Lady Anna Part 41

"I will remember both, mamma," said Lady Anna. The Countess looked down on her daughter's face, and could not help thinking that her child was different from what she had been. There had been almost defiance in the words spoken, though they had been spoken with the voice of an invalid.

At three o'clock that afternoon, according to his custom, Lord Lovel came, and was at once told that he was to be spoken to by his cousin.

"She says it is about money," said the Countess.

"About money?"

"Yes;--and if she confines herself to that, do as she bids you. If she is ever to be your wife it will be all right; and if not,--then it will be better in your hands than in hers. In three months time she can do as she pleases with it all." He was then taken into Lady Anna's room. "Here is your cousin," said the Countess. "You must not talk long or I shall interrupt you. If you wish to speak to him about the property,--as the head of your family,--that will be very right; but confine yourself to that for the present." Then the Countess left them and closed the door.

"It is not only about money, Lord Lovel."

"You might call me Frederic now," said he tenderly.

"No;--not now. If I am ever well again and we are then friends I will do so. They tell me that there is ever so much money,--hundreds of thousands of pounds. I forget how much."

"Do not trouble yourself about that."

"But I do trouble myself very much about it,--and I know that it ought to be yours. There is one thing I want to tell you, which you must believe. If I am ever any man's wife, I shall be the wife of Daniel Thwaite." That dark frown came upon his face which she had seen once before. "Pray believe that it is so," she continued. "Mamma does not believe it,--will not believe it; but it is so. I love him with all my heart. I think of him every minute. It is very very cruel that I may not hear from him or send one word to tell him how I am.

There! My hand is on the Bible, and I swear to you that if I am ever the wife of any man, I will be his wife."

He looked down at her and saw that she was wan and thin and weak, and he did not dare to preach to her the old family sermon as to his rank and station. "But, Anna, why do you tell me this now?" he said.

"That you may believe it and not trouble yourself with me any more.

You must believe it when I tell you so in this manner. I may perhaps never live to rise from my bed. If I get well, I shall send to him, or go. I will not be hindered. He is true to me, and I will be true to him. You may tell mamma if you think proper. She would not believe me, but perhaps she may believe you. But, Lord Lovel, it is not fit that he should have all this money. He does not want it, and he would not take it. Till I am married I may do what I please with it;--and it shall be yours."

"That cannot be."

"Yes, it can. I know that I can make it yours if I please. They tell me that--that you are not rich, as Lord Lovel should be, because all this has been taken from you. That was the reason why you came to me."

"By heaven, Anna, I love you most truly."

"It could not have been so when you had not seen me. Will you take a message from me to Daniel Thwaite?"

He thought awhile before he answered it. "No, I cannot do that."

"Then I must find another messenger. Mr. Goffe will do it perhaps. He shall tell me how much he wants to keep, and the rest shall be yours.

That is all. If you tell mamma, ask her not to be hard to me." He stood over her and took her hand, but knew not how to speak a word to her. He attempted to kiss her hand; but she raised herself on her elbow, and shook her head and drew it from him. "It belongs to Daniel Thwaite," she said. Then he left her and did not speak another word.

"What has she said?" asked the Countess, with an attempt at smiling.

"I do not know that I should tell you."

"Surely, Lovel, you are bound to tell me."

"She has offered me all her property,--or most of it."

"She is right," said the Countess.

"But she has sworn to me, on the Bible, that she will never be my wife."

"Tush!--it means nothing."

"Ah yes;--it means much. It means all. She never loved me,--not for an instant. That other man has been before me, and she is too firm to be moved."

"Did she say so?"

He was silent for a moment and then replied, "Yes; she did say so."

"Then let her die!" said the Countess.

"Lady Lovel!"

"Let her die. It will be better. Oh, G.o.d! that I should be brought to this. And what will you do, my lord? Do you mean to say that you will abandon her?"

"I cannot ask her to be my wife again."

"What;--because she has said this in her sickness,--when she is half delirious,--while she is dreaming of the words that man spoke to her?

Have you no more strength than that? Are you so poor a creature?"

"I think I have been a poor creature to ask her a second time at all."

"No; not so. Your duty and mine are the same,--as should be hers. We must forget ourselves while we save the family. Do not I bear all?

