“That was your fault, not theirs.There are sensible, as well as handsome women in X—; women it is worth any man’s while to talk to, and with whom I can talk with pleasure: but you had and have no pleasant address; there is nothing in you to induce a woman to be affable.I have remarked you sitting near the door in a room full of company, bent on hearing, not on speaking; on observing, not on entertaining; looking frigidly shy at the commencement of a party, confusingly vigilant about the middle, and insultingly weary towards the end.Is that the way, do you think, ever to communicate pleasure or excite interest? No; and if you are generally unpopular, it is because you deserve to be so.”
“Content!” I ejaculated.
“No, you are not content; you see beauty always turning its back on you; you are mortified and then you sneer.I verily believe all that is desirable on earth—wealth, reputation, love—will for ever to you be the ripe grapes on the high trellis: you’ll look up at them; they will tantalize in you the lust of the eye; but they are out of reach: you have not the address to fetch a ladder, and you’ll goaway calling them sour.”
Cutting as these words might have been under some circumstances, they drew no blood now.My life was changed; my experience had been varied since I left X—, but Hunsden could not know this; he had seen me only in the character of Mr.Crimsworth’s clerk—a dependant amongst wealthy strangers, meeting disdain with a hard front, conscious of an unsocial and unattractive exterior, refusing to sue for notice which I was sure would be withheld, declining to evince an admiration which I knew would be scorned as worthless.He could not be aware that since then youth and loveliness had been to me everyday objects; that I had studied them at leisure and closely, and had seen the plain texture of truth under the embroidery of appearance; nor could he, keen-sighted as he was, penetrate into my heart, search my brain, and read my peculiar sympathies and antipathies; he had not known me long enough, or well enough, to perceive how low my feelings would ebb under some influences, powerful over most minds; how high, how fast they would flow under other influences, that perhaps acted with the more intense force on me, because they acted on me alone.Neither could he suspect for an instant the history of my communications with Mdlle Reuter; secret to him and to all others was the tale of her strange infatuation; her blandishments, her wiles had been seen but by me, and to me only were they known; but they had changed me, for they had proved that I could impress.A sweeter secret nestled deeper in my heart; one full of tenderness and as full of strength: it took the sting out of Hunsden’s sarcasm; it kept me unbent by shame, and unstirred by wrath.But of all this I could say nothing—nothing decisive at least; uncertainty sealed my lips, andduring the interval of silence by which alone I replied to Mr.Hunsden, I made up my mind to be for the present wholly misjudged by him, and misjudged I was; he thought he had been rather too hard upon me, and that I was crushed by the weight of his upbraidings; so to reassure me he said, doubtless I should mend some day; I was only at the beginning of life yet; and since happily I was not quite without sense, every false step I made would be a good lesson.
Just then I turned my face a little to the light; the approach of twilight, and my position in the window-seat, had, for the last ten minutes, prevented him from studying my countenance; as I moved, however, he caught an expression which he thus interpreted:—“Confound it! How doggedly self-approving the lad looks! I thought he was fit to die with shame, and there he sits grinning smiles, as good as to say, ‘Let the world wag as it will, I’ve the philosopher’s stone in my waist-coat pocket, and the elixir of life in my cupboard; I’m independent of both Fate and Fortune.’”
“Hunsden—you spoke of grapes; I was thinking of a fruit I likebetter than your X— hot-house grapes—an unique fruit, growing wild, which I have marked as my own, and hope one day to gather and taste.It is of no use your offering me the draught of bitterness, or threatening me with death by thirst: I have the anticipation of sweetness on my palate; the hope of freshness on my lips; I can reject the unsavoury, and endure the exhausting.”
“For how long?”
“Till the next opportunity for effort; and as the prize of success will be a treasure after my own heart, I’ll bring a bull’s strength to the struggle.”
“Bad luck crushes bulls as easily as bullaces; and, I believe, the fury dogs you: you were born with a wooden spoon in your mouth, depend on it.”
“I believe you; sad I mean to make my wooden spoon do thework of some people’s silver ladles: grasped firmly, and handled nimbly, even a wooden spoon will shovel up broth.”
Hunsden rose: “I see,” said he; “I suppose you’re one of thosewho develop best unwatched, and act best unaided-work your own way.Now, I’ll go.” And, without another word, he was going; at the door he turned:—“Crimsworth Hall is sold,” said he.“Sold!” was my echo.
“Yes; you know, of course, that your brother failed threemonths ago?”
“What! Edward Crimsworth?”
“Precisely; and his wife went home to her fathers; when affairs went awry, his temper sympathized with them; he used her ill; I told you he would be a tyrant to her some day; as to him—”
“Ay, as to him—what is become of him?”
“Nothing extraordinary—don’t be alarmed; he put himself under the protection of the court, compounded with his creditors—tenpence in the pound; in six weeks set up again, coaxed backhis wife, and is flourishing like a green bay-tree.”
“And Crimsworth Hall—was the furniture sold too?” “Everything—from the grand piano down to the rolling-pin.” “And the contents of the oak dining-room—were they sold?” “Of course; why should the sofas and chairs of that room beheld more sacred than those of any other?”
“And the pictures?”
“What pictures? Crimsworth had no special collection that I know of—he did not profess to be an amateur.”
