Hard Cash Part 21

But this impression did not last long; he recalled Julia's character, and all the signs of a love tender and true she had given him. He read her by himself, and, lover-like, laid all the blame on another. It was all her cold-blooded mother. "Fool that I have been. I see it all now.

She appeals to my delicacy to keep away; then she goes to Julia and says, 'See, he deserts you at a word from his father. Be proud, be gay!

He never loved you; marry another.' The shallow plotter forgets that whoever she does marry I'll kill. How many unsuspicious girls have these double-faced mothers deluded so? They do it in half the novels, especially in those written by women; and why? because these know the perfidy and mendacity of their s.e.x better than we do; they see them nearer, and with their souls undrest. War, Mrs. Dodd! war to the death!

From this moment I am alone in the world with her. I have no friend but Alfred Hardie: and my bitterest enemies are my cold-blooded father and her cold-blooded mother."

The above sentences, of course, were never uttered. But they represent his thoughts accurately, though in a condensed form, and are, as it were, a miniature of this young heart boiling over.

From that moment he lay in wait for her, and hovered about the house day and night, determined to appeal to her personally, and undeceive her, and baffle her mother's treachery. But at this game he was soon detected: Mrs. Dodd lived on the watch now. Julia, dressed to go out, went to the window one afternoon to look at the weather; but retreated somewhat hastily and sat down on the sofa.

"You flutter, darling," said Mrs. Dodd. "Ah! he is there."

"Yes."

"You had better take off your things."

"Oh, yes. I tremble at the thoughts of meeting him. Mamma, he is changed, sadly changed. Poor, poor Alfred!" She went to her own room and prayed for him. She informed the Omniscient that, though much greater and better in other respects than she was, he had not Patience. She prayed, with tears, that he might have Christian patience granted Him from on high.

"Heart of stone! she shuns me," said Alfred, outside. He had seen her in her bonnet.

Mrs. Dodd waited several days to see whether this annoyance would not die of itself: waiting was her plan in most things. Finding he was not to be tired out, she sent Sarah out to him with a note carefully sealed.

"Mr. Alfred Hardie,--Is it generous to confine my daughter to the house?--Yours regretfully,

"LUCY DODD."

A line came back instantly in pencil.

"Mrs. Dodd,--Is all the generosity and all the good faith to be on one side?--Yours in despair,

"ALFRED HARDIE."

Mrs. Dodd coloured faintly: the reproach p.r.i.c.ked her, but did not move her. She sat quietly down that moment, and wrote to a friend in London, to look out for a furnished villa in a healthy part of the suburbs, with immediate possession. "Circ.u.mstances," said she, "making it desirable we should leave Barkington immediately, and for some months."

The Bosanquets gave a large party; Mrs. and Miss Dodd were there. The latter was playing a part in a charade to the admiration of all present, when in came Mr. Peterson, introducing his friend, Alfred Hardie.

Julia caught the name, and turned a look of alarm on her mother, but went on acting.

Presently she caught sight of him at some distance. He looked very pale, and his glittering eye was fixed on her with a sort of stern wonder.

Such a glance from fiery eyes, that had always dwelt tenderly on her till then, struck her like a weapon. She stopped short, and turned red and pale by turns. "There, that is nonsense enough," said she bitterly, and went and sat by Mrs. Dodd. The gentlemen thronged round her with compliments, and begged her to sing. She excused herself. Presently she heard an excited voice, towards which she dared not look; it was inquiring whether any lady could sing Aileen Aroon. With every desire to gratify the young millionaire, n.o.body knew Aileen Aroon, nor had ever heard of it.

"Oh, impossible!" cried Alfred. "Why, it is in praise of Constancy, a virtue ladies shine in: at least, they take credit for it."

"Mamma," whispered Julia terrified, "get me away, or there will be a scene. He is reckless."

"Be calm, love," said Mrs. Dodd, "there shall be none." She rose and glided up to Alfred Hardie, looked coldly in his face; then said with external politeness and veiled contempt, "I will attempt the song, sir, since you desire it." She waved her hand, and he followed her sulkily to the piano. She sung Aileen Aroon, not with her daughter's eloquence, but with a purity and mellowness that charmed the room: they had never heard the genius sing it.

As spirits are said to overcome the man at whose behest they rise, so this sweet air, and the gush of reminiscence it awakened, overpowered him who had evoked them; Alfred put his Hand unconsciously to his swelling heart, cast one look of anguish at Julia, and hurried away half choked. n.o.body but Julia noticed.

A fellow in a rough great-coat and tattered white hat opened the fly door for Mrs. Dodd. As Julia followed her, he kissed her skirt unseen by Mrs. Dodd, but her quick ears caught a heart-breaking sigh. She looked and recognised Alfred in that disguise; the penitent fit had succeeded to the angry one. Had Julia observed? To ascertain this without speaking of him, Mrs. Dodd waited till they had got some little distance, then quietly put out her hand and rested it for a moment on her daughter's; the girl was trembling violently "Little wretch!" came to Mrs. Dodd's lips, but she did not utter it. They were near home before she spoke at all, and then she only said very kindly, "My love, you will not be subjected again to these trials:" a remark intended quietly to cover the last occurrence as well as Alfred's open persecution.

