 Chapter 18 of Kept in the Dark This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Kept in the Dark by Anthony Trollop. Chapter 18. A Man's Pride About a week after Lady Grant had gone, Mrs. Weston received a letter from her husband. She had expected that he would write, and had daily looked for the letter. But when it did come, she did not know whether to take it as a joy or a source of additional discomfort. There was in it hardly a word of declared affection. Nothing was said as to his future life or hers. But he did write, as she thought, in a familiar and loving strain as to the event which had yet to be expected for many months. �My sister has told me of your news,� he said, �and I cannot but let you know how anxious I shall be both for your safety and for that of the stranger. If there be anything that I can do for your comfort, if you will ask me, you may be sure that it will be done. I am still at Dresden and have no idea of immediately returning to England. There was no commencement to this nor any ending. He did not even sign his name nor call her his wife or his dear Cecilia. Upon the whole she felt that it rather confirmed her sentence of banishment than gave her a reason for hope. He had felt when he wrote it that he could not remain altogether silent, but had yet determined to awaken no hopes by an assurance of his returning love. In fact, the letter, she said to her mother, �must be taken as meaning nothing.� He did not choose to subject himself to the charge of having been indifferent to the coming of such an event, but beyond this he had nothing to say to me. Poor Mrs. Holt remained altogether silent when her daughter discussed the subject. She knew that she could not speak without loud abuse, and she knew also that her daughter would not allow her to abuse him. Cecilia, without asking the advice of anyone, resolved that she would not answer the letter. She could not write without using affectionate language, and such words should never come from her till she had first been addressed with full affection by him. Never, she had said to herself a score of times, never. The meaning of this had been that having been so cruelly ill-used, she would do and say nothing that might be taken as evidence that she had thought herself in the wrong. She would bear it all rather than give him to understand that she did not appreciate his cruelty. She had told him of her love, and he had not vouchsafe to say a word to her in reply. It was of the injustice done to her that she complained in the words which she was constantly framing for herself, but it was the apparent want of affection which was deepest in her heart. Though he had been twice as cruel, twice as hard, she would have been less unhappy had she succeeded in drawing from him one word of affection. What can he do for my comfort? she said to herself again and again. He means that if I want money I shall have it, so that he may avoid the disgrace of leaving his wife and his child unprovided for. I will not have his money unless he also come himself. She would not even write to Lady Grant, or let her know that she had received a letter from her husband. Oh yes, I have heard from him. There is his letter, and she flung the document across the table to a mother. Having done so she at once left the room, so that there could be no discussion on the matter. That there should not be a word of love in it, not a single word, she went on saying to herself, how hard must be a man's heart and how changeable. He certainly did love me, and now it is all gone, simply through an unworthy suspicion on his own part. But here she showed how little able she had been as yet to read the riddle of a man's heart. How ignorant she had been of the difficulty under which a man may labor to express his own feeling. That which we call reticence is more frequently an inability than an unwillingness to express itself. The man is silent, not because he would not have the word spoken, but because he does not know the fitting words with which to speak. His dignity and his so-called manliness are always near to him and are guarded, so that he should not melt into open roof. So it was with Mr. Western, living there all alone at Dresden, seeing no society, passing much of his time in a vain attempt to satisfy himself with music and with pictures. He spent all his hours in thinking how necessary his wife had made herself to his comfort during the few months that they were married. He had already taught himself to endeavour to make excuses for her, though in doing so he always fell back at last on the enormity of her offence. Though he loved her, though he might probably pardon her in his weakness, it was impossible that the sin should be washed out. His anger still burned very hotly, because he could not quite understand the manner in which the sin had been committed. There was a secret, and he did not know the nature of the secret. There had been an understanding of which he did not even yet know the nature between his wife and that base baronet. And then the terrible truth of his memory added to his wounds. He thought of all the words that had been spoken, and which he felt ought to have given her an opportunity of telling the truth, and would have done so had she not purposely kept the secret. He had playfully asked her how it had been that she had loved no other man, and then she had remained silent in a manner which he now declared to himself to be equal to a falsehood. And when he had been perfectly free with his own story, she had still kept back hers. She had had her story, and had resolved that he should not know it, even though he had been so open with his. She no doubt had been open at a time when he had no right to expect her to be equally so. But when the time did come, then, then she had been