Castle Richmond by Anthony Trollope (good story books to read .txt) 📖

about from place to place in the room, as though incapable of fixing himself in one position.

Clara was ignorant whether or no it behoved her to rebuke him for calling her simply by her Christian name. She thought that she ought to do so, but she did not do it.

"I have been told," he continued, "that you have engaged yourself to marry Herbert Fitzgerald; and I have now come to hear a contradiction of this from yourself."

"But, Mr. Fitzgerald, it is true."

"It is true that Herbert Fitzgerald is your accepted lover?"

"Yes," she said, looking down upon the ground, and blushing deeply as she said it.

There was a pause of a few moments, during which she felt that the full fire of his glance was fixed upon her, and then he spoke.

"You may well be ashamed to confess it," he said; "you may well feel that you dare not look me in the face as you pronounce the words. I would have believed it, Clara, from no other mouth than your own."

It appeared to Clara herself now as though she were greatly a culprit. She had not a word to say in her own defence. All those arguments as to Owen's ill course of life were forgotten; and she could only remember that she had acknowledged that she loved him, and that she was now acknowledging that she loved another.

But now Owen had made his accusation; and as it was not answered, he hardly knew how to proceed. He walked about the room, endeavouring to think what he had better say next.

"I know this, Clara; it is your mother's doing, and not your own. You could not bring yourself to be false, unless by her instigation."

"No," said she; "you are wrong there. It is not my mother's doing: what I have done, I have done myself."

"Is it not true," he asked, "that your word was pledged to me? Had you not promised me that you would be my wife?"

"I was very young," she said, falling back upon the only excuse which occurred to her at the moment as being possible to be used without incriminating him.

"Young! Is not that your mother's teaching? Why, those were her very words when she came to me at my house. I did not know that youth was any excuse for falsehood."

"But it may be an excuse for folly," said Clara.

"Folly! what folly? The folly of loving a poor suitor; the folly of being willing to marry a man who has not a large estate! Clara, I did not think that you could have learned so much in so short a time."

All this was very hard upon her. She felt that it was hard, for she knew that he had done that which entitled her to regard her pledge to him as at an end; but the circumstances were such that she could not excuse herself.

"Am I to understand," said Owen Fitzgerald, "that all that has passed between us is to go for nothing? that such promises as we have made to each other are to be of no account? To me they are sacred pledges, from which I would not escape even if I could."

As he then paused for a reply, she was obliged to say something.

"I hope you have not come here to upbraid me, Mr. Fitzgerald."

"Clara," he continued, "I have passed the last year with perfect reliance upon your faith. I need hardly tell you that it has not been passed happily, for it has been passed without seeing you. But though you have been absent from me, I have never doubted you. I have known that it was necessary that we should wait—wait perhaps till years should make you mistress of your own actions: but nevertheless I was not unhappy, for I was sure of your love."

Now it was undoubtedly the case that Fitzgerald was treating her unfairly; and though she had not her wits enough about her to ascertain this by process of argument, nevertheless the idea did come home to her. It was true that she had promised her love to this man, as far as such promise could be conveyed by one word of assent; but it was true also that she had been almost a child when she pronounced that word, and that things which had since occurred had entitled her to annul any amount of contract to which she might have been supposed to bind herself by that one word. She bethought herself, therefore, that as she was so hard pressed she was forced to defend herself.

"I was very young then, Mr. Fitzgerald, and hardly knew what I was saying: afterwards, when mamma spoke to me, I felt that I was bound to obey her."

"What, to obey her by forgetting me?"

"No; I have never forgotten you, and never shall. I remember too well your kindness to my brother; your kindness to us all."

"Psha! you know I do not speak of that. Are you bound to obey your mother by forgetting that you have loved me?"

She paused a moment before she answered him, looking now full before her,—hardly yet bold enough to look him in the face.

"No," she said; "I have not forgotten that I loved you. I shall never forget it. Child as I was, it shall never be forgotten. But I cannot love you now—not in the manner you would have me."

"And why not, Lady Clara? Why is love to cease on your part—to be thrown aside so easily by you, while with me it remains so stern a fact, and so deep a necessity? Is that just? When the bargain has once been made, should it not be equally binding on us both?"

"I do not think you are fair to me, Mr. Fitzgerald," she said; and some spirit was now rising in her bosom.

"Not fair to you? Do you say that I am unfair to you? Speak but one word to say that the troth which you pledged me a year since shall still remain unbroken, and I will at once leave you till you yourself shall name the time when my suit may be renewed."

"You know that I cannot do that."

"And why not? I know that you ought to do it."

"No, Mr. Fitzgerald, I ought not. I am now engaged to your cousin, with the consent of mamma and of his friends. I can say nothing to you now which I cannot repeat to him; nor can I say anything which shall oppose his wishes."

