by Brontë, Anne
‘You can feel for him, Helen – can’t you?’
‘I can feel for anyone that is unjustly treated,’ I replied, ‘and I can feel for those that injure them too.’
‘Why Helen, you are as jealous as he is!’ cried he, laughing still more; and I found it impossible to convince him of his mistake. So from that time I have carefully refrained from any notice of the subject whatever, and left Lord Lowborough to take care of himself. He either has not the sense or the power to follow my example, though he does try to conceal his uneasiness as well as he can; but still, it will appear in his face, and his ill-humour will peep out at intervals, though not in the expression of open resentment – they never go far enough for that. But I confess I do feel jealous at times – most painfully, bitterly so – when she sings and plays to him, and he hangs over the instrument and dwells upon her voice with no affected interest; for then, I know he is really delighted, and I have no power to awaken similar fervour. I can amuse and please him with my simple songs, but not delight him thus.
I might retaliate if I chose, for Mr Hargrave is disposed to be very polite and attentive to me as his hostess – especially so when Arthur is the most neglectful, whether in mistaken compassion for me, or ambitious to show off his own good breeding by comparison with his friend’s remissness, I cannot tell; but in either case, his civilities are highly distasteful to me. If Arthur is a little careless, of course it is unpleasant to have the fault exaggerated by contrast; and to be pitied as a neglected wife when I am not such, is an insult I can ill endure. But for hospitality’s sake, I endeavour to suppress my impulse of scarcely reasonable resentment, and behave with decent civility to our guest, who, to give him his due, is by no means a disagreeable companion: he has good conversational powers and considerable information and taste, and talks about things that Arthur never could be brought to discuss, or to feel any interest in. But Arthur dislikes me to talk to him, and is visibly annoyed by his commonest acts of politeness; not that my husband has any unworthy suspicions of me – or of his friend either, as I believe – but he dislikes me to have any pleasure but in himself, any shadow of homage or kindness but such as he chooses to vouchsafe: he knows he is my sun, but when he chooses to withhold his light, he would have my sky to be all darkness; he cannot bear that I should have a moon to mitigate the deprivation.1 This is unjust; and I am sometimes tempted to tease him accordingly; but I won’t yield to the temptation: if he should carry his trifling with my feelings too far, I shall find some other means of checking him.
28th. – Yesterday we all went to the Grove, Mr Hargrave’s much neglected home. His mother frequently asks us over that she may have the pleasure of her dear Walter’s company; and this time she had invited us to a dinner party, and got together as many of the country gentry as were within reach to meet us. The entertainment was very well got up; but I could not help thinking about the cost of it all the time. I don’t like Mrs Hargrave; she is a hard, pretentious, worldly-minded woman. She has money enough to live very comfortably, if she only knew how to use it judiciously, and had taught her son to do the same; but she is ever straining to keep up appearances, with that despicable pride that shuns the semblance of poverty as of a shameful crime. She grinds her dependants, pinches her servants, and deprives even her daughters and herself of the real comforts of life, because she will not consent to yield the palm in outward show to those who have three times her wealth, and, above all, because she is determined her cherished son shall be enabled to ‘hold up his head with the highest gentleman in the land.’ This same son, I imagine, is a man of expensive habits – no reckless spendthrift, and no abandoned sensualist, but one who likes to have ‘everything handsome about him,’2 and to go to a certain length in youthful indulgences – not so much to gratify his own tastes as to maintain his reputation as a man of fashion in the world, and a respectable fellow among his own lawless companions; while he is too selfish to consider how many comforts might be obtained for his fond mother and sisters with the money he thus wastes upon himself as long: as they can contrive to make a respectable appearance once a year when they come to town, he gives himself little concern about their private stintings and struggles at home. This is a harsh judgment to form of ‘dear, noble-minded, generous-hearted Walter,’ but I fear it is too just.
