Squire Arden; volume 2 of 3

“But Harry does not hate it,” said Edgar, turning his eyes once more upon the eldest son. Harry was not at all a bad fellow. He tossed the book he had been reading away from him, and twisted his moustache, and pulled his snow-white cuffs. “I think it’s a confounded bore,” said Harry, and then he got up and strolled away.

This conversation took place in a house which had shuddered from garret to basement at the thought of not being able to get cards for Lady Bodmiller’s ball. Harry had roused himself up for that occasion, and had shown an energy which was almost superhuman. He had rushed about London as if his mission had been to stop a war or save a kingdom. His scheme of operations was as elaborate and careful as if it had been a campaign. And even Helena had forgotten all about the injuries of women, and had rushed to meet her brother at the door and to ask “What news?” with as much eagerness as if she thought dancing the real employment of life. Such relapses into levity may be pardoned to a young philosopher; but they were very strange to Edgar who, with the wondering clear mystified eyes of a semi-savage, was looking on.

CHAPTER XXI

It was not, however, Edgar Arden’s intention to preach any crusade. On the contrary, the first impulse of his friendly and neighbour-loving soul was to find out some reason for the existence which seemed so strange to him. He tried to approach, in a great many different ways, and evoke out of it, as it were, or surprise out of it, its secrets. It could not exist, he said to himself, without a meaning. Edgar was not very profound in his philosophy, but still he had a way of thinking of what he saw, and his amused interest in everything led him into a world of questions. Besides, he was not merely conversant with Harry Thornleigh and his class, but also with various other divisions of society. He saw a good deal of Lord Newmarch, for instance, who was entirely a different kind of man; and he renewed his acquaintance with some men whom he had met abroad in his earlier days, one of whom was a great cricketer, and another who was of the Alpine Club, and whose soul dwelt habitually in the sacred recesses of the Matterhorn or Jungfrau. Except Lord Newmarch and his set, these men were all utterly disinterested, pursuing their favourite amusements, not for any purpose to be gained, but for the mere sake of the pursuit itself. The Alpine Club man had no curiosity about the view from the mountain-head, and cared nothing for the formation of the glaciers, or any other subject connected with his mountains: all his object was to get to the top; and he did get to a great many tops, and distinguished himself, and acquired various bits of practical knowledge, which, having no connection of purpose or interest in his mind, were of little use to himself, and none to others. And so likewise the men who devoted themselves to society did not expect to be amused, or instructed, or to meet people they liked, or to find in it any of those solaces which theorists pretend. They went because everybody went—because it was the right thing to do—just for the sake of going, and no other reason. This disinterestedness was the great thing that struck Edgar. He himself was aware that he did not at all possess it. He was continually desiring some result—pleasure or advantage of some description, which, when you come to think of it (he reflected), is a mean way of treating existence after all. Whereas, society was grand in its indifference to any issue. It lived, it assembled, it talked, it went to and fro, and gave itself a great deal of trouble; and from all this exertion it expected nothing to come. This was the first discovery Edgar made, or thought he made; and it staggered him much in the contempt for society which he had been settling into. Was not this in reality a higher principle than his own? It bewildered him, and he could not make it out; and Lord Newmarch, though he was a social philosopher of much greater experience than Edgar, did not seem capable of giving him any aid.

“I don’t know what you mean by disinterestedness,” Lord Newmarch said. “There is nobody who is disinterested. We have some selfish object in whatever we do. I think, for my own part, that I desire sincerely the good of the country, and make it the grand object of my life; but I know that I want the country to be benefited in my way, not in any one else’s. We are all like that. There is my brother Everard, do you see, making himself very agreeable to that great fat woman. He hates fat women, and that one in particular, I know; but he is being so very civil to her because he wants her to ask him to her garden party, which is coming off next week. He is going to call her carriage for her, like a humbug as he is—but all with the most selfish and interested motives.”

“I allow that,” said Edgar. “I allow that anybody will do anything for an invitation; but why should he wish to go to her garden party? That is what I want to know.”

