Hester. Volume 2 of 3

"Yes, Hester, your cousin is quite right," said Mrs. John, eagerly. The poor lady was so anxious to secure her child's assent to what she felt would be so manifestly for her advantage that she was ready to back up everything that Ellen said. A spark of animation and new life had lighted up in Mrs. John's eyes. It was not a very elevated kind of hope perhaps, yet no hope that is centred in the successes of another is altogether ignoble. She wanted to see her child happy; she wanted Hester to have her chance, as Ellen said. That she should be seen and admired and made much of, was, Mrs. John felt, the first object in her life. It would not be without some cost to herself, but she did not shrink from the idea of the lonely evenings she would have to spend, or the separation that might ensue. Her mind, which was not a great mind, jumped forward into an instant calculation of how the evening dresses could be got, at what sacrifice of ease or comfort. She did not shrink from this, whatever it might be. Neither did she let any visionary pride stand in her way as Hester did. She was ready to forgive, to forget, to condone all offences – and in the long discussion and argument that followed, Mrs. John was almost more eloquent than Ellen on the mutual advantages of the contract. She saw them all the instant they were set before her. She was quite tremulous with interest and expectation. She ran over with approval and beaming admiration as Ellen unfolded her plans. "Oh, yes, I can quite understand; you want to strike out something original," cried Mrs. John. "You must not think I agree with Hester about Catherine's parties. I think Catherine's parties are very nice; and relations, you know, must expect to give way to strangers, especially when there are not enough of gentlemen; but it will be much pleasanter for you to strike out something original. I should have liked it when I was in your circumstances, but I don't think I had the energy. And I am sure if Hester can be of any use – Oh, my darling! of course you will like it very much. You always are ready to help, and you have plenty of energy – far more than I ever had – and so fond of dancing too; and there are so few dances in Redborough. Oh, yes, I think it is a capital plan, Ellen! and Hester will be delighted to help you. It will be such an opening for her," Mrs. John said, with tears of pleasure in her eyes.

Hester did not say much while the talk ran on. She was understood to fall into the scheme, and that was all that was necessary. But when Ellen, after a prolonged visit and a detailed explanation to Mrs. John, which she received with the greatest excitement and interest, of all her arrangements as to the music, the suppers, and every other particular they could think of between them, rose to take her leave, she put her hand within Hester's arm, and drew her aside for a few confidential words.

"Don't think of coming to the door," she said to Mrs. John; "it is so cold you must not stir. Hester will see me out. There is one thing I must say to you, dear," she added, raising herself to Hester's ear when they were out of the mother's hearing, "and you are not to take it amiss. It must be a condition beforehand – now please, Hester, mind, and don't be offended. You must promise me that you will have nothing to say to either of the boys."

The quick flush of offence sprang to Hester's face.

"I don't know what you mean. You mean something you have no right to say, Ellen!"

"I have a very good right to say it – for I'm a married lady, and you are only a girl, and of course I must know best. You are not to have anything to say to the boys. Any one else you like. I am sure I don't mind, but will do anything I can to help – but not the boys. Oh, I know something about Harry. I know you have had the sense to – Well, I don't understand how far it went, but I suppose it must have gone as far as it could go, for he's not clever enough to be put off with anything less than a real No. But you may have changed your mind, or a hundred things might happen. And then there's Edward; Aunt Catherine would be wild if anything got up between you and Edward. Oh, I think it's always best to speak plain, and then one has nothing to reproach one's self with after. She would just be wild, you know. She thinks there is nobody good enough for him; and you and she have never got on. Oh, I don't suppose there's anything between you and Edward. I never said so; the only thing is you must promise me to have nothing to say to them. There are plenty of others – much better matches, and more eligible: and it's always a pity to have anything to say to a cousin in that way. You're sure to set the family by the ears; and then it narrows the connection, and you keep always the same name; and there are ever so many drawbacks. So just you promise me, Hester, there's a dear – never," said Ellen, seizing her with both hands, and giving her a sudden perfumy kiss, "never!" and the salute was repeated on the other cheek, "to have anything to say to the boys – "

"The boys! if you think I care anything for the boys! I shall have nothing to say to anybody," cried Hester, with indignation, drawing herself out of this too urgent embrace. Ellen tossed back all her bracelets, and shook her golden locks and her sealskin hat, and made an agitation in the air of scent and sound and movement.