"He is then so much more to you now than I am?"

"He is everything to me now."

"That is all the reply I am to get then! You acknowledge your falseness, and throw me off without vouchsafing me any answer beyond this."

"What would you have me say? I did do that which was wrong and foolish, when—when we were walking there on the avenue. I did give a promise which I cannot now keep. It was all so hurried that I hardly remember what I said. But of this I am sure, that if I have caused you unhappiness, I am very sorry to have done so. I cannot alter it all now; I cannot unsay what I said then; nor can I offer you that which I have now absolutely given to another."

And then, as she finished speaking, she did pluck up courage to look him in the face. She was now standing as well as he; but she was so standing that the table, which was placed near the sofa, was still between him and her. As she finished speaking the door opened, and the Countess of Desmond walked slowly into the room.

Owen Fitzgerald, when he saw her, bowed low before her, and then frankly offered her his hand. There was something in his manner to ladies devoid of all bashfulness, and yet never too bold. He seemed to be aware that in speaking to any lady, be she who she might, he was only exercising his undoubted privilege as a man. He never hummed and hawed and shook in his shoes as though the majesty of womanhood were too great for his encounter. There are such men, and many of them, who carry this dread to the last day of their long lives. I have often wondered what women think of men who regard women as too awful for the free exercise of open speech.

"Mr. Fitzgerald," she said, accepting the hand which he offered to her, but resuming her own very quickly, and then standing before him in all the dignity which she was able to assume, "I quite concurred with my daughter that it was right that she should see you, as you insisted on such an interview; but you must excuse me if I interrupt it. I must protect her from the embarrassment which your—your vehemence may occasion her."

"Lady Desmond," he replied, "you are quite at liberty, as far as I am concerned, to hear all that passes between us. Your daughter is betrothed to me, and I have come to claim from her the fulfilment of her promise."

"For shame, Mr. Fitzgerald, for shame! When she was a child you extracted from her one word of folly; and now you would take advantage of that foolish word; now, when you know that she is engaged to a man she loves with the full consent of all her friends. I thought I knew you well enough to feel sure that you were not so ungenerous."

"Ungenerous! no; I have not that generosity which would enable me to give up my very heart's blood, the only joy of my soul, to such a one as my cousin Herbert."

"You have nothing to give up, Mr. Fitzgerald: you must have known from the very first that my daughter could not marry you—"

"Not marry me! And why not, Lady Desmond? Is not my blood as good as his?—unless, indeed, you are prepared to sell your child to the highest bidder!"

"Clara, my dear, I think you had better leave the room," said the countess; "no doubt you have assured Mr. Fitzgerald that you are engaged to his cousin Herbert."

"Yes, mamma."

"Then he can have no further claim on your attendance, and his vehemence will terrify you."

"Vehement! how can I help being vehement when, like a ruined gambler, I am throwing my last chance for such a stake?"

And then he intercepted Clara as she stepped towards the drawing-room door. She stopped in her course, and stood still, looking down upon the ground.

"Mr. Fitzgerald," said the countess, "I will thank you to let Lady Clara leave the room. She has given you the answer for which you have asked, and it would not be right in me to permit her to be subjected to further embarrassment."

"I will only ask her to listen to one word. Clara—"

"Mr. Fitzgerald, you have no right to address my daughter with that freedom," said the countess; but Owen hardly seemed to hear her.

"I here, in your hearing, protest against your marriage with Herbert Fitzgerald. I claim your love as my own. I bid you think of the promise which you gave me; and I tell you that as I loved you then with all my heart, so do I love you at this moment; so shall I love you always. Now I will not hinder you any longer."

And then he opened the door for her, and she passed on, bowing to him, and muttering some word of farewell that was inaudible.

He stood for a moment with the door in his hand, meditating whether he might not say good morning to the countess without returning into the room; but as he so stood she called him. "Mr. Fitzgerald," she said; and so he therefore came back, and once more closed the door.

And then he saw that the countenance of Lady Desmond was much changed. Hitherto she had been every inch the countess, stern and cold and haughty; but now she looked at him as she used to look in those old winter evenings when they were accustomed to talk together over the evening fire in close friendliness, while she, Lady Desmond, would speak to him in the intimacy of her heart of her children, Patrick and Clara.

"Mr. Fitzgerald," she said, and the tone of her voice also was changed. "You are hardly fair to us; are you?"

"Not fair, Lady Desmond?"

"No, not fair. Sit down now, and listen to me for a moment. If you had a child, a penniless girl like Clara, would you be glad to see her married to such a one as you are yourself?"

"In what way do you mean? Speak out, Lady Desmond."

"No; I will not speak out, for I would not hurt you. I myself am too fond of you—as an old friend, to wish to do so.