The Law and the Lady

by Wilkie Collins

  CHAPTER XXIII

  MY MOTHER-IN-LAW SURPRISES ME.

  I TOOK a chair at a respectful distance from the sofa on which Mrs.Macallan seated herself. The old lady smiled, and beckoned to me to takemy place by her side. Judging by appearances, she had certainly not cometo see me in the character of an enemy. It remained to be discovered Iwhether she were really disposed to be my friend.

  "I have received a letter from your uncle the vicar," she began. "Heasks me to visit you, and I am happy--for reasons which you shallpresently hear--to comply with his request. Under other circumstancesI doubt very much, my dear child--strange as the confession mayappear--whether I should have ventured into your presence. My son hasbehaved to you so weakly, and (in my opinion) so inexcusably, that I amreally, speaking as his mother, almost ashamed to face you."

  Was she in earnest? I listened to her and looked at her in amazement.

  "Your uncle's letter," pursued Mrs. Macallan, "tells me how you havebehaved under your hard trial, and what you propose to do now Eustacehas left you. Doctor Starkweather, poor man, seems to be inexpressiblyshocked by what you said to him when he was in London. He begs me to usemy influence to induce you to abandon your present ideas, and to makeyou return to your old home at the Vicarage. I don't in the least agreewith your uncle, my dear. Wild as I believe your plans to be--you havenot the slightest chance of succeeding in carrying them out--I admireyour courage, your fidelity, your unshaken faith in my unhappy son,after his unpardonable behavior to you. You are a fine creature,Valeria, and I have come here to tell you so in plain words. Give me akiss, child. You deserve to be the wife of a hero, and you have marriedone of the weakest of living mortals. God forgive me for speaking so ofmy own son; but it's in my mind, and it must come out!"

  This way of speaking of Eustace was more than I could suffer, even fromhis mother. I recovered the use of my tongue in my husband's defense.

  "I am sincerely proud of your good opinion, dear Mrs. Macallan," I said."But you distress me--forgive me if I own it plainly--when I hear youspeak so disparagingly of Eustace. I cannot agree with you that myhusband is the weakest of living mortals."

  "Of course not!" retorted the old lady. "You are like all goodwomen--you make a hero of the man you love,--whether he deserve it ornot. Your husband has hosts of good qualities, child--and perhaps I knowthem better than you do. But his whole conduct, from the moment when hefirst entered your uncle's house to the present time, has been, I sayagain, the conduct of an essentially weak man. What do you think he hasdone now by way of climax? He has joined a charitable brotherhood; andhe is off to the war in Spain with a red cross on his arm, when he oughtto be here on his knees, asking his wife to forgive him. I say that isthe conduct of a weak man. Some people might call it by a harder name."

  This news startled and distressed me. I might be resigned to his leavingme for a time; but all my instincts as a woman revolted at his placinghimself in a position of danger during his separation from his wife.He had now deliberately added to my anxieties. I thought it cruel ofhim--but I would not confess what I thought to his mother. I affectedto be as cool as she was; and I disputed her conclusions with all thefirmness that I could summon to help me. The terrible old woman onlywent on abusing him more vehemently than ever.

  "What I complain of in my son," proceeded Mrs. Macallan, "is that he hasentirely failed to understand you. If he had married a fool, his conductwould be intelligible enough. He would have done wisely to conceal froma fool that he had been married already, and that he had suffered thehorrid public exposure of a Trial for the murder of his wife. Then,again, he would have been quite right, when this same fool haddiscovered the truth, to take himself out of her way before she couldsuspect him of poisoning he r--for the sake of the peace and quiet ofboth parties. But you are not a fool. I can see that, after only a shortexperience of you. Why can't he see it too? Why didn't he trust youwith his secret from the first, instead of stealing his way into youraffections under an assumed name? Why did he plan (as he confessed tome) to take you away to the Mediterranean, and to keep you abroad,for fear of some officious friends at home betraying him to you as theprisoner of the famous Trial? What is the plain answer to all thesequestions? What is the one possible explanation of this otherwiseunaccountable conduct? There is only one answer, and one explanation. Mypoor, wretched son--he takes after his father; he isn't the least likeme!--is weak: weak in his way of judging, weak in his way of acting,and, like all weak people, headstrong and unreasonable to the lastdegree. There is the truth! Don't get red and angry. I am as fond ofhim as you are. I can see his merits too. And one of them is that he hasmarried a woman of spirit and resolution--so faithful and so fond ofhim that she won't even let his own mother tell her of his faults. Goodchild! I like you for hating me!"

  "Dear madam, don't say that I hate you!" I exclaimed (feeling very muchas if I did hate her, though, for all that). "I only presume to thinkthat you are confusing a delicate-minded man with a weak-minded man. Ourdear unhappy Eustace--"

  "Is a delicate-minded man," said the impenetrable Mrs. Macallan,finishing my sentence for me. "We will leave it there, my dear, and geton to another subject. I wonder whether we shall disagree about thattoo?"

  "What is the subject, madam?"

  "I won't tell you if you call me madam. Call me mother. Say, 'What isthe subject, mother?'"