"Oh, that's being a great deal too good," she cried.

Hester stood at the door, and looked on while Mrs. Algernon got into her victoria and drew the fur rug over her, and was driven away, waving the hand and the bracelets in a parting jingle. The girl was not envious, but half-contemptuous, feeling herself in her poverty as much superior to this butterfly in furs and feathers, as pride could desire. Hester did little credit to the social gifts, or the popularity or reputed cleverness in her own way, of her gay cousin who had been the inspiration of Harry, and now was the guide of Algernon Merridew. She said to herself with the downrightness of youth, that Ellen was a little fool. But her own cheeks were blazing with this parting dart which had been thrown at her. The boys! She had a softened feeling of amity towards Harry, who had done all a stupid young man could do to overcome the sentence of disapproval under which Hester was aware she lay. It had been embarrassing and uncomfortable, and had made her anything but grateful at the moment; but now she began to feel that Harry had indeed behaved like a man, and done all that a man could to remedy her false position, and give her a substantial foundation for the native indomitable pride which none of them could crush, though they did their best. No; she would have nothing to say to Harry. She shook her head to herself, and laughed at the thought, all in the silence of the verandah, where she stood hazily gazing out through the dim greenish glass at Ellen, long after Ellen had disappeared. But Edward! that was a different matter altogether. She would give no word so far as he was concerned. Edward was altogether different from Harry. He piqued and excited her curiosity; he kept her mind in a tremor of interest. She could not cease thinking of him when she was in his neighbourhood, wondering what he would do, what he would say. And if it did make Catherine wild, as Ellen said, that was but an inducement the more in Hester's indignant soul. She had no wish to please Catherine Vernon. There had not been any love lost between them from the first, and Hester was glad to think she was not one of those who had in any way pretended to her kinswoman's favour. She had never sought Catherine, never bowed the knee before her. When she went to the Grange it had been against her will, as a matter of obedience to her mother, not to Catherine. If it made Catherine wild to think that there was a friendship, or any other sentiment between Edward and the girl whom she had so slighted, then let Catherine be wild. That was no motive to restrain Hester's freedom of action. All this passed through her mind as she stood in the verandah in the cold, gazing after Ellen, long after Ellen was out of sight. There were many things which gave her a sort of attraction of repulsion to Edward. He had tried to deceive Roland Ashton about her, telling him she was about to marry Harry, when he knew very well she had refused to marry Harry. Why had he done it? And in his manner to herself Edward was two men. When they were alone he was more than friendly; he was tender, insinuating, anxious for her approval, eager to unfold himself to her. But when he saw her in the Grange drawing-room he never went near her. In early times she had asked why, and he had answered with deceiving words, asking how she thought he could bear to approach her with commonplace civilities when she was the only creature in the place for whom he cared at all, a speech which had pleased Hester at first as something high-flown and splendid, but which had not preserved its effect as time went on: for she could not see why he should not be civil, and show some regard for her presence, even if he could not devote himself to her. And why could he not devote himself to her? Because it would displease Catherine. When Catherine was not present, there was nobody for him but Hester. When Catherine was there, he was unconscious of her existence. This, of course, should have shown clearly to Hester that he was not worthy of her regard, and to some degree did so. But the conviction was mingled with so lively a curiosity in respect to him, so strong an opposition as regarded her, that Hester's moral judgment was confused altogether. She was anxious, eager to overcome her adversary, excited to know what Edward's meaning was. He would not stand up for her like a true friend, but at the same time he would never let her alone, he would still let her see that she was in his mind. She disliked him, yet – She almost loved him, but still – Nothing could be more tantalising, more entirely unlike indifference. To think of meeting Edward in society, yet not under Catherine's eye, made her heart beat loudly. She had never done this hitherto. She had met him by chance on the Common or in the country roads about, and his voice had been almost that of a lover. She had met him before the world, and he had scarcely seemed to know her. But how could these meetings test what he meant? This it was that made Ellen's proposal exciting, even while she herself half scorned it. Harry? no! Poor Harry! she would not disturb his peace, nor say a word, nor even look a look which should put him in jeopardy. But Edward? – ah! that was a different matter. It was with all the vehemence of a quarrel that she snatched at the chance put into her hands, even when she had seemed to scorn it. To know what he meant – to know what was his real state of mind. If he would be afraid of what the world would say, as well as of what Catherine would say – in that case there was no scorn which Hester did not feel herself capable of pouring out upon her unworthy admirer; but if things proved different? Ah! then she did not know what softening, what yielding, she might not be capable of. The very thought melted her heart.