a traitor to him. When accepting his caresses, and returning them with all the young wife's ardour, even at that moment she had been a traitor to him. Though in his arms she had thought, she must have continued to think of some unholy compact which existed between her and Sir Francis Geraldine, and even now she had not told him the nature of that compact. Even now she might be corresponding with Sir Francis, or seeing him for ought that he knew to the contrary. How was it possible that he should pardon a wife who had sinned against him as she had sinned? And yet he was so far aware of his own weakness as to admit to himself that he would have taken her back to him if she had answered his last letter in a contrite spirit, and with affectionate words. He would have endeavored to forgive if not to forget, and would have allowed himself to fall into the loving intimacy of domestic life. But that she was cold and indifferent, as well as treacherous. So he told himself, keeping his wrath hot, though at the same time his love nearly mastered him, but in truth he knew nothing of things as they really were. He had made the mistake of drawing a false conclusion from some words written by Sir Francis, and then of looking upon those words as containing the whole truth. Sir Francis had no doubt intended him to think that he and Cecilia Holt had come to some rupture in their engagement from other than the real cause. He had intended Mr. Weston to believe that they had both agreed and that they had merely resolved between them that they had better not be husband and wife. He had intended to convey the idea that he had been more active in so arranging it than Cecilia herself. Cecilia, though she had read the letter, had done so in such a frame of mind as hardly to catch the truth. But he, Mr. Weston, had courted altogether, and had believed it. Though he knew that the man was a dishonest liar, yet he had believed the letter, he was tortured at the thought that his wife should have made herself a party to such a compact, and that the compact should still have remaining existence without his knowledge. Although there were hours during which he was most anxious to return to her, in which he told himself that it was more difficult to stay away from her than even to endure her faithlessness. Though from day to day he became convinced that he could never return to the haunts of men, or even to the easy endurance of life without her, yet his pride would ever come back to him and assure him that, as a reasonable man, he was unable to put up with such treachery. He had unfortunately been taught to think, by the correspondence which had come from the matter of his cousin's racing bet, that Sir Francis Geraldine was the very basest of mankind. It was unfortunate because he had no doubt been induced to think worse of his wife because she had submitted herself, and continued to submit herself to a man who was, in his eyes, so contemptible. He could not endure the idea that a woman for whom such a partnership had had charms should be the chosen companion of all his hours. He had already lived with her for weeks, which should have been enough to teach him her character. During those weeks he had been satisfied to the very full. He had assured himself frequently that he had at last met a woman that suited him and made her his own. Had he known nothing of Sir Francis Geraldine, he would have been thoroughly contented. Then had come the blow, and all his joys were sickled over with the unhealthy tone which his image of her former lover gave him. She became at once to him a different creature, though he told himself that she was still the same Cecilia as had been his delight, yet he told himself also that she was not the same as he had fancied her when he at first knew her. There is in a man a pride of which a woman knows nothing, or rather a woman is often subject to pride the very opposite. The man delights to think that he has been the first to reach the woman's heart. The woman is rejoiced to feel that she owns permanently that which has been often reached before. The man may know that in his own case it is not so with him, but as there has been no concealment, or perhaps only a little to conceal, he takes it as it comes and makes the best of it. His Mary may have liked some other one, but it has not gone farther, or if she has been engaged as a bride there has been no secret about it, or it has been a thing so long ago that there has been time for new ideas to form themselves. The husband when he does come knows at any rate that he has no ground of complaint, and is not kept specially in the dark when he takes his wife. But Mr Weston had been kept specially in the dark, and was of all men the least able to endure such treatment. To have been kept in the dark as to the man with whom the girl was engaged, as he thought, at the very moment in which he had accepted him. To have been made use of as a step on which a disadvantageous marriage might be avoided without detriment to her own interest. It was this feeling which made him utterly prostrate, which told him that death itself would be the one desirable way out of his difficulties if death were within his reach. When he received the letter from his sister telling him that he might probably become the father of a child, he was at the first prepared to say that thus would they too be reconciled. He could hardly live apart not only from the mother of his child but from the child itself. He went away into solitude and wept hot tears as he thought of it all, but ever as he thought of it the cause of his anger came back to him, and made him declare to himself that in the indulgence of no feeling of personal tenderness ought he to disgrace himself. At any rate it could not be till she should have told him the whole