“My dear fellow,” said Lord Newmarch, shrugging his shoulders, “why, even I am going! everybody will be there.”

“Does he want to meet everybody?” said Edgar. “He does continually, and he is sick of them. Does he want to see any one in particular? Does he think he will enjoy himself? Is it for the pleasure of it he is going? When he has got his invitation he will say, what a confounded bore! He knows exactly beforehand what it will be like. Well, then, I say he is utterly disinterested. He is going for the sake of going. It is not to make him happier, or amuse him, or benefit him. And everybody is going just for the same reason. Surely something might be made of this wonderful disinterestedness! It cannot be meant to be wasted upon garden parties and Lady Bodmiller’s ball.”

“My dear Arden, you mistake completely,” said Lord Newmarch, with even a little irritation. “Disinterestedness! nonsense! Don’t you see they want it to be known they have been there; everybody will be there. And out of the list, if one name was wanting, don’t you see that the owner of it would lose a certain position. He would feel himself left out. Of course, you have a card. You are one of the most eligible young men of the season. There is no telling what fears and hopes you are exciting in some gentle breasts. Disinterested! That shows how little you know.”

And even Lord Newmarch laughed—a refined little laugh—not much like him. He was drawn out of his usual rôle for the moment by the exceeding simplicity of his friend—a thing he could not help laughing at. “Why, there is no saying how many fair huntresses will go there in search of you,” he said. “These are the happy hunting-grounds where every woman is permitted to shoot, and none of the men dare run away.”

“I was not speaking of women,” said Edgar, sharply, for he had a kindness for women. “I was talking of your brother and the rest. These are not happy hunting-grounds for them. There is nothing there for them except the mere fact that they are there. They go for the sake of going. The other is poor enough, but still it is a motive if it exists. The question is, which is finest, my stupid search for a motive, or your brother’s grand disinterestedness. There is something splendid, don’t you think, in seeing a man throw away his life like this?”

“What do you mean by throwing away a man’s life?” cried the social philosopher. “You have become dreadfully highflown. An hour or two in an afternoon, in a pretty garden, with well-dressed people about, and a band, and all that—I don’t understand what you mean.”

To this Edgar made no reply. His antagonist had the best of it; and yet he was right, and his theory was just. As for the poor ladies who went to those happy hunting-grounds—if there was any truth in it—that was a branch of the subject more melancholy and more intricate still. Edgar preferred not to enter into it. He thought of Helena Thornleigh and her visions, poor girl—visions which, perhaps, were only evidences of a spasmodic state of conflict against the happy hunting-grounds. Fancy Clare going out with her bow and her spear like the other young Dianas! Edgar thought to himself. But then Clare was rich: she had no need to become a huntress. She, like himself, would be the pursued and not the pursuer. This thought made the young man faint and sick. What a ghastly light it threw upon all these pretty parties and assemblies of pleasure! Even the men who sought nothing were better than this.

“Women are so much more practical than we are,” said Lord Newmarch. “I see it constantly. Now that I think of it, there is some truth in what you say. The young fellows are singularly without motive. I don’t see the beauty of it as you do. They do what other people do; but the women always have an object—they are trying to marry their daughters or to marry themselves, or to rise in the social scale, or something which is definite. They are practical, but not in a large way. That is what prevents them from being so useful in the way of public work as they ought to be. They won’t or they can’t take a broad view. They fasten upon some matter of fact, and stick to that. It is all very well, you know, for a girl with Helena Thornleigh’s notions to talk as she does, in that grand, vague way. But observe how women will pick up a subject—probably a nasty subject—and harp upon it. I could give you a hundred instances. They are not nasty women, that is the odd thing. I suppose it is from some feeling of duty not to shrink from what is most repugnant to them—so instead of shrinking they make a pounce upon it, and hold by it in the most aggravating way. I don’t know a woman who takes a really large view except your sister, Arden. She is the sort of girl that would help a man, that would be of real use–”

“She is much obliged to you, I am sure,” said Edgar, interrupting him; “but we were not talking of my sister—nor, indeed, of women at all. Let us settle with the others first. You don’t seem to understand that I want information. I want to know why these sons of piratical land-acquiring Saxons, and conquering Normans, and robber Danes, and marauding Celts—every one of them getting and taking as much as ever they could—should have got into this habit of spending their lives for nothing, neither gain nor honour, nor pleasure nor advantage to others, nor profit to themselves—that is what I can’t make out.”