  "What is the subject, mother?"

  "Your notion of turning yourself into a Court of Appeal for a new Trialof Eustace, and forcing the world to pronounce a just verdict on him. Doyou really mean to try it?"

  "I do!"

  Mrs. Macallan considered for a moment grimly with herself.

  "You know how heartily I admire your courage, and your devotion to myunfortunate son," she said. "You know by this time that _I_ don't cant.But I cannot see you attempt to perform impossibilities; I cannot letyou uselessly risk your reputation and your happiness without warningyou before it is too late. My child, the thing you have got it in yourhead to do is not to be done by you or by anybody. Give it up."

  "I am deeply obliged to you, Mrs. Macallan--"

  "'Mother!'"

  "I am deeply obliged to you, mother, for the interest that you take inme, but I cannot give it up. Right or wrong, risk or no risk, I must andI will try it!"

  Mrs. Macallan looked at me very attentively, and sighed to herself.

  "Oh, youth, youth!" she said to herself, sadly. "What a grand thingit is to be young!" She controlled the rising regret, and turned on mesuddenly, almost fiercely, with these words: "What, in God's name, doyou mean to do?"

  At the instant when she put the question, the idea crossed my mind thatMrs. Macallan could introduce me, if she pleased, to Miserrimus Dexter.She must know him, and know him well, as a guest at Gleninch and an oldfriend of her son.

  "I mean to consult Miserrimus Dexter," I answered, boldly.

  Mrs. Macallan started back from me with a loud exclamation of surprise.

  "Are you out of your senses?" she asked.

  I told her, as I had told Major Fitz-David, that I had reason to thinkMr. Dexter's advice might be of real assistance to me at starting.

  "And I," rejoined Mrs. Macallan, "have reason to think that your wholeproject is a mad one, and that in asking Dexter's advice on it youappropriately consult a madman. You needn't start, child! There is noharm in the creature. I don't mean that he will attack you, or be rudeto you. I only say that the last person whom a young woman, placed inyour painful and delicate position, ought to associate herself with isMiserrimus Dexter."

  Strange! Here was the Major's warning repeated by Mrs. Macallan, almostin the Major's own words. Well! It shared the fate of most warnings. Itonly made me more and more eager to have my own way.

  "You surprise me very much," I said. "Mr. Dexter's evidence, given atthe Trial, seems as clear and reasonable as evidence can be."

  "Of course it is!" answered Mrs. Macallan. "The shorthand writers andreporters put his evidence into presentable language b
efore they printedit. If you had heard what he really said, as I did, you would havebeen either very much disgusted with him or very much amused by him,according to your way of looking at things. He began, fairly enough,with a modest explanation of his absurd Christian name, which at oncechecked the merriment of the audience. But as he went on the mad sideof him showed itself. He mixed up sense and nonsense in the strangestconfusion; he was called to order over and over again; he was eventhreatened with fine and imprisonment for contempt of Court. In short,he was just like himself--a mixture of the strangest and the mostopposite qualities; at one time perfectly clear and reasonable, asyou said just now; at another breaking out into rhapsodies of the mostoutrageous kind, like a man in a state of delirium. A more entirelyunfit person to advise anybody, I tell you again, never lived. You don'texpect Me to introduce you to him, I hope?"

  "I did think of such a thing," I answered. "But after what you havesaid, dear Mrs. Macallan, I give up the idea, of course. It is nota great sacrifice--it only obliges me to wait a week for MajorFitz-David's dinner-party. He has promised to ask Miserrimus Dexter tomeet me."

  "There is the Major all over!" cried the old lady. "If you pin yourfaith on that man, I pity you. He is as slippery as an eel. I supposeyou asked him to introduce you to Dexter?"

  "Yes."

  "Exactly! Dexter despises him, my dear. He knows as well as I do thatDexter won't go to his dinner. And he takes that roundabout way ofkeeping you apart, instead of saying No to you plainly, like an honestman."

  This was bad news. But I was, as usual, too obstinate to own myselfdefeated.

  "If the worst comes to the worst," I said, "I can but write to Mr.Dexter, and beg him to grant me an interview."

  "And go to him by yourself, if he does grant it?" inquired Mrs.Macallan.

  "Certainly. By myself."

  "You really mean it?"

  "I do, indeed."

  "I won't allow you to go by yourself."

  "May I venture to ask, ma'am how you propose to prevent me?"

  "By going with you, to be sure, you obstinate hussy! Yes, yes--I can beas headstrong as you are when I like. Mind! I don't want to know whatyour plans are. I don't want to be mixed up with your plans. My son isresigned to the Scotch Verdict. I am resigned to the Scotch Verdict.It is you who won't let matters rest as they are. You are a vain andfoolhardy young person. But, somehow, I have taken a liking to you,and I won't let you go to Miserrimus Dexter by yourself. Put on yourbonnet!"

  "Now?" I asked.

  "Certainly! My carriage is at the door. And the sooner it's over thebetter I shall be pleased. Get ready--and be quick about it!"

  I required no second bidding. In ten minutes more we were on our way toMiserrimus Dexter.

  Such was the result of my mother-in-law's visit!