Dr Thorne (17 page)

And she answered the question. Absolute, intrinsic, acknowledged, individual merit must give it to its possessor, let him be whom, and what, and whence he might. So far the spirit of democracy was strong within her. Beyond this it could be had but by inheritance, received as it were second-hand, or twenty-second-hand. And so far the spirit of aristocracy was strong within her. All this she had, as may be imagined, learnt in early years from her uncle; and all this she was at great pains to teach Beatrice Gresham, the chosen of her heart.

When Frank declared that Mary had a right to give him an answer, he meant that he had a right to expect one. Mary acknowledged this right, and gave it him.

‘Mr Gresham,' she said.

‘Oh, Mary; Mr Gresham!'

‘Yes, Mr Gresham. It must be Mr Gresham after that. And, moreover, it must be Miss Thorne as well.'

‘I'll be shot if it shall, Mary.'

‘Well; I can't say that I shall be shot if it be not so; but if it be not so, if you do not agree that it shall be so, I shall be turned out of Greshamsbury.'

‘What! you mean my mother?' said Frank.

‘Indeed, I mean no such thing,' said Mary, with a flash from her eye that made Frank almost start. ‘I mean no such thing. I mean you, not your mother. I am not in the least afraid of Lady Arabella; but I am afraid of you.'

‘Afraid of me, Mary!'

‘Miss Thorne; pray, pray remember. It must be Miss Thorne. Do not turn me out of Greshamsbury. Do not separate me from Beatrice. It is you that will drive me out; no one else. I could stand my ground against your mother – I feel I could; but I cannot stand against you if you treat me otherwise than – than –'

‘Otherwise than what? I want to treat you as the girl I have chosen from all the world as my wife.'

‘I am sorry you should so soon have found it necessary to make a choice. But, Mr Gresham, we must not joke about this at present. I am sure you would not willingly injure me; but if you speak to me, or of me, again in that way, you will injure me, injure me so much that I shall be forced to leave Greshamsbury in my own defence. I know you are too generous to drive me to that.'

And so the interview had ended. Frank, of course, went upstairs to see if his new pocket-pistols were all ready, properly cleaned, loaded, and capped, should he find, after a few days' experience, that prolonged existence was unendurable.

However, he managed to live through the subsequent period; doubtless with the view of preventing any disappointment to his father's guests.

MARY
had contrived to quiet her lover with considerable propriety of demeanour. Then came on her the somewhat harder task of quieting herself. Young ladies, on the whole, are perhaps quite as susceptible of the softer feelings as young gentlemen are. Now Frank Gresham was handsome, amiable, by no means a fool in intellect, excellent in heart; and he was, moreover, a gentleman, being the son of Mr Gresham of Greshamsbury. Mary had been, as it were, brought up to love him. Had aught but good happened to him, she would have cried as for a brother. It must not therefore be supposed that when Frank Gresham told her that he loved her, she had heard it altogether unconcerned.

He had not, perhaps, made his declaration with that propriety of language in which such scenes are generally described as being carried on. Ladies may perhaps think that Mary should have been deterred, by the very boyishness of his manner, from thinking at all seriously on the subject. His ‘will you, won't you – do you, don't you?' does not sound like the poetic raptures of a highly inspired lover. But, nevertheless, there had been warmth, and a reality in it not in itself repulsive; and Mary's anger – anger? no, not anger – her objections to the declaration were probably not based on the absurdity of her lover's language.

We are inclined to think that these matters are not always discussed by mortal lovers in the poetically passionate phraseology which is generally thought to be appropriate for their description. A man cannot well describe that which he has never seen nor heard; but the absolute words and acts of one such scene did once come to the author's knowledge. The couple were by no means plebeian, or below the proper standard of high bearing and high breeding; they were a handsome pair, living among educated
people, sufficiently given to mental pursuits, and in every way what a pair of polite lovers ought to be. The all-important conversation passed in this wise. The site of the passionate scene was the seashore, on which they were walking, in autumn.

Gentleman. ‘Well, Miss the long and the short of it is this: here I am; you can take me or leave me.'

Lady – scratching a gutter on the sand with her parasol, so as to allow a little salt water to run out of one hole into another. ‘Of course, I know that's all nonsense.'

Gentleman. ‘Nonsense! By Jove it isn't nonsense at all: come, Jane; here I am: come, at any rate you can say something.'

Lady. ‘Yes, I suppose I can say something.'

Gentleman. ‘Well, which is it to be; take me or leave me?'

Lady – very slowly, and with a voice perhaps hardly articulate, carrying on, at the same time, her engineering works on a wider scale. ‘Well, I don't exactly want to leave you.'

And so the matter was settled: settled with much propriety and satisfaction; and both the lady and gentleman would have thought, had they ever thought about the matter at all, that this, the sweetest moment of their lives, had been graced by all the poetry by which such moments ought to be hallowed.

When Mary had, as she thought, properly subdued young Frank, the offer of whose love she, at any rate, knew was, at such a period of his life, an utter absurdity, then she found it necessary to subdue herself. What happiness on earth could be greater than the possession of such a lover, had the true possession been justly and honestly within her reach? What man could be more lovable than such a man as would grow from such a boy? And then, did she not love him – love him already, without waiting for any change? Did she not feel that there was that about him, about him and about herself too, which might so well fit them for each other? It would be so sweet to be the sister of Beatrice, the daughter of the squire, to belong to Greshamsbury as a part and parcel of itself.