“This sort of thing only lasts for three months or so,” said Lord Newmarch; “then there is grouse, and so forth. Never mind them—they can take care of themselves. But, Arden, I wish you would make up your mind to go into Parliament, and give your attention to more serious matters. We have too many of those young fellows who mean nothing, and we have too many who mean just one thing in particular, your rich cotton-spinners, and so forth. They are not bad so far as they go, but they are like women—they never take a broad view. They think themselves Radicals, but some of them are as narrow and limited as old wives in a village. And then there are our old squires, who are narrow in another way. They don’t understand things as this century understands them. The most enlightened of them will turn short round upon you all at once, and join in some insane cry. We want young men, Arden—men of independent minds, who have been used to think for themselves. If you were a Tory of the old Arden type you would have been the last man I should have made overtures to. And what is odd about it is, that your sister is out-and-out of the old Arden type, and yet, for the best kind of reform I should trust her instincts. She is not one of those who would be afraid of such words as liberty or despotism. Liberty means something more than giving a man a vote, and the people never like you any the worse for using a little dignified force. It must be real force, however, not sham, and it must be used with dignity. Your sister fully understands–”

“Never mind my sister,” said Edgar, with some impatience.

“But I must mind your sister,” said Lord Newmarch. “My dear Arden, I wish so much you would give me your ear for a little. I never met anyone who entered into all my views like Miss Arden. I cannot tell you—for anything I could say would sound exaggerated—how much I admire her. I have too great a respect for her to venture to approach herself till I have your approval. If you should know any obstacle, any difficulty—you must know better than anyone what a treasure she is.”

Edgar was disposed to be angry, and then he was disposed to laugh, but he did neither, feeling himself in too grave a position to permit any levity. “Confound the fellow!” he said to himself. “You take me very much by surprise,” he said when he had composed himself a little. “I had not the least expectation of any such proposal from you–”

“Why not from me?—from any other, then?” asked Newmarch with anxiety. “I thought you could not fail to remark before I left your house. Ah, Arden, that never-to-be-forgotten visit! I had known her before, of course, for years—but there are moments when a woman’s existence bursts upon you like a revelation, however long you may have known her. Such a revelation then happened to me. So beautiful, so dignified, so truly liberal in her views, so full of real insight! I have every reason to believe that such a match would receive the most complete sanction of my family, and I trust it would not be disagreeable to you.”

“I am sure you do Clare and myself great honour,” said Edgar, “but you must pardon me for being quite unprepared. I don’t know in the least what my sister’s feelings may be; of course it is for her, and for her alone, to decide. You know I have been little at home. I know of no difficulties, no–; but my opinion on this point is really of very little importance,” he continued, pausing with a recollection of Arthur Arden which was anything but comforting. “It is Clare only who can decide.”

“But if such a happiness should be in store for me,” said Lord Newmarch, always correct in his expressions, “I might hope that I should meet with no disapproval from you?”