And yet she had thought herself more "interested" (this was what she called it) in Roland Ashton than in any man whom she had ever heard of before. The world had seemed all blank to her when he went away. His step at the door had made her heart thrill: the commonplace day had brightened up into something smiling and sweet when he came in. But then she had not been fighting a duel with him half her life as she had been doing with Edward. She was not curious, intriguée, to know what Roland meant. She thought (with a blush) that she did know – more or less – what he meant. But Edward was a sort of sphinx; he was an enemy to be beaten, a riddle to be read. She said to herself, what would please her best would be to force him into self-abandonment, to carry him so out of himself that he should give up all pretences and own himself at her disposal, and then to turn her back upon him and scorn him. Would she have done so? she thought she would, and that in this lay the secret of her interest in Edward and his crooked ways. And now, here was the trial approaching. She would see what was his true mettle, she would be able indeed to judge of him now.

"Hester," said Mrs. John appearing at the open door, "what do you mean by lingering in the cold, to get your death? You will be chilled to your very bones. You have not even a shawl on, and in this cold place. What are you doing? I have called you three times, and you never paid any attention. Even to stand here for five minutes freezes me."

"Then don't stand here, mamma," said Hester, taking hold of her mother's arm and thus leading her back in the old way. They did not walk about very much together now. Hester preferred her own thoughts to her mother's society, and Mrs. John was not sorry to be left quietly by herself at the fireside. How long it seemed since the time when she held her mother's arm clasped in hers whenever she moved, and used it as a helm to guide that timid and trustful woman wherever she would! A little compunction came over her as she made use of that well-known expedient again, and steered her mother (all the more gently for that thought) back to her own chair.

"Yes, yes, dear, this is very comfortable," said Mrs. John, "but I wish you had come at once, when I called you, for we must not lose any time in thinking about your dresses. You must do Ellen credit, that is one thing clear. I can't have you dowdy, Hester. The Merridew girls shall not have a word to say about the Vernons on your account. Oh, I know they will if they can; they will whisper and say how proud we all are, and give ourselves airs, and just look at Hester in a washed muslin! I would rather go without my dinner," said Mrs. John with vehemence, "for a whole year."

"But I shall not let you do that, mamma."

"Oh, Hester, just hold your tongue. What do you know about it? I would rather sell my Indian shawl, or my pearls – Dear me, what a good thing I did not part with my pearls! that is something nobody can turn up their noses at. And you can say you got them from your mother, and your grandmother before her – which is more than they ever had. But there are the dresses to be thought of," said the tender mother, looking in Hester's face, half awed, half appealing: for even in the pride of descent she was forced to remember that you cannot send your child to a Thé Dansante with nothing but a string of pearls round her neck, however fine, and however long in the family it may have been.