But though she could not restrain these thoughts, it never for a moment occurred to her to take Frank's offer in earnest. Though she was a grown woman, he was still a boy. He would have to see the world before he settled in it, and would change his mind about woman half a score of times before he married. Then, too, though she did not like the Lady Arabella, she felt that she owed something,
if not to her kindness, at least to her forbearance; and she knew, felt inwardly certain, that she would be doing wrong, that the world would say she was doing wrong, that her uncle would think her wrong, if she endeavoured to take advantage of what had passed.

She had not for an instant doubted; not for a moment had she contemplated it as possible that she should ever become Mrs Gresham because Frank had offered to make her so; but, nevertheless, she could not help thinking of what had occurred – of thinking of it, most probably much more than Frank did himself.

A day or two afterwards, on the evening before Frank's birthday, she was alone with her uncle, walking in the garden behind their house, and she then essayed to question him, with the object of learning if she were fitted by her birth to be the wife of such a one as Frank Gresham. They were in the habit of walking there together when he happened to be at home of a summer's evening. This was not often the case, for his hours of labour extended much beyond those usual to the upper working world, the hours, namely, between breakfast and dinner; but those minutes that they did thus pass together, the doctor regarded as perhaps the pleasantest of his life.

‘Uncle,' said she, after a while, ‘what do you think of this marriage of Miss Gresham's?'

‘Well, Minnie' – such was his name of endearment for her – ‘I can't say I have thought much about it, and I don't suppose anybody else has either.'

‘She must think about it, of course; and so must he, I suppose.'

‘I'm not so sure of that. Some folks would never get married if they had to trouble themselves with thinking about it.'

‘I suppose that's why you never got married, uncle?'

‘Either that, or thinking of it too much. One is as bad as the other.'

Mary had not contrived to get at all near her point as yet; so she had to draw off, and after a while begin again.

‘Well, I have been thinking about it, at any rate, uncle.'

‘That's very good of you; that will save me the trouble: and perhaps save Miss Gresham too. If you have thought it over thoroughly, that will do for all.'

‘I believe Mr Moffat is a man of no family.'

‘He'll mend in that point, no doubt, when he has got a wife.'

‘Uncle, you're a goose: and what is worse, a very provoking goose.'

‘Niece, you're a gander; and what is worse, a very silly gander. What is Mr Moffat's family to you and me? Mr Moffat has that which ranks above family honours. He is a very rich man.'

‘Yes,' said Mary, ‘I know he is rich; and a rich man I suppose can buy anything – except a woman that is worth having.'

‘A rich man can buy anything,' said the doctor; ‘not that I meant to say that Mr Moffat has bought Miss Gresham. I have no doubt that they will suit each other very well,' he added with an air of decisive authority, as though he had finished the subject.

But his niece was determined not to let him pass so. ‘Now, uncle,' said she, ‘you know you are pretending to a great deal of worldly wisdom, which, after all, is not wisdom at all in your eyes.'

‘Am I?'

‘You know you are: and as for the impropriety of discussing Miss Gresham's marriage –'

‘I did not say it was improper.'

‘Oh, yes, you did; of course such things must be discussed. How is one to have an opinion if one does not get it by looking at the things which happen around us?'

‘Now I am going to be blown up,' said Dr Thorne.

‘Dear uncle, do be serious with me.'

‘Well, then, seriously, I hope Miss Gresham will be very happy as Mrs Moffat.'

‘Of course you do: so do I. I hope it as much as I can hope what I don't at all see ground for expecting.'

‘People constantly hope without any such ground.'

‘Well, then, I'll hope in this case. But, uncle –'

‘Well, my dear?'

‘I want your opinion, truly and really. If you were a girl –'

‘I am perfectly unable to give any opinion founded on so strange an hypothesis.'

‘Well; but if you were a marrying man.'

‘The hypothesis is quite as much out of my way.'

‘But, uncle, I am a girl, and perhaps I may marry; – or at any rate think of marrying some day.'

‘The latter alternative is certainly possible enough.'

‘Therefore, in seeing a friend take such a step, I cannot but speculate on the matter as though I were myself in her place. If I were Miss Gresham, should I be right?'

‘But, Minnie, you are not Miss Gresham.'

‘No, I am Mary Thorne; it is a very different thing, I know. I suppose
I
might marry anyone without degrading myself.'

It was almost ill-natured of her to say this; but she had not meant to say it in the sense which the sounds seemed to bear. She had failed in being able to bring her uncle to the point she wished by the road she had planned, and in seeking another road, she had abruptly fallen into unpleasant places.

‘I should be very sorry that my niece should think so,' said he; ‘and am sorry, too, that she should say so. But, Mary, to tell the truth, I hardly know at what you are driving. You are, I think, not so clear minded – certainly, not so clear worded – as is usual with you.'

‘I will tell you, uncle'; and, instead of looking up into his face, she turned her eyes down on the green lawn beneath their feet.

‘Well, Minnie, what is it?'; and he took both her hands in his.

‘I think that Miss Gresham should not marry Mr Moffat. I think so because her family is high and noble, and because his is low and ignoble. When one has an opinion on such matters, one cannot but apply it to things and people around one; and having applied my opinion to her, the next step naturally is to apply it to myself. Were I Miss Gresham, I would not marry Mr Moffat though he rolled in gold. I know where to rank Miss Gresham. What I want to know is, where I ought to rank myself?'

They had been standing when she commenced her last speech; but as she finished it, the doctor moved on again, and she moved with him. He walked on slowly without answering her; and she, out of her full mind, pursued aloud the tenor of her thoughts.

‘If a woman feels that she would not lower herself by marrying in a rank beneath herself she ought also to feel that she would not lower a man that she might love by allowing him to marry into a rank beneath his own – that is, to marry her.'