Middlemarch

by George Eliot

  CHAPTER XXVII.

  Let the high Muse chant loves Olympian: We are but mortals, and must sing of man.

  An eminent philosopher among my friends, who can dignify even your uglyfurniture by lifting it into the serene light of science, has shown methis pregnant little fact. Your pier-glass or extensive surface ofpolished steel made to be rubbed by a housemaid, will be minutely andmultitudinously scratched in all directions; but place now against it alighted candle as a centre of illumination, and lo! the scratches willseem to arrange themselves in a fine series of concentric circles roundthat little sun. It is demonstrable that the scratches are goingeverywhere impartially and it is only your candle which produces theflattering illusion of a concentric arrangement, its light falling withan exclusive optical selection. These things are a parable. Thescratches are events, and the candle is the egoism of any person nowabsent--of Miss Vincy, for example. Rosamond had a Providence of herown who had kindly made her more charming than other girls, and whoseemed to have arranged Fred's illness and Mr. Wrench's mistake inorder to bring her and Lydgate within effective proximity. It wouldhave been to contravene these arrangements if Rosamond had consented togo away to Stone Court or elsewhere, as her parents wished her to do,especially since Mr. Lydgate thought the precaution needless.Therefore, while Miss Morgan and the children were sent away to afarmhouse the morning after Fred's illness had declared itself,Rosamond refused to leave papa and mamma.

  Poor mamma indeed was an object to touch any creature born of woman;and Mr. Vincy, who doted on his wife, was more alarmed on her accountthan on Fred's. But for his insistence she would have taken no rest:her brightness was all bedimmed; unconscious of her costume which hadalways been so fresh and gay, she was like a sick bird with languid eyeand plumage ruffled, her senses dulled to the sights and sounds thatused most to interest her. Fred's delirium, in which he seemed to bewandering out of her reach, tore her heart. After her first outburstagainst Mr. Wrench she went about very quietly: her one low cry was toLydgate. She would follow him out of the room and put her hand on hisarm moaning out, "Save my boy." Once she pleaded, "He has always beengood to me, Mr. Lydgate: he never had a hard word for his mother,"--asif poor Fred's suffering were an accusation against him. All thedeepest fibres of the mother's memory were stirred, and the young manwhose voice took a gentler tone when he spoke to her, was one with thebabe whom she had loved, with a love new to her, before he was born.

  "I have good hope, Mrs. Vincy," Lydgate would say. "Come down with meand let us talk about the food." In that way he led her to the parlorwhere Rosamond was, and made a change for her, surprising her intotaking some tea or broth which had been prepared for her. There was aconstant understanding between him and Rosamond on these matters. Healmost always saw her before going to the sickroom, and she appealed tohim as to what she could do for mamma. Her presence of mind andadroitness in carrying out his hints were admirable, and it is notwonderful that the idea of seeing Rosamond began to mingle itself withhis interest in the case. Especially when the critical stage waspassed, and he began to feel confident of Fred's recovery. In the moredoubtful time, he had advised calling in Dr. Sprague (who, if he could,would rather have remained neutral on Wrench's account); but after twoconsultations, the conduct of the case was left to Lydgate, and therewas every reason to make him assiduous. Morning and evening he was atMr. Vincy's, and gradually the visits became cheerful as Fred becamesimply feeble, and lay not only in need of the utmost petting butconscious of it, so that Mrs. Vincy felt as if, after all, the illnesshad made a festival for her tenderness.

  Both father and mother held it an added reason for good spirits, whenold Mr. Featherstone sent messages by Lydgate, saying that Fred mustmake haste and get well, as he, Peter Featherstone, could not dowithout him, and missed his visits sadly. The old man himself wasgetting bedridden. Mrs. Vincy told these messages to Fred when hecould listen, and he turned towards her his delicate, pinched face,from which all the thick blond hair had been cut away, and in which theeyes seemed to have got larger, yearning for some word aboutMary--wondering what she felt about his illness. No word passed hislips; but "to hear with eyes belongs to love's rare wit," and themother in the fulness of her heart not only divined Fred's longing, butfelt ready for any sacrifice in order to satisfy him.

  "If I can only see my boy strong again," she said, in her loving folly;"and who knows?--perhaps master of Stone Court! and he can marryanybody he likes then."