“Whatever my sister’s decision should be, you may be sure I shall do my best to carry it out,” said Edgar, who was confused by this sudden attack; and they stood together for five minutes in an embarrassed silence, and then separated, to the great relief of both. This sudden declaration was to Edgar what a bomb suddenly falling without any warning would be to the inhabitants of a peaceful town. He was quite unprepared for it; his mind was full of other things, occupied with a hundred novelties quite detached for the moment from Arden and its concerns. He had even half forgotten the original cause which made him leave home, and his fears for his sister. He walked to his rooms that evening from the house where this conversation had taken place, and found himself thrown back at once to his home and its more intimate concerns. He had left Clare alone—much to his annoyance—but she assured him she preferred being alone; and Arthur Arden had given him the slip, and declined his invitation to spend the remainder of the season with him in town. Clare had not mentioned Arthur in any of her letters. No doubt he must be at the end of the world, forming new plans, perhaps pursuing some new love. It was folly to think of him as Edgar felt himself doing the moment Clare’s affairs were thus brought before his mind. He had been so easily able to dismiss Arthur that he had ceased thinking of him as dangerous—but now he kept presenting himself like a spectre wherever Edgar turned his eyes. “I wonder where the fellow is. I wonder how those fellows manage. He ought to have a secured income,” he said to himself; and yet could not make out why it was that when he ought to be thinking of Clare it was Arthur Arden he began to think of—Arthur, who had divined Lord Newmarch, and hated him. Edgar’s mind was full of excitement. It is so much more easy to philosophise about things which don’t affect ourselves personally. He had been amused and quite calm when he discussed with himself the doings of Mayfair, but when it was Arden that was the subject of his thoughts he was not calm. Thus it was the most steady and serious among all his friends and acquaintances who threw this sudden barb into Edgar’s life.

CHAPTER XXII

“I don’t think you are happy in town, Mr. Arden,” said Gussy Thornleigh the next time Edgar presented himself in Berkeley Square; “and when we saw you last at home you said you were not coming. What made you resolve to come after all?”

The truth was that Gussy supposed it was herself who had made him come: this had been taken for granted by all the family, and Gussy naturally had believed it, or at least had tried to believe it—a point on which, however, her good sense made a feeble conflict with that happy girlish vanity, which as yet had not experienced many rebuffs. Privately in the retirement of her own chamber she had already disclosed her scepticism to her sister Helena. “I don’t believe he came after me,” she said. “Mamma thinks so, and Harry thinks so, but I believe it is only their innocence. They don’t understand Edgar Arden. He is fond of me and he is fond of you, and he does not care a bit for either of us. That is my opinion. He wants to make friends of us all the same as if we were not girls.”

“And why shouldn’t he?” asked Helena with some indignation; not that she cared for Edgar Arden, but for the principle. “His being a man does not make any difference to me; and why should it make a difference to him that I am a girl?”

“Ah, but it does make a difference,” said wiser Gussy. “Perhaps not when people are older; but I don’t know any except fast girls who go and afficher their friendship with men. I don’t think he came for me. I think I shall ask him some day, quite promiscuous, that he may not be put on his guard—and I shall soon see if it is for me.”

It was in accordance with this resolution that she spoke, and her question was “quite promiscuous,” as she said, interjected into the midst of a conversation with which it had nothing to do. Edgar bore the test with a composure which satisfied Gussy’s intellect at once, though it somewhat depressed her in spite of herself.

“I could not help it,” he said quite seriously, “It seemed a way out of a difficulty. I am not quite sure now that it was a wise way, but then it seemed the best.”

Gussy looked at him with a little surprise. He was so perfectly composed and unmoved, evidently quite unaware of the interpretation that had been placed on his change of purpose. She was not in love with him in the very least, and yet it was a shock to her vanity to see how unconscious he was of the supposed reason. “He might have complimented and made belief a little,” she said to herself; “there is no need for being so deadly sincere.”

“How odd that you should have to do anything like that,” she said aloud; “it is like one of our expedients; but you can do just as you like, at least Helena tells us so, and I suppose men can–”

“I don’t think men can,” said Edgar, laughing; “at least not men like myself. The fact was, I had a guest whom I did not wish to keep any longer. You must be kind, and not betray me.”

“Certainly,” said Gussy with promptitude, opening her eyes wide at the same time in wonder at such a confession. “Don’t be angry with me,” she resumed; “I do so like to know everything about my friends. Do tell me! Was it Arthur Arden? Mamma would scold me dreadfully for asking; but I should so like to know. There, don’t tell me any more. I can see it was by your eyes. I know some people don’t like him; but he is very nice. I think you might have let him stay.”

“Do you think he is very nice?” said Edgar, who was, as she had divined, very fond of Gussy, though not (according to her own dialect) in that way.

