The Two Guardians

by Charlotte Mary Yonge

  Thus it came to pass, that nightly sittings by each other's bed-room fire were renewed, and long consultations took place, always at first about Lionel, but sometimes branching to things in general, even as in the olden time. Caroline was, however, very unlike what she had been a year ago, when as Marian full well remembered, they had first talked of Mr. Faulkner's visit. She was gayer in public, but her spirits were very low when alone with Marian; and now and then the conversation flagged, till she sat for full half an hour, her head on her hand, without a word. At first she would try to excuse such a reverie, by calling herself very tired; but as days went on, and it recurred, she smiled as she woke from it, and told Marian "it was such repose to be with a person who would let her be silent."

  There was much confidence in such silence. Marian began to grow even more sorry for her than at first, because it was impossible to continue to be angry; and tried in every way to show her kindness, becoming, unconsciously, much more demonstrative in affection than ever she had been before. On the day on which Lionel received the letter mentioned at the end of the last chapter, Caroline came into Marian's room at dressing-time; and after lingering about a little, she said, "Could Lionel read that letter to day?"

  Marian shook her head sadly.

  "He brought it to you, then?" sighed Caroline, "Ah! I saw who it came from."

  She looked wistfully at Marian, as if longing to hear something of the letter, though she would not ask; and Marian, though much touched, was determined against saying one word about it, however indifferent, as she felt that, without Lionel's consent, she ought to be as mute as the paper it was written upon. Caroline paused, then continued, "Do you think he will ask you to write his answer for him?"

  "No, I think not. You know he wrote a note to Gerald in one of my letters the other day. I dare say he will always be able to write; Mrs. Wortley has a blind friend who does."

  Caroline did not answer, but gazed at the fire for almost ten minutes. At last she said, "Poor Walter! I wonder what he is doing."

  "I am sure he must be making himself very useful," said Marian.

  "That is one thing we may be sure of," said Caroline, smiling mournfully. "Walter is excellent wherever he is; but O, Marian," continued she, in a voice of inexpressible sadness, "who would have told me, a year ago, that all I should hear of Walter's ordination would be in the newspaper?"

  Marian could make no answer but some sound expressive of sorrow.

  "He has only written to me once since--since June!" proceeded Caroline, in the same utterly dejected tone.

  Then Walter had remonstrated, which was a great comfort to Marian, by restoring him to his place in her estimation. Still she maintained her expressive silence, and Caroline went on after another interval. "You and he have been consistent from the first, Marian."

  At that moment Fanny came in, and no more could be said, for Marian was obliged to dress for dinner in a hurry. She took an opportunity of saying to Lionel that evening, something about the pleasure it would give Caroline if he would tell her about his letter.

  "What! you have been telling her about it?" said he, in a tone of great vexation; "that is always the way with women--no trusting them!"

  "No, indeed, Lionel, I said not one word; but she saw it was Walter's writing."

  "And you went and told her I could not read it?"

  "If she asked me, what could I do but speak the truth?" said Marian gently; but he only made an impatient exclamation.

  "I gave not the least hint of what it was about," added Marian, pleadingly. "Of course I could not think of that, nor she either; but she looked as if she did so long for some news of Walter: she has not heard from him since the summer."

  "That is her own fault," said Lionel, in his surly voice.

  "That only makes it the worse for her. She is so much out of spirits, Lionel; and if you would only tell her that part about his schools and his lodging, I am sure she would be so much obliged to you."

  "I shan't do any such thing," was his reply; "I always keep my letters to myself, and I wish you would not talk about me."

  He turned sharply away, and crossed the room; but his temper was not improved by the consequences of his stumbling over a footstool which had been left full in the way, and in rather a dark place, where it would have been a trap for any one. He recovered in an instant without falling; so that it would not have signified if Mr. and Mrs. Lyddell had not both been startled. The former issued an edict that no stumbling-block should be left in the way, and the latter entered upon an investigation as to who had been the delinquent in the present case, so as to make a great deal of discussion of the very worst kind for Lionel.