Have not I borne everything--contumely, solitude, ill words, poverty, and now this girl's unkindness? But even yet I will not give it up.

Take the property,--as it is offered."

"I could not touch it."

"If not for you, then for your children. Take it all, so that we may be the stronger. But do not abandon us now, if you are a man."

He would not stay to hear her further exhortations, but hurried away from the house full of doubt and unhappiness.

CHAPTER x.x.xIX.

LADY ANNA'S OFFER.

Early in March Lady Anna was convalescent, but had not yet left the house in Keppel Street,--and the confusion and dismay of the Countess were greater than ever. Lady Anna had declared that she would not leave England for the present. She was reminded that at any rate till the 10th of May she was subject to her mother's control. But by this time her mother's harshness to her had produced some corresponding hardness in her. "Yes, mamma;--but I will not go abroad. Things must be settled, and I am not well enough to go yet." The Countess a.s.serted that everything could be arranged abroad, that papers could be sent after them, that Mr. Goffe could come out to them, and with much show of authority persisted. She would do anything by which she might be able to remove Lady Anna from the influence of Daniel Thwaite at the time at which the girl would cease to be subject to her. But in truth the girl had ceased to be subject to her. "No, mamma, I will not go. If you will ask Serjeant Bluestone, or Sir William Patterson, I am sure they will say that I ought not to be made to go." There were some terrible scenes in which the mother was driven almost to desperation. Lady Anna repeated to the Countess all that she had said to Lord Lovel,--and swore to her mother with the Bible in hand that if ever she became the wife of any man she would be the wife of Daniel Thwaite. Then the Countess with great violence knocked the book out of her daughter's grasp, and it was thrown to the other side of the room. "If this is to go on," said the Countess, "one of us must die."

"Mamma, I have done nothing to make you so unkind to me. You have not spoken one word of kindness to me since I came from Yoxham."

"If this goes on I shall never speak a word of kindness to you again," said the mother.

But in the midst of all this there was one point on which they were agreed,--on which they came sufficiently near together for action, though there was still a wide difference between them. Some large proportion of the property at stake was to be made over to Lord Lovel on the day that gave the girl the legal power of transferring her own possessions. The Countess began by presuming that the whole of Lady Anna's wealth was to be so transferred,--not from any lack of reverence for the great amount which was in question, but feeling that for all good purposes it would be safer in the hands of the Earl than in those of her own child. If it could be arranged that the tailor could get nothing with his bride, then it might still be possible that the tailor might refuse the match. At any rate a quarrel might be fostered and the evil might be staved off. But to this Lady Anna would not a.s.sent. If she might act in this business in concert with Mr. Thwaite she would be able, she thought, to do better by her cousin than she proposed. But as she was not allowed to learn what were Mr. Thwaite's wishes, she would halve her property with her cousin. As much as this she was willing to do,--and was determined to do, acting on her own judgment. More she would not do,--unless she could see Mr. Thwaite. As it stood, her proposition was one which would, if carried out, bestow something like 10,000 a year upon the Earl. Then Mr. Goffe was sent for, and Lady Anna was allowed to communicate her suggestion to the lawyer. "That should require a great deal of thought," said Mr. Goffe with solemnity. Lady Anna declared that she had been thinking of it all the time she had been ill. "But it should not be done in a hurry," said Mr. Goffe. Then Lady Anna remarked that in the meantime, her cousin, the Earl, the head of her family, would have nothing to support his t.i.tle. Mr.

Goffe took his leave, promising to consult his partner, and to see Mr. Flick.

Mr. Goffe did consult his partner and did see Mr. Flick, and then Serjeant Bluestone was asked his advice,--and the Solicitor-General.

The Serjeant had become somewhat tired of the Lovels, and did not care to give any strong advice either in one direction or in the other. The young lady, he said, might of course do what she liked with her own when it was her own; but he thought that she should not be hurried. He pointed it out as a fact that the Earl had not the slightest claim upon any portion of the estate,--not more than he would have had if this money had come to Lady Anna from her mother's instead of from her father's relatives. He was still of opinion that the two cousins might ultimately become man and wife if matters were left tranquil and the girl were taken abroad for a year or two. Lady Anna, however, would be of age in a few weeks, and must of course do as she liked with her own.