  "Not if they won't have me, mother," said Fred. The illness had madehim childish, and tears came as he spoke.

  "Oh, take a bit of jelly, my dear," said Mrs. Vincy, secretlyincredulous of any such refusal.

  She never left Fred's side when her husband was not in the house, andthus Rosamond was in the unusual position of being much alone.Lydgate, naturally, never thought of staying long with her, yet itseemed that the brief impersonal conversations they had together werecreating that peculiar intimacy which consists in shyness. They wereobliged to look at each other in speaking, and somehow the lookingcould not be carried through as the matter of course which it reallywas. Lydgate began to feel this sort of consciousness unpleasant andone day looked down, or anywhere, like an ill-worked puppet. But thisturned out badly: the next day, Rosamond looked down, and theconsequence was that when their eyes met again, both were moreconscious than before. There was no help for this in science, and asLydgate did not want to flirt, there seemed to be no help for it infolly. It was therefore a relief when neighbors no longer consideredthe house in quarantine, and when the chances of seeing Rosamond alonewere very much reduced.

  But that intimacy of mutual embarrassment, in which each feels that theother is feeling something, having once existed, its effect is not tobe done away with. Talk about the weather and other well-bred topicsis apt to seem a hollow device, and behavior can hardly become easyunless it frankly recognizes a mutual fascination--which of course neednot mean anything deep or serious. This was the way in which Rosamondand Lydgate slid gracefully into ease, and made their intercourselively again. Visitors came and went as usual, there was once moremusic in the drawing-room, and all the extra hospitality of Mr. Vincy'smayoralty returned. Lydgate, whenever he could, took his seat byRosamond's side, and lingered to hear her music, calling himself hercaptive--meaning, all the while, not to be her captive. Thepreposterousness of the notion that he could at once set up asatisfactory establishment as a married man was a sufficient guaranteeagainst danger. This play at being a little in love was agreeable, anddid not interfere with graver pursuits. Flirtation, after all, was notnecessarily a singeing process. Rosamond, for her part, had neverenjoyed the days so much in her life before: she was sure of beingadmired by some one worth captivating, and she did not distinguishflirtation from love, either in herself or in another. She seemed tobe sailing with a fair wind just whither she would go, and her thoughtswere much occupied with a handsome house in Lowick Gate which she hopedwould by-and-by be vacant. She was quite determined, when she wasmarried, to rid herself adroitly of all the visitors who were notagreeable to her at her father's; and she imagined the drawing-room inher favorite house with various styles of furniture.

  Certainly her thoughts were much occupied with Lydgate himself; heseemed to her almost perfect: if he had known his notes so that hisenchantment under her music had been less like an emotional elephant's,and if he had been able to discriminate better the refinements of hertaste in dress, she could hardly have mentioned a deficiency in him.How different he was from young Plymdale or Mr. Caius Larcher! Thoseyoung men had not a notion of French, and could speak on no subjectwith striking knowledge, except perhaps the dyeing and carrying trades,which of course they were ashamed to mention; they were Middlemarchgentry, elated with their silver-headed whips and satin stocks, butembarrassed in their manners, and timidly jocose: even Fred was abovethem, having at least the accent and manner of a university man.Whereas Lydgate was always listened to, bore himself with the carelesspoli
teness of conscious superiority, and seemed to have the rightclothes on by a certain natural affinity, without ever having to thinkabout them. Rosamond was proud when he entered the room, and when heapproached her with a distinguishing smile, she had a delicious sensethat she was the object of enviable homage. If Lydgate had been awareof all the pride he excited in that delicate bosom, he might have beenjust as well pleased as any other man, even the most densely ignorantof humoral pathology or fibrous tissue: he held it one of the prettiestattitudes of the feminine mind to adore a man's pre-eminence withouttoo precise a knowledge of what it consisted in. But Rosamond was notone of those helpless girls who betray themselves unawares, and whosebehavior is awkwardly driven by their impulses, instead of beingsteered by wary grace and propriety. Do you imagine that her rapidforecast and rumination concerning house-furniture and society wereever discernible in her conversation, even with her mamma? On thecontrary, she would have expressed the prettiest surprise anddisapprobation if she had heard that another young lady had beendetected in that immodest prematureness--indeed, would probably havedisbelieved in its possibility. For Rosamond never showed anyunbecoming knowledge, and was always that combination of correctsentiments, music, dancing, drawing, elegant note-writing, privatealbum for extracted verse, and perfect blond loveliness, which made theirresistible woman for the doomed man of that date. Think no unfairevil of her, pray: she had no wicked plots, nothing sordid ormercenary; in fact, she never thought of money except as somethingnecessary which other people would always provide. She was not in thehabit of devising falsehoods, and if her statements were no direct clewto fact, why, they were not intended in that light--they were amongher elegant accomplishments, intended to please. Nature had inspiredmany arts in finishing Mrs. Lemon's favorite pupil, who by generalconsent (Fred's excepted) was a rare compound of beauty, cleverness,and amiability.