  Thenceforth the evening was uncomfortable. Marian felt as if she was guilty of all, and was extremely provoked with herself for that blundering way of driving at her point, which made things worse when she most wanted to set them right. She had not comforted Caroline, and she had led poor Lionel to fancy his confidence betrayed, and himself discussed and--as he would call it--gossiped about. No wonder he looked as if she had been injuring him; yet, unjust as it was, she had only her own mal-adroitness to blame. A person of tact would have smoothed it all at once, instead of ruffling everything up.

  The tact Marian longed for is a natural talent; the consideration, the delicacy of feeling, that she really had, were a part of her sterling goodness, such as may be acquired by all; and her thorough truth, trustiness, kindness, and above all her single-mindedness, had a value, where she was really known, which weighed down, in the long run, all that was involuntarily against her in manner, and won her not only esteem, but such warm affection, such thorough reliance, as neither she herself, nor those who felt it could fathom. Tact is an excellent thing, but genuine love to our neighbour, seeking to show true kindness, delicacy, and consideration,--striving in fact to do as it would be done by,--is as much more precious, as a spiritual gift is than a natural quality.

  That very night, as Marian was sitting in her own room in her dressing-gown, pondering on these unfortunate blunders, there was a knock at her door, and in came Caroline. Sitting down by the fire, she held out a letter on two or three sheets of closely written notepaper. "Read that, Marian," said she, turning her face straight, to the fire as she gave it.

  It was from Walter, and the date showed that it had been written, immediately on receiving the announcement of Caroline's engagement. It was grave, earnest, and affectionate; not accusing Mr. Faulkner of anything, not positively objecting to him, but reminding Caroline of the solemnity of the duties she was about to undertake, and of the extreme danger of allowing herself to be so attracted by agreeableness of manner, or led on by the opinion of those around her, as to forget that the connection she was about to form was to last for life, and that she must be responsible for the influence her husband would exercise on her life here, and therefore on her life hereafter. He said he was sure she could not enter lightly on such an engagement, and therefore trusted that her own mind was thoroughly convinced that she had chosen one who would be a guide, an aid, and a support in the path that all were treading.

  It was exactly Walter's way, as Marian well knew, to manage to say, in his simple, and as he thought, guarded manner of representing things, what to sharper people had very much the air of irony; and as she gave back the letter, her observation, as the first that would occur, was, "It is very like Walter."

  "Very," said Caroline.

  "Did you answer him?"

  "I wrote again, but--but"--her voice began to fail--"it was not an answer. I would not seem to understand him. I wrote a lively, careless sort of letter, and only said papa and mamma were delighted, or something of that kind. And O, Marian, Marian, he has never written to me again, and I have deserved it." She burst into tears.

  "But why don't you write now? He must be very anxious to hear of Lionel, and there is no one to tell him."

  "I cannot," she replied; "I cannot, while--while he thinks of me as he must--as he ought!" She wept bitterly, and Mar
ian stood by perplexed and distressed. "Dear Caroline," was the utmost that she could say.

  "Marian!" cried Caroline, looking up for a moment, then hiding her face again--"I would give anything in the world that he had been at home last summer; or that you had slept at High Down that night."

  A flash of hope and joy came across Marian. "If you think so," she began, but Caroline cut her short. "I know what you mean, but that it? impossible, quite Impossible--decidedly so," she added, as if these assurances were to strengthen her own belief in its impossibility, and not arguing, from a consciousness that her friend would overthrow every one of her arguments. "I don't know what made me come to you, and tease you," said she, rising and taking her letter; "good night."

  "Tease me! O, Caroline, Caroline, you know--"

  What she knew was lost in a most affectionate embrace; but Caroline would not stay any longer, and left Marian as usual, regretting everything that had passed.