They had promised to go out the very next day; but Mrs. Dodd went alone, and made excuses for Miss Dodd. On her return she found Julia sitting up for her, and a letter come from her friend describing a pleasant cottage, now vacant, near Maida Vale. Mrs. Dodd handed the open letter to Julia; she read it without comment.

"We will go up to-morrow and take it for three months. Then the Oxford vacation will terminate."

"Yes, mamma."

I am now about to relate a circ.u.mstance by no means without parallels, but almost impossible to account for; and, as nothing is more common and contemptible than inadequate solutions, I will offer none at all: but so it was, that Mrs. Dodd awoke in the middle of that very night in a mysterious state of mental tremor; trouble, veiled in obscurity, seemed to sit heavy on her bosom. So strong, though vague, was this new and mysterious oppression, that she started up in bed and cried aloud, "David!--Julia!--Oh, what is the matter?" The sound of her own voice dispelled the cloud in part, but not entirely. She lay awhile, and then finding herself quite averse to sleep, rose and went to her window, and eyed the weather anxiously. It was a fine night; soft fleecy clouds drifted slowly across a silver moon. The sailor's wife was rea.s.sured on her husband's behalf. Her next desire was to look at Julia sleeping; she had no particular object: it was the instinctive impulse of an anxious mother whom something had terrified. She put on her slippers and dressing-gown, and, lighting a candle at her night-lamp, opened her door softly and stepped into the little corridor. But she had not taken two steps when she was arrested by a mysterious sound.

It came from Julia's room.

What was it?

Mrs. Dodd glided softly nearer and nearer, all her senses on the stretch.

The sound came again. It was a m.u.f.fled sob.

The stifled sound, just audible in the dead stillness of the night, went through and through her who stood there listening aghast. Her bowels yearned over her child, and she hurried to the door, but recollected herself, and knocked, very gently. "Don't be alarmed, love; it is only me. May I come in?" She did not wait for the answer, but turned the handle and entered. She found Julia sitting up in bed, looking wildly at her, with cheeks flushed and wet. She sat on the bed and clasped her to her breast in silence: but more than one warm tear ran down upon Julia's bare neck; the girl felt them drop, and her own gushed in a shower.

"Oh, what have I done?" she sobbed. "Am I to make you wretched too?"

Mrs. Dodd did not immediately reply. She was there to console, and her admirable good sense told her that to do that she must be calmer than her patient; so even while she kissed and wept over Julia, she managed gradually to recover her composure. "Tell me, my child," said she, "why do you act a part with me? Why brave it out under my eye, and spend the night secretly in tears? Are you still afraid to trust me?"

"Oh no, no; but I thought I was so strong, so proud: I undertook miracles. I soon found my pride was a molehill and my love a mountain. I could not hold out by day if I did not ease my breaking heart at night.

How unfortunate! I kept my head under the bed-clothes, too; but you have such ears. I thought I would stifle my grief, or else perhaps you would be as wretched as I am: forgive me pray forgive me!"

"On one condition," said Mrs. Dodd, struggling with the emotion these simple words caused her.

"Anything to be forgiven," cried Julia, impetuously. "I'll go to London.

I'll go to Botany Bay. I deserve to be hanged."

"Then, from this hour, no half-confidences between us. Dear me, you carry in your own bosom a much harsher judge, a much less indulgent friend, than I am. Come! trust me with your heart. Do you love him very much? Does your happiness depend on him?"

At this point-blank question Julia put her head over Mrs. Dodd's shoulder, not to be seen; and, clasping her tight, murmured scarce above a whisper, "I don't know how much I love him. When he came in at that party I felt his slave--his unfaithful adoring slave; if he had ordered me to sing Aileen Aroon, I should have obeyed; if he had commanded me to take his hand and leave the room, I think I should have obeyed. His face is always before me as plain as life; it used to come to me bright and loving; now it is pale, and stern, and sad. I was not so wretched till I saw he was pining for me, and thinks me inconstant--oh, mamma, so pale!

so shrunk I so reckless! He was sorry for misbehaving that night: he changed clothes with a beggar to kiss my dress, poor thing! poor thing!

Who ever loved as he does me! I am dying for him; I am dying."

"There! there!" said Mrs. Dodd soothingly. "You have said enough. This must be love. I am on your Alfred's side from this hour."

Julia opened her eyes, and was a good deal agitated as well as surprised. "Pray do not raise my hopes," she gasped. "We are parted for ever. His father refuses. Even you seemed averse; or have I been dreaming?"

"Me, dearest? How can I be averse to anything lawful on which I find your heart is really set, and your happiness at stake? Of course I have stopped the actual intercourse, under existing circ.u.mstances; but these circ.u.mstances are not unalterable: your only obstacle is Mr. Richard Hardie."