Mrs Hargrave’s anxiety to make good matches for her daughters is partly the cause and partly the result of these errors: by making a figure in the world and showing them off to advantage, she hopes to obtain better chances for them; and by thus living beyond her legitimate means and lavishing so much on their brother, she renders them portionless, and makes them burdens on her hands. Poor Milicent, I fear, has already fallen a sacrifice to the manoeuvrings of this mistaken mother, who congratulates herself on having so satisfactorily discharged her maternal duty, and hopes to do as well for Esther. But Esther is a child as yet – a little merry romp of fourteen: as honest-hearted, and as guileless and simple as her sister, but with a fearless spirit of her own, that, I fancy, her mother will find some difficulty in bending to her purposes.
CHAPTER 27
A MISDEMEANOUR
October 9th. – While the gentlemen are ranging the woods and Lady Lowborough is busy writing her letters, I will return to my chronicle for the purpose of recording sayings and doings, the last of the kind I hope I shall ever have cause to describe.
It was on the night of the 4th, a little after tea, that Annabella had been singing and playing, with Arthur as usual at her side: she had ended her song, but still she sat at the instrument; and he stood leaning on the back of her chair, conversing in scarcely audible tones, with his face in very close proximity with hers. I looked at Lord Lowborough. He was at the other end of the room, talking with Messrs Hargrave and Grimsby; but I saw him dart towards his lady and his host a quick, impatient glance, expressive of intense disquietude, at which Grimsby smiled. Determined to interrupt the tête-à-tête, I rose, and, selecting a piece of music from the music-stand, stepped up to the piano, intending to ask the lady to play it; but I stood transfixed and speechless on seeing her seated there, listening with what seemed an exultant smile on her flushed face, to his soft murmurings, with her hand quietly surrendered to his clasp. The blood rushed first to my heart and then to my head – for there was more than this; almost at the moment of my approach, he cast a hurried glance over his shoulder towards the other occupants of the room, and then ardently pressed the unresisting hand to his lips. On raising his eyes he beheld me and dropped them again, confounded and dismayed. She saw me too, and confronted me with a look of hard defiance. I laid the music on the piano, and retired. I felt ill; but I did not leave the room: happily, it was getting late and could not be long before the company dispersed. I went to the fire and leant my head against the chimney-piece. In a minute or two, someone asked me if I felt unwell. I did not answer – indeed, at the time I knew not what was said – but I mechanically looked up, and saw Mr Hargrave standing beside me on the rug.
‘Shall I get you a glass of wine?’ said he.
‘No, thank you,’ I replied; and turning from him, I looked round. Lady Lowborough was beside her husband, bending over him as he sat, with her hand on his shoulder, softly talking and smiling in his face; and Arthur was at the table turning over a book of engravings. I seated myself in the nearest chair; and Mr Hargrave, finding his services were not desired, judiciously withdrew. Shortly after, the company broke up, and as the guests were retiring to their rooms, Arthur approached me, smiling with the utmost assurance.
‘Are you very angry, Helen?’ murmured he.
‘This is no jest, Arthur,’ said I seriously, but as calmly as I could – ’unless you think it a jest to lose my affection for ever.’
‘What! so bitter?’ he exclaimed, laughingly clasping my hand between both his; but I snatched it away, in indignation – almost in disgust, for he was obviously affected with wine.
‘Then I must go down on my knees,’ said he; and, kneeling before me
with clasped hands uplifted in mock humiliation, he continued imploringly – ‘Forgive me, Helen! – dear Helen forgive me, and I’ll never do it again!’ and, burying his face in his handkerchief, he affected to sob aloud.
Leaving him thus employed, I took my candle, and, slipping quietly from the room, hastened upstairs as fast as I could. But he soon discovered that I had left him, and rushing up after me, caught me in his arms, just as I had entered the chamber, and was about to shut the door in his face.
‘No, no, by heaven, you shan’t escape me so!’ he cried. Then, alarmed at my agitation, he begged me not to put myself in such a passion, telling me I was white in the face, and should kill myself if I did so.