  The nest night, however, Caroline came again, as if there was some irresistible spell that drew her to Marian. It was Sunday, and Marian had long since observed that on such days Caroline was always most out of spirits. She sat down, and let a long time pass without talking; but at last she said, "Marian, it is very kind in you to let me come and sit here. You cannot--no--you will never know how wretched I am."

  "My dear, dear Caroline, if I could but do anything for you! but," she proceeded, gathering resolution from her day's reflections, "you are the only person who can do anything for yourself."

  "Impossible!" repeated Caroline.

  Marian was not exactly silenced, but involved in deep considerations as to the propriety of interfering, and whether attempting to persuade Caroline would be doing evil that good might come. Before she had made up her mind,--as, indeed, how could she in five minutes come to a conclusion to which hours of previous perplexity had failed to bring her?--Caroline spoke again, "If it had but never begun! but now it has, it must go on."

  "I don't know--"

  "It must, I tell you!" repeated Caroline. "If it had all to begin over again, it would be very different. O, if it was but this time last year!"

  "But Caroline, Caroline," repeated Marian, carried away by the thought that rose to her lips, "only think; you say now if it was this time last year--now, while you can escape. Shall not you say so all the more when it is really too late,--when you will wish you had drawn back now?"

  "You have no right to say I should wish, that!" said Caroline, offended. "You don't know what the love is that you are holding so cheaply."

  "I beg your pardon, Caroline," and Marian was thrown into herself again; but she thought a little longer, and seeing that Caroline was still waiting and musing, she ventured on saying, in a timid voice, "Somehow, I think, it would seem to me that the more affection there was, the more painful it would all be."

  "You are right there, Marian," exclaimed Caroline, in a voice of acute feeling.

  It was a strange question that Marian next asked abruptly, on an impulse sudden at the moment, though it was what she had long eagerly desired to know. "Do you love him after all?"

  Caroline did not seem vexed by the inquiry, but went on speaking rather as if she was examining herself as to the answer,--"Love him? I don't know; sometimes I think I do, sometimes I think not. It is not as people in books love, and--and it can't be as your Agnes must love Mr. Arundel."

  A most emphatic "O no!" escaped from Marian, she hardly knew how, as if it was profanation to compare Mr. Faulkner to Edmund; and perhaps the strongest proof that Caroline's was not a real attachment, was that she let it pass. "But then," pursued she warmly, "I am sure he is attached to me--yes, very much--and--well, and I am glad to see him come into the room; I like to walk with him. There is no one--no--no one in the whole world whom I like so well. All my doubts and fears go away at the first sound of his voice, and I am quite happy then. O, Marian, that surely is love?"

  "I don't know," said Marian; "I can't fancy love that has not begun with esteem, with looking up,"

  "I do look up!" said Caroline, eagerly. "He is so clever, so sensible, has such a mind."

  "I did not mean looking up intellectually,"

  "Ah! you can live in that way," said Caroline, quickly; "your own people are all of _that sort_. But you know I should never have had any one at all to love, if I had begun looking for _that kind of thing_, even at home."

  Too true, thought Marian, while she answered, "It is a different thing where you have to begin afresh, and take it voluntarily upon you."

  "Voluntarily!" repeated Caroline; "I am sure my will had very little to do with it. I found myself in the midst of it, without knowing how, before I had made up my mind one way or the other. O, Marian! if you had but been with me that morning."

  "Would that have prevented you?"

  "I do really believe it would. You would have looked as if you thought it so impossible, that I should have been strengthened up to do something they could not have taken for consent. I'll tell you all about it, Marian, from the beginning, and you will see how little free will I had in it, and how distracted I am now."