truth, till she should have told her story as to enable him to ascertain whether that story were in all respect true. At present, as he said to himself, he was altogether in the dark. But in fact had he now learned the very story as it had existed and had Cecilia told it as far as she was able to tell it all, she would even in his estimation have been completely whitewashed. In her perfect absolution from the terrible sin of which he now accused her, he would have forgiven and forgotten altogether the small, the trifling fault which he had in truth committed. There was something of nobility in all these feelings, but then that something was alloyed by much that was ignoble. He had resolved that were she to come back to him, she must come acknowledging the depth of her sin. He would endeavour to forgive though he could not forget, but he never thought to himself in these hours that it would be well for him to be gracious in his manner of forgiveness. To go to her and fetch her home to him and say to her that all that was past should be as a dream, a sad and ugly dream, that one to which no reality was attached never occurred to him. He must still be the master and in order that his masterdom might be assured full and abject confession must be made. Yet he had such an idea of his wife that he felt that no such confession would be forthcoming and therefore to him it appeared ever more and more impossible that they too should again come together. With Cecilia the matter was regarded with very different eyes. To her too it was apparent that she had been treated with extremist cruelty. She too was very hot in her anger. In discussing the matter with herself she allowed herself thoughts in which indignation against her husband was maintained at a boiling heat, but nevertheless she had quite resolved to forgive him altogether if he would once come to her and to ensure her forgiveness no word even of apology should be necessary. She knew that she would have to deal with a man to whom the speaking of such words would be painful and none should be expected, none asked for. If he would but show her that he still loved her that would suffice. The world around them would of course know that she had been sent away from him and then taken back. There was in this much that was painful, a feeling full of dismay as she reflected that all her friends that are acquaintance that the very servant should know that she had been so disgraced. But of all that she would take no notice, no notice as far as the outside world was concerned. Let them think, let them talk as they would. She would then have her one great treasure with which to console herself and that treasure if once more her own would suffice for her happiness. In her hottest anger she told herself from time to time that her anger would all depart from her, that it would be made to vanish from her as by a magician's wand, if she could only once more be allowed to feel his arm round her waist. In all this she had no friend with whom to discuss either her anger or her hopes. Her mother she knew shared her anger to the full but entertained hopes altogether different. Her desires were so different that they hardly amounted to hopes. Yes he might be allowed to return but with words of absolute contrition with words which should always be remembered against him. Such would have been Mrs. Holt's expression as to the state of things had she ventured to express herself but she understood enough of her daughter's feelings to repress them. The only person who sympathized with Cecilia and her present condition was the girl who had once before evoked from her so strong a feeling of tenderness. She did know that the man had to be forgiven, terrible as had been his sin and that nothing more was to be said about it. Oh mom, she said, he'll come back now. I'm sure he'll come back now and never more have any of them silly vagaries. Who can say what vagaries a man may choose to indulge? That's true too man that any man should have had such a vagary as this that he's dying to come back. I'm sure of it. And when he does come and finds that he's let to come quiet and that he's asked to say nothing as he don't like and that you are all smiles to him in kindness and then with the baby coming and all my belief is that he'll be happier than than he was even the first day when he had you. This though spoken in rough language so exactly expressed Cecilia's wishes that she did feel that her maid at least entirely sympathized with her. End of chapter 18. Chapter 19 of Kept in the Dark. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org. Kept in the Dark by Anthony Trollop. Chapter 19. Dick takes his final leave. When Sir Francis received the reply which Miss Alte Fiorla sent to his letter he was not altogether satisfied with it. He had expected that the lady would once have flown into his arms but the lady seemed to hesitate and asked for a week to think about it. This showed so much ingratitude on her part was so poor an acknowledgement of the position which he had offered her that he was inclined to be indignant. Damn it! If she don't care about it she shan't have it. It was thus that he expressed himself aloud in the hearing of Dick Ross but without however explaining who the she was or what the it was or indeed in any way asking Dick's opinion on the matter. Not the less had Miss Alte Fiorla been wise in the nature of the reply which she had given. Had she expressed her warm affection and at once accepted all that had been proffered the gentleman would probably have learned at once to despise that which had been obtained so easily. As it was he was simply cross and thought that he had determined to withdraw the proposal but still the other letter was to come and Miss Alte Fiorla's chance was still open to her. The immediate