“Yes,” said Gussy, jumping by instinct into the heart of the question. “The thing is, you know—but you serious people cannot understand—that he never means anything. He is very attentive, and all that. It is his way with girls. He makes you think there never was any one like you, and that he never had such an opinion of anybody before, and all that; but he never means anything. Even mamma says so. A very young girl might be taken in; but we all know that he means nothing, and I assure you he is very nice.”

“I don’t understand how such a man can be very nice,” said Edgar, with subdued annoyance, for he did not quite like the idea that Gussy herself should have gone through this discipline or made such a discovery. “I like people who mean more and not less than they say.”

“That is all very well, Mr. Arden, in most matters,” said Gussy, with a little hesitation and a momentary blush. (“I wonder if he means anything?” she was asking herself; but Edgar was looking at her with the simplest straightforwardness and making no pretences.) “But, you know, when it is only just the common chatter of society– Well, why should everybody be so dreadfully sincere? People may just as well be agreeable. I am not standing up for flirting or that sort of thing. But still, you know, when you are quite sure that nothing is meant–”

“Don’t confuse my mind altogether,” said Edgar. “I am bewildered enough as it is. You go to places not to be amused, but because everybody is going; you do things you don’t care for because everybody does them; and now you tell me men are very ‘nice’ because they never mean anything. My brain is going very fast, but I think this last doctrine is the most confusing of all.”

“You would see the sense of it if you were in our position,” said Gussy, shaking her pretty head. “Now, for instance, Arthur Arden—suppose, just for the sake of argument, that he was really in love with one of us. It sounds ridiculous, does it not? What do you suppose papa and mamma would say? They would send him out of the house very quickly you may be sure; and the poor girl, whoever it was, would be scolded to death. Oh, there would be such a business in the house! Worse than there was when poor Fred. Burton wanted to marry Ada. Perhaps you never heard of that?”

“No, indeed,” said Edgar, to whom Ada, who was the quiet one, had always appeared the least interesting of the family.

“He was the curate at Thorne,” said Gussy; “and, of course, he ought never to have dreamt of such a thing; but Harry had been at college with him, and he was very nice, and came to us constantly. I liked him myself—indeed, we all liked him; and if he only had had two thousand or so a-year, or even less, as he was a clergyman– But he had only about twopence,” said Gussy, with a sigh; “and what was poor papa to do?”

“And Miss Thornleigh?” asked Edgar, with all the impulsive interest in a love story which comes natural to an unsophisticated mind. Ada was sitting at the other end of the room with a great basket before her full of pieces of coloured print. She was making little frocks for her poor children—a work in which by fits and starts the other girls would give her uncertain aid.

“O Ada!” said Gussy, with a little shrug of her shoulders; and then she glanced at her sister, and a glimmer of moisture came into the corners of her bright eyes. “She is the greatest darling that ever was! I don’t think there is anybody so good in the whole world!” she said, under her breath, and dashed away that drop of dew from her eyelashes. “It is so absurd to make any fuss,” she added a moment after. “One knows it must be, but one cannot help being sorry sometimes when one sees–” and here Gussy’s voice failed her, and she bit her lip, that she might not be proved to have broken down.

“You are a dear, kind girl to feel for her so,” cried Edgar, putting out his hand to give her a grasp of sympathy; and then he remembered suddenly that he was a man and she a woman, and that an invisible line was stretched between them. “It is very hard,” he said, checking himself with a half laugh, “that you are not your brother, or I my own sister for the moment, because I must not say (I suppose) how sorry I am, nor how I like you for it; but I do all the same. Don’t you think if we were to lay our heads together and get him a living–”

“Oh, hush,” said Gussy, growing paler, and this time quite unable to conceal the tears that rushed to her eyes. “Did you really never hear about him? He died a year ago. It was not our fault. He went to the East-End of London, you know, and worked dreadfully hard, and caught a fever. Oh, will you take that chair between me and Ada, please! Don’t you see she always wears black and white—nothing else—but you men never notice what any one wears.”