‘Let me go then,’ I murmured; and immediately he released me – and it was well he did, for I was really in a passion. I sunk into the easy-chair and endeavoured to compose myself, for I wanted to speak to him calmly. He stood beside me, but did not venture to touch me or to speak, for a few seconds; then, approaching a little nearer, he dropped on one knee – not in mock humility, but to bring himself nearer my level, and, leaning his hand on the arm of the chair, he began in a low voice –
‘It is all nonsense, Helen – a jest, a mere nothing – not worth a thought. Will you never learn?’ he continued more boldly, ‘that you have nothing to fear from me? that I love you wholly and entirely? – or if,’ he added with a lurking smile, ‘I ever give a thought to another, you may well spare it, for those fancies are here and gone like a flash of lightning, while my love for you burns on steadily, and for ever like the sun. You little exorbitant tyrant, will not that–’
‘Be quiet a moment, will you Arthur,’ said I, ‘and listen to me – and don’t think I’m in a jealous fury: I am perfectly calm. Feel my hand.’ And I gravely extended it towards him – but closed it upon his with an energy that seemed to disprove the assertion, and made him smile. ‘You needn’t smile, sir,’ said I, still tightening my grasp, and looking steadfastly on him till he almost quailed before me. ‘You may think it all very fine, Mr Huntingdon, to amuse yourself with rousing my jealousy; but take care you don’t rouse my hate instead. And when you have once extinguished my love, you will find it no easy matter to kindle it again.’
‘Well Helen, I won’t repeat the offence. But I meant nothing by it, I assure you. I had taken too much wine, and I was scarcely myself, at the time.’
‘You often take too much; – and that is another practice I detest’ He looked up astonished at my warmth. ‘Yes,’ I continued. ‘I never mentioned it before, because I was ashamed to do so; but now I’ll tell you that it distresses me, and may disgust me, if you go on and suffer the habit to grow upon you, as it will, if you don’t check it in time. But the whole system of your conduct to Lady Lowborough, is not referable to wine; and this night you knew perfectly well what you were doing.’
‘Well, I’m sorry for it,’ replied he, with more of sulkiness than contrition: ‘what more would you have?’
‘You are sorry that I saw you, no doubt,’ I answered coldly.
‘If you had not seen me,’ he muttered, fixing his eyes on the carpet, ‘it would have done no harm.’
My heart felt ready to burst; but I resolutely swallowed back my emotion, and answered calmly. ‘You think not?’
‘No,’ replied he, boldly. ‘After all, what have I done? It’s nothing – except as you choose to make it a subject of accusation and distress.’
‘What would Lord Lowborough, your friend think, if he knew all? or what would you yourself think, if he or any other had acted the same part to me, throughout, as you have to Annabella?’
‘I would blow his brains out.’
‘Well then, Arthur, how can you call it nothing – an offence for which you would think yourself justified in blowing another man’s brains out’ Is it nothing to trifle with your friend’s feelings and mine – to endeavour to steal a woman’s affections from her husband – what he values more than his gold, and therefore what it is more dishonest to take? Are the marriage vows a jest; and is it nothing to make it your sport to break them, and to tempt another to do the same? Can I love a man that does such things, and coolly maintains it is nothing?’
‘You are breaking your marriage vows yourself,’1 said he, indignantly rising and pacing to and fro. ‘You promised to honour and obey me, and now you attempt to hector over me, and threaten and accuse me and call me worse than a highwayman. If it were not for your situation Helen, I would not submit to it so tamely. I won’t be dictated to by a woman, though she be my wife.’
‘What will you do then? Will you go on till I hate you; and then accuse me of breaking my vows?’
He was silent a moment, and then replied,
‘You never will hate me.’ Returning and resuming his former position at my feet, he repeated more vehemently – ‘You cannot hate me, as long as I love you.’
