct; and, on his side, Mr. Mannion made no further
advances. He maintained the same manner, and continued the same
habits, during his intercourse with the family at North Villa, which I
had observed as characterising him before I took shelter from the
storm, in his house. He never referred again to the conversation of
that evening, when we now met.
Margaret's behaviour, when I mentioned to her Mr. Mannion's
willingness to be useful to us both, rather increased than diminished
the vague uncertainties which perplexed me, on the subject of
accepting or rejecting his overtures.
I could not induce her to show the smallest interest about him.
Neither his house, his personal appearance, his peculiar habits, or
his secrecy in relation to his early life--nothing, in short,
connected with him--appeared to excite her attention or curiosity in
the slightest degree. On the evening of his return from the continent,
she had certainly shown some symptoms of interest in his arrival at
North Villa, and some appearance of attention to him, when he joined
our party. Now, she seemed completely and incomprehensibly changed on
this point. Her manner became almost petulant, if I persisted long in
making Mr. Mannion a topic of conversation--it was as if she resented
his sharing my thoughts with her in the slightest degree. As to the
difficult question whether we should engage him in our interests or
not, that was a matter which she always seemed to think too trifling
to be discussed between us at all.
Ere long, however, circumstances decided me as to the course I should
take with Mr. Mannion.
A ball was given by one of Mr. Sherwin's rich commercial friends, to
which he announced his intention of taking Margaret. Besides the
jealousy which I felt--naturally enough, in my peculiar situation--at
the idea of my wife going out as Miss Sherwin, and dancing in the
character of a young unmarried lady with any young gentlemen who were
introduced to her, I had also the strongest possible desire to keep
Margaret out of the society of her own class, until my year's
probation was over, and I could hope to instal her permanently in the
society of my class. I had privately mentioned to her my ideas on this
subject, and found that she fully agreed with them. She was not
wanting in ambition to ascend to the highest degree in the social
scale; and had already begun to look with indifference on the society
which was offered to her by those in her own rank.
To Mr. Sherwin I could confide nothing of this. I could only object,
generally, to his taking Margaret out, when neither she nor I desired
it. He declared that she liked parties--that all girls did--that she
only pretended to dislike them, to please me--and that he had made no
engagement to keep her moping at home a whole year on my account. In
the case of the particular ball now under discussion, he was
determined to have his own way; and he bluntly told me as much.
Irritated by his obstinacy and gross want of consideration for my
defenceless position, I forgot all doubts and scruples; and privately
applied to Mr. Mannion to exert the influence which he had promised to
use, if I wished it, in my behalf.
The result was as immediate as it was conclusive. The very next
evening, Mr. Sherwin came to us with a note which he had just written,
and informed me that it was an excuse for Margaret's non-appearance at
the ball. He never mentioned Mr. Mannion's name, but sulkily and
shortly said, that he had reconsidered the matter, and had altered his
first decision for reasons of his own.
Having once taken a first step in the new direction, I soon followed
it up, without hesitation, by taking many others. Whenever I wished to
call oftener than once a-day at North Villa, I had but to tell Mr.
Mannion, and the next morning I found the permission immediately
accorded to me by the ruling power. The same secret machinery enabled
me to regulate Mr. Sherwin's incomings and outgoings, just as I chose,
when Margaret and I were together in the evening. I could feel almost
certain, now, of never having any one with us, but Mrs. Sherwin,
unless I desired it--which, as may be easily imagined, was seldom
enough.
My new ally's ready interference for my advantage was exerted quietly,
easily, and as a matter of course. I never knew how, or when, he
influenced his employer, and Mr. Sherwin on his part, never breathed a
word of that influence to me. He accorded any extra privilege I might
demand, as if he acted entirely under his own will, little suspecting
how well I knew what was the real motive power which directed him.
I was the more easily reconciled to employing the services of Mr.
Mannion, by the great delicacy with which he performed them. He did
not allow me to think--he did not appear to think himself--that he was
obliging me in the smallest degree. He affected no sudden intimacy
with me; his manners never altered; he still persisted in not joining
us in the evening, but at my express invitation; and if I referred in
any way to the advantages I derived from his devotion to my interests,
he always replied in his brief undemonstrative way, that he considered
himself the favoured person, in being permitted to make his services
of some use to Margaret and me.
I had told Mr. Mannion, when I was leaving him on the night of the
storm, that I would treat his offers as the offers of a friend; and I
had now made good my words, much sooner and much more unreservedly
than I had ever intended, when we parted at his own house-door.