"Dresses! one will do," said Hester, with a little flush of pleasure, yet determination to repress her mother's unnecessary liberality. "You forget what you are talking of, mother dear. One dress is as much as – "

"And to whom do you suppose you are speaking," said Mrs. John with dignity; "there are a great many things which you think you know better than I. Perhaps you are wrong there too; but I am not going to bandy words with you. One thing I must say, than when we talk of ball dresses I know a great deal better than you. Oh, but I do – I had to get everything for myself in old days. Your father delighted in seeing me fine, but he never pretended to have any taste. All the responsibility was on me. Considering that we are poor, and that you are so young, I should think tulle would do: or even tarlatan. Hester, I should like you to have silk slips, that gives a character to a thing at once. A white one, a pink one, and a blue one – "

"Dear mamma, a white frock, that is all I want. I am sure that is all I want; we can't afford any more. And as for silk slips – "

"Oh, hold your tongue, Hester, what do you know about it?" cried Mrs. John, exasperated. "You have never been at a ball in your life. You can't know what's wanted, like me. There are quantities of other things besides. Shoes – you must have satin shoes and silk stockings, and gloves, and something to wear in your hair. I don't even know what's worn now. We used to have wreaths in my day, but perhaps that's not the fashion at present. When I had not a maid – and of course, poor child, you have no maid – I used to have a hair-dresser to do my hair when I was going out. We wore it quite high on the top of our heads, and now you wear it down in the nape of your neck. What a thing fashion is! We had gigot sleeves all puffed out with feather cushions, and I used to wear a lace scarf which was very becoming. We had muslins in my time, nice clear book-muslins, and when you had worn it two or three times for balls you just wore it out in the evenings at home. Tarlatan is not half so profitable," said Mrs. John, with a very serious face, "but you must have it, I suppose, all the same."

"Mother," said Hester, when her mother paused for breath, "I feel quite horrified at all this. Why should I dress up so fine for Ellen's parties? I shall only be a sort of poor relation. My washed muslin will do very well. Nobody will expect anything better from me."

"Then that is just why you shall have something better," said the poor lady, her pale countenance brightening with a pretty pink flush. "You sha'n't go at all if you can't go as my daughter should. You shall have a white first, and then a – no, not a pink; pink used to be my colour, for you know I was pale, and my hair was plain brown, not like yours. Yours is a little too – auburn – for pink. You must have a blue for your second, with silk slips made very simply, and tarlatan over that. White shoes, and white gloves, and my pearls. Oh, how glad I am I kept my pearls! It will be such a pleasure, dear, to see you dressed, it will be like old times again. And you must ask Ellen what to wear in your hair, a wreath, or just one flower at the side, with a spray hanging down over your neck. Mr. Ashton, I am sure, would get it for me in town. For flowers and those sort of things one should always send to London. And you must have a fan. I wonder if my ivory fan would be old-fashioned? I must ask Ellen. And, dear child, don't stand there doing nothing when there is not a moment to lose, but ring for the tea. We must have tea first. I always feel better after, and then we must put everything down upon paper, and calculate what it will cost, and how we are to do."

"I don't want all that," said Hester again: but the sound of it flattered her youthful ears; for she was only a girl, when all was said.

"Don't talk any nonsense, child, but ring for the tea," said Mrs. John, feeling herself for once mistress of the occasion. "But Hester," she added, in so solemn a tone that Hester came back half frightened to hear what it was, "if you ever have children, as I hope you will, be sure you have one of your girls taught how to cut out, and to look after the dressmaking. If we only could have them made at home, what a saving it would be!"

CHAPTER VII.