‘But how can I believe that you love me, if you continue to act in this way? Just imagine yourself in my place: would you think I loved you, if I did so? Would you believe my protestations, and honour and trust me under such circumstances?’
‘The cases are different,’ he replied. ‘It is a woman’s nature to be constant – to love one and one only, blindly, tenderly, and for ever – bless them, dear creatures! and you above them all – but you must have some commiseration for us, Helen; you must give us a little more licence, for as Shakespeare has it –
“However we do praise ourselves,
Our fancies are more giddy and unfirm,
More longing, wavering, sooner lost and won
Than women’s are.”’2
‘Do you mean by that, that your fancies are lost to me, and won by Lady Lowborough?’
‘No; Heaven is my witness that I think her mere dust and ashes in comparison with you, – and shall continue to think so, unless you drive me from you by too much severity. She is a daughter of earth; you are an angel of heaven; only be not too austere in your divinity, and remember that I am a poor, fallible mortal. Come now, Helen; won’t you forgive me?’ he said, gently taking my hand, and looking up with an innocent smile.
‘If I do, you will repeat the offence.’
‘I swear by –’
‘Don’t swear, I’ll believe your word as well as your oath. I wish I could have confidence in either.’
‘Try me then, Helen: only trust and pardon me this once, and you shall see! Come, I am in hell’s torments till you speak the word.’
I did not speak it, but I put my hand on his shoulder and kissed his forehead, and then burst into tears. He embraced me tenderly; and we have been good friends ever since. He has been decently temperate at table, and well-conducted towards Lady Lowborough. The first day, he held himself aloof from her, as far as he could without any flagrant breach of hospitality: since that, he has been friendly and civil but nothing more – in my presence, at least, nor, I think, at any other time; for she seems haughty and displeased, and Lord Lowborough is manifestly more cheerful, and more cordial towards his host than before. But I shall be glad when they are gone, for I have so little love for Annabella that it is quite a task to be civil to her, and as she is the only woman here besides myself, we are necessarily thrown so much together. Next time Mrs Hargrave calls, I shall hail her advent as quite a relief. I have a good mind to ask Arthur’s leave to invite the old lady to stay with us till our guests depart. I think I will. She will take it as a kind attention, and, though I have little relish for her society, she will be truly welcome as a third to stand between Lady Lowborough and me.
The first time the latter and I were alone together, after that unhappy evening, was an hour or two after breakfast on the following day, when the gentlemen were gone out after the usual time spent in the writing of letters, the reading of newspapers, and desultory conversation. We sat silent for two or three minutes. She was busy with her work and I was running over the columns of a paper from which I had extracted all the pith some twenty minutes before. It was a moment of painful emb
arrassment to me, and I thought it must be infinitely more so to her; but it seems I was mistaken. She was the first to speak; and, smiling with the coolest assurance, she began, –
‘Your husband was merry last night, Helen: is he often so?’
My blood boiled in my face; but it was better she should seem to attribute his conduct to this than to anything else.
‘No,’ replied I, ‘and never will be so again I trust.’
‘You gave him a curtain lecture,3 did you?’
‘No; but I told him I disliked such conduct, and he promised me not to repeat it.’
‘I thought he looked rather subdued this morning,’ she continued; ‘and you, Helen; you’ve been weeping I see – that’s our grand resource, you know – but doesn’t it make your eyes smart? – and do you always find it to answer?’
‘I never cry for effect; nor can I conceive how anyone can.’
‘Well, I don’t know: I never had occasion to try it; – but I think if Lowborough were to commit such improprieties, I’d make him cry. I don’t wonder at your being angry, for I’m sure I’d give my husband a lesson he would not soon forget for a lighter offence than that. But then he never will do anything of the kind; for I keep him in too good order for that.’
‘Are you sure you don’t arrogate too much of the credit to yourself? Lord Lowborough was quite as remarkable for his abstemiousness for some time before you married him, as he is now, I have heard.’