  Lydgate found it more and more agreeable to be with her, and there wasno constraint now, there was a delightful interchange of influence intheir eyes, and what they said had that superfluity of meaning forthem, which is observable with some sense of flatness by a thirdperson; still they had no interviews or asides from which a thirdperson need have been excluded. In fact, they flirted; and Lydgate wassecure in the belief that they did nothing else. If a man could notlove and be wise, surely he could flirt and be wise at the same time?Really, the men in Middlemarch, except Mr. Farebrother, were greatbores, and Lydgate did not care about commercial politics or cards:what was he to do for relaxation? He was often invited to theBulstrodes'; but the girls there were hardly out of the schoolroom; andMrs. Bulstrode's _naive_ way of conciliating piety and worldliness, thenothingness of this life and the desirability of cut glass, theconsciousness at once of filthy rags and the best damask, was not asufficient relief from the weight of her husband's invariableseriousness. The Vincys' house, with all its faults, was thepleasanter by contrast; besides, it nourished Rosamond--sweet to lookat as a half-opened blush-rose, and adorned with accomplishments forthe refined amusement of man.

  But he made some enemies, other than medical, by his success with MissVincy. One evening he came into the drawing-room rather late, whenseveral other visitors were there. The card-table had drawn off theelders, and Mr. Ned Plymdale (one of the good matches in Middlemarch,though not one of its leading minds) was in tete-a-tete with Rosamond.He had brought the last "Keepsake," the gorgeous watered-silkpublication which marked modern progress at that time; and heconsidered himself very fortunate that he could be the first to lookover it with her, dwelling on the ladies and gentlemen with shinycopper-plate cheeks and copper-plate smiles, and pointing to comicverses as capital and sentimental stories as interesting. Rosamond wasgracious, and Mr. Ned was satisfied that he had the very best thing inart and literature as a medium for "paying addresses"--the very thingto please a nice girl. He had also reasons, deep rather thanostensible, for being satisfied with his own appearance. Tosuperficial observers his chin had too vanishing an aspect, looking asif it were being gradually reabsorbed. And it did indeed cause himsome difficulty about the fit of his satin stocks, for which chins wereat that time useful.

  "I think the Honorable Mrs. S. is something like you," said Mr. Ned.He kept the book open at the bewitching portrait, and looked at itrather languishingly.

  "Her back is very large; she seems to have sat for that," saidRosamond, not meaning any satire, but thinking how red young Plymdale'shands were, and wondering why Lydgate did not come. She went on withher tatting all the while.

  "I did not say she was as beautiful as you are," said Mr. Ned,venturing to look from the portrait to its rival.

  "I suspect you of being an adroit flatterer," said Rosamond, feelingsure that she should have to reject this young gentleman a second time.

  But now Lydgate came in; the book was closed before he reachedRosamond's corner, and as he took his seat with easy confidence on theother side of her, young Plymdale's jaw fell like a barometer towardsthe cheerless side of change. Rosamond enjoyed not only Lydgate'spresence but its effect: she liked to excite jealousy.

  "What a late comer you are!" she said, as they shook hands. "Mamma hadgiven you up a little while ago. How do you find Fred?"

  "As usual; going on well, but slowly. I want him to go away--to StoneCourt, for example. But your mamma seems to have some objection."

  "Poor fellow!" said Rosamond, prettily. "You will see Fred sochanged," she added, turning to the other suitor; "we have looked toMr. Lydgate as our guardian angel during this illness."