THE FIRST OF THEM

Young Mrs. Merridew's Thés Dansantes made a great commotion in Redborough. Dancing teas – what did it mean? It meant some nonsense or another. You might be sure it meant nonsense of some kind, as it was Ellen Vernon that was at the bottom of it, the elder people said; but the younger ones were of a different opinion. It did not matter to them so much that Ellen Vernon was silly; indeed the greater part of them were so dazzled by the furs and the bracelets, and the victoria, if not by the brilliant fairness and beaming smiles and prettiness of the bride, that they did not remember Ellen Vernon had been silly, and thought Mrs. Algernon Merridew not only the leader of fashion, but the most amiable and good-natured of all queens of society, the most "easy to get on with" and most full of "go." Nothing like her and her dresses, and her house and her company, had ever been seen in the quiet, steady-going country town. She made it known graciously, that she was always at home at lunch, and there was scarcely a day that a merry party did not assemble at her house, filling the newly-furnished pretty room with chatter and laughter, and all the distracting devices of careless youth to get rid of a few of its golden hours. And already there had been half a dozen dinners, far too soon and quite unnecessary, as all the elders said. She ought to have waited until everybody had given her and her husband a dinner before she began to return their hospitalities. But Ellen had no idea either of waiting or returning the heavy dinners to which she, as a daughter of one of the reigning houses of the town, and her husband as belonging, if not to that rank, at least to the foremost respectability, were invited by all the principal people. The entertainments she gave were reckless young dinners, where there was no solemnity at all, and perhaps not much wit, but where laughter abounded and all sorts of wild schemes of pleasure were invented. And just as the solid people who had made a point of having a dinner for the Algernon Merridews began to feel a little offended at the goings-on of the young household which paid no attention to ordinary rules of civility, the younger portion of the population was thrown into the wildest excitement by the announcement of the Thés Dansantes, and frowning mothers were courted to smiles again, by the anticipated pleasure of their children. The old Merridews, the father and mother, looked on with pride but misgiving, the brothers and sisters with pride and delight, as they felt themselves already rising high upon the topmost wave of society by means of their brilliant sister-in-law.

"Only mind what you are about and keep hold on the reins, my boy," old Merridew said to his son, which Algernon promised with a laughing "Trust me for that."

"Trust Algy, indeed!" his mother said, shaking her head. "I would not trust him a step further that I saw him with that crazy little thing by the side of him; all my hope is that being a Vernon her people will step in." They were all sure that no great harm could happen to a Vernon in Redborough. Harry, her brother, was always at her side, as faithful as her husband, backing her up. And Catherine herself could not disapprove, for she went to the house now and then, and laughed when she was spoken to on the subject. "Ellen was always like that," she said, "wild for pleasure and amusement. She has asked me to her dancing teas, as an entertainment quite suited to my years and habits." All which things reassured the Merridews and the other anxious persons about.

"And you are going to this dancing tea?" Catherine Vernon said.

"I suppose so," said Edward, indifferently. "They would think it strange if I did not go. And they expect you – Merridew told me so. He said it would add such dignity to their little party!"

There was something in the tone with which Edward said this which Catherine did not like. It was true that she herself had always represented the invitation as ludicrous, yet it was quite true that her presence would have added dignity to the party, and there was nothing ridiculous in the idea that Algernon Merridew thought so. This annoyed her a little, but it was the annoyance of a moment. She said, "I hope you will enjoy yourself," with a laugh, which Edward on his side found as offensive: but he did not betray this, and smiled in reply, as he knew she meant him to smile, with a sort of apologetic indulgent air.

"I shall do the best I can," he said, and they both laughed. She tenderly, thinking how good he was to take this trouble in order to gratify the frivolous young pair and keep up the Vernon traditions; he with a fierce question to herself, why shouldn't he enjoy it? at least it would be an evening to himself, with nobody to keep watch over him and make a note of every girl he danced with. Alas for Catherine! if she noticed the girls he danced with it was in order to invite them afterwards (if she approved of them), for she had no jealous desire to keep him to herself, but wanted him to marry. But then there was one at least whom she could never have tolerated. And the chief point in Edward's anticipations, as in Hester's, was the freedom of intercourse permitted under Ellen's easy young wing, and the opportunity he would have of seeing how the eager, large-eyed girl would look among other girls, when he could approach her freely. This gave him something of the same sense of curiosity which was so warm in Hester's mind. How would she look among other girls – how would she receive him? It did not occur to him as probable that she would resent that avoidance of her when under Catherine's eye which he had so often assured her made him wretched. He felt that the little secret between them, the stolen glance he would give her at the Grange parties, the little shrug with which he pointed her attention to his bondage, would have an attraction even greater than had he been always at her side; and in some sense this was true. But he did not think of Hester's judgment and of the natural indignation of her high spirit; neither did he think of the comparison she made between him and Harry, who had never hesitated to show his devotion. To compare himself and Harry, seemed to Edward impossible. A big idiot – a nonentity. She had more sense than that.