  Caroline went through the whole story, incoherently, and often only half expressing her sentiments, and passing over what Marian knew already. It seemed that she had been pleased with Mr. Faulkner's agreeableness, flattered by his attention, and entered upon the same sort of intercourse with him as with any other pleasant acquaintance. It would never have been her way, brought up as she had been, to shrink from him with such shuddering aversion as Marian did, simply from what she had heard of his opinions. He was so agreeable, that it was just as well quite to forget that, or only half to believe it. Then came the growing perceptions of his intentions towards her, and of her mother's triumph in them. But this was not till the archery arrangements were so far advanced, that she could not have drawn back from them; and she was, besides, in a whirl of gaiety and excitement that left little time for serious thought: that she put off till his offer should be made, if it was really coming. It came, and when she did not expect it. She knew not what to do she was too confused for consideration. The next day was bewilderment, and in the evening she found herself engaged. The new sensation given her by her lover's affection, her genuine admiration of his personal superiority, and wonder at herself for having attracted such a man,--her gratitude to his family for their kindness, the triumph of her parents,--all formed such a mixture of pleasurable, almost intoxicating feelings, as at first to giddy her, (or, as the French will express it, _l'ètourdir_,) as to what she had done, and what she was about to do. Marian's grave, still face, and omission of one congratulatory, even of one sympathetic word, were indeed witnesses; but the impression of her unaccommodating ways was then recent, and Caroline thought of her as one who showed goodness to be unpleasing and impracticable, and looked on her silent disapproval as part of that system of severity in which, she was consistent, but which her conduct only proved to be absurd and unreasonable.

  In the same spirit Caroline disregarded Walter's letter,--only a letter, which could therefore be laid aside, and which, in truth, did not say all he meant as forcibly or as well as it might have been said, since, as every one knew, Walter was more good than clever. A tenderness of feeling, reminding her that Walter loved her, would not let her destroy the letter, or be offended; but she intrenched herself in her parents' satisfaction, and being resolved not to attend to it, she would not seem to understand it. So time passed; at first she was really not exactly happy, but possessing what passed very well for happiness with herself and every one else; then came a time when an effort became necessary to persuade herself that she was so. It was not that Mr. Faulkner showed his character more openly, or startled her with any such plain expressions as had so much shocked Lionel; for he held that most subtle and perilous of all views partaking of unbelief,--that Christianity was the best and most beautiful form of religion yet promulgated, that it was all very well now for women and weak-minded people, and it was a step to some wonderful
perfectibility, which was a sort of worship of an essence of beauty and intellect.

  He did not say such things to her, but they were the principles on which all his sentiments were founded: and as she knew him mire and more intimately, compared and discussed their tastes and likings, and the grounds on which they were formed, there were tokens, which could not help now and then showing themselves, of those opinions of which Marian had warned her.

  Very slow was she to admit the conviction, for she was growing much attached to him; and whenever he praised the beauty, the poetry, the morality, the majesty of anything belonging to religion, she caught at it and silenced all her doubts with it,--hoped she had silenced them for ever,--but the perception would return that it was only the beauty that he praised, because it was beauty, and struck him as such. Shade upon shade, imperceptible in itself, but each tint adding to its depth, the cloud of misgiving darkened, and though she tried to fight it off,--though she told herself it was too late,--though she was very angry with herself for it, there it still hung; and the ever-present consciousness of Marian's disapproval heightened it, till in impatient moods she began to dislike Marian, and wish her out of the house,

  Then came the news of Edmund Arundel's engagement, rousing Marian into such a glow of warm-hearted delight, as to waken Caroline to a complete sense of her power of affection, as well as of the contrast of the manner in which she regarded the prospects of her two friends. Caroline grew more unhappy, and strove both against her own growing wretchedness, and an almost magnetic attraction, which drew her to impart it all to Marian, in spite of the chill with which it would be first met, and of the advice which could never be taken; whilst a yearning, longing desire for the long-suspended intercourse with Walter, and a sense of his displeasure, formed no slight portion of her miserable feelings. The arrangements for her marriage she looked on as part of her destiny,--at any rate, they occupied her mind; and there would be an end, after that, of these dreadful and vain doubts.