  Mr. Ned smiled nervously, while Lydgate, drawing the "Keepsake" towardshim and opening it, gave a short scornful laugh and tossed up hischin, as if in wonderment at human folly.

  "What are you laughing at so profanely?" said Rosamond, with blandneutrality.

  "I wonder which would turn out to be the silliest--the engravings orthe writing here," said Lydgate, in his most convinced tone, while heturned over the pages quickly, seeming to see all through the book inno time, and showing his large white hands to much advantage, asRosamond thought. "Do look at this bridegroom coming out of church:did you ever see such a 'sugared invention'--as the Elizabethans usedto say? Did any haberdasher ever look so smirking? Yet I will answerfor it the story makes him one of the first gentlemen in the land."

  "You are so severe, I am frightened at you," said Rosamond, keeping heramusement duly moderate. Poor young Plymdale had lingered withadmiration over this very engraving, and his spirit was stirred.

  "There are a great many celebrated people writing in the 'Keepsake,' atall events," he said, in a tone at once piqued and timid. "This is thefirst time I have heard it called silly."

  "I think I shall turn round on you and accuse you of being a Goth,"said Rosamond, looking at Lydgate with a smile. "I suspect you knownothing about Lady Blessington and L. E. L." Rosamond herself was notwithout relish for these writers, but she did not readily commitherself by admiration, and was alive to the slightest hint thatanything was not, according to Lydgate, in the very highest taste.

  "But Sir Walter Scott--I suppose Mr. Lydgate knows him," said youngPlymdale, a little cheered by this advantage.

  "Oh, I read no literature now," said Lydgate, shutting the book, andpushing it away. "I read so much when I was a lad, that I suppose itwill last me all my life. I used to know Scott's poems by heart."

  "I should like to know when you left off," said Rosamond, "because thenI might be sure that I knew something which you did not know."

  "Mr. Lydgate would say that was not worth knowing," said Mr. Ned,purposely caustic.

  "On the contrary," said Lydgate, showing no smart; but smiling withexasperating confidence at Rosamond. "It would be worth knowing by thefact that Miss Vincy could tell it me."

  Young Plymdale soon went to look at the whist-playing, thinking thatLydgate was one of the most conceited, unpleasant fellows it had everbeen his ill-fortune to meet.

  "How rash you are!" said Rosamond, inwardly delighted. "Do you seetha
t you have given offence?"

  "What! is it Mr. Plymdale's book? I am sorry. I didn't think aboutit."

  "I shall begin to admit what you said of yourself when you first camehere--that you are a bear, and want teaching by the birds."

  "Well, there is a bird who can teach me what she will. Don't I listento her willingly?"

  To Rosamond it seemed as if she and Lydgate were as good as engaged.That they were some time to be engaged had long been an idea in hermind; and ideas, we know, tend to a more solid kind of existence, thenecessary materials being at hand. It is true, Lydgate had thecounter-idea of remaining unengaged; but this was a mere negative, ashadow cast by other resolves which themselves were capable ofshrinking. Circumstance was almost sure to be on the side ofRosamond's idea, which had a shaping activity and looked throughwatchful blue eyes, whereas Lydgate's lay blind and unconcerned as ajelly-fish which gets melted without knowing it.

  That evening when he went home, he looked at his phials to see how aprocess of maceration was going on, with undisturbed interest; and hewrote out his daily notes with as much precision as usual. Thereveries from which it was difficult for him to detach himself wereideal constructions of something else than Rosamond's virtues, and theprimitive tissue was still his fair unknown. Moreover, he wasbeginning to feel some zest for the growing though half-suppressed feudbetween him and the other medical men, which was likely to become moremanifest, now that Bulstrode's method of managing the new hospital wasabout to be declared; and there were various inspiriting signs that hisnon-acceptance by some of Peacock's patients might be counterbalancedby the impression he had produced in other quarters. Only a few dayslater, when he had happened to overtake Rosamond on the Lowick road andhad got down from his horse to walk by her side until he had quiteprotected her from a passing drove, he had been stopped by a servant onhorseback with a message calling him in to a house of some importancewhere Peacock had never attended; and it was the second instance ofthis kind. The servant was Sir James Chettam's, and the house wasLowick Manor.