consequence of these doubts in the mind of Sir Francis was a postponement of the verdict of banishment which he had resolved to pronounce against Dick as soon as his marriage with Miss Alte Fiorla should have been settled. He did not wish to leave himself altogether alone in the world and if this Dick were dismissed it would be necessary that he should provide himself with another unless he were minded to provide himself with a wife instead. He became therefore gradually more gracious after the little speech which has been above given. Dick had understood perfectly who the she had been and what the it intended. As no question had been asked he had made no reply but he was quite quick enough to perceive the workings of the baronet's mind. He despised the baronet almost as thoroughly as did Mr Weston but for certain purposes as to which he despised himself also the friendship of the baronet suited him just at present. One morning for private reasons of his own Dick went into Perth which was 20 miles distant from the baronet shooting lodge and returned the same day bringing the post bag with him from a point in the road in which it was daily left by the postman. Sir Francis with unusual haste read his letters and among them was one from Miss Alte Fiorla but Dick had a budget of news which he was anxious to reveal and which he did tell before Sir Francis had said anything as to his own letter. There was another friend one Captain Forks at the lodge with them and Dick had at first been restrained by this man's presence. As soon as he found himself alone with Sir Francis he began, Lady Grant has gone off to Dresden he said. Where did you hear that? asked the baronet. They told me so at the club. Everybody in Perth knows that she's gone and why? What business is it of theirs? Since you know so much about it why has she gone? To persuade her brother to come home and take his wife once more. It was an infernal shame that they should ever have been separated. In fact she has gone to undo what you did. If she can only succeed in making the man know the whole truth about it free from all lies she'll do what she's gone to do. What the devil do you mean by lies? said Sir Francis rising in wrath from his chair. Well lies mean lies. As I haven't applied the word to anyone I suppose I may be allowed to use it and to stand by it. I suppose you know what lies mean and I suppose you are aware that Western has been made to believe lies about his wife. Who told them? I say nothing about that said Dick. Lies are a sort of thing which are very commonly told and are ordinarily ascribed to the world at large. The world never quarrels with the accusation. The world has told most infernal lies to this man about his wife. I don't suppose the world means to call me out for saying as much as that. Then the two remain silent for some moment and Dick proceeded with his eloquence. Of course there have been lies. Damnable lies. Had a man or a woman it's all one gone to that poor creature with a pistol in his hand and blown her brains out he wouldn't have done a more dastardly action. What the devil do you mean by that? said the other. I'm not talking about you especially. I say lies have been told but I do not say who was told them. I rather suspect a woman to be at the bottom of it. Sir Francis who had in his pocket a most tender and loving reply from Miss Altie Fuehler knew very well who was the lady to whom Dick referred. That man has been made to believe certain things about his wife which are all lies. Lies from beginning to end. He has been made to believe that she was engaged to me first. Is that a lie? That depends on the way in which it was told. He didn't send her home merely for that. I'm not saying what the lies were but they were damnable lies. You sometimes tell me that I ain't any better than another or generally a great deal worse but I'd rather have blown my brains out than have told such lies about a woman as have been told here by somebody. You asked me what they were saying at the club in Perth. Now you know it pretty well all. It must be supposed that what had passed at the club had induced Dick to determine that it would no longer become him to remain with Sir Francis as his humble friend. Very evil things had in truth been said of Sir Francis and they were more than Dick could endure. The natural indignation of the man was aroused so that by degrees it had come to pass that he hated the baronet. He had before said very sharp words to him but had now gone home resolved in his righteous mind to bring things to a conclusion. It matters little in the telling of our story to know what lies did in truth impute to his friend but they were of a nature to fill his mind with righteous wrath and to produce from him the eloquence above described. Sir Francis whose vanity had been charmed by the letter which he kept in his pocket had already made up his mind to part with Dick but Dick words has now spoken left him no alternative. It was a question with him whether he could not so part with him as to inflict some further punishment. Why Dick he said smiling you have broken out quite in a new place. I know nothing about that. He must have been with the bishop and taken a lesson in preaching. I never heard you come out so strong before. I wish you'd heard what some of those men at Perth said about you and how you answered them as my friend. As far as I remember I didn't say much myself. What I did say certainly was not in your favour but I was hardest on that sweet young lady with the Italian name. You won't mind that because you and she are two now. Can you tell me Ross how long you've been eating my bread? I suppose I could. Or how much you have drunk of my wine? I haven't made a calculation of that nature. It isn't usual. For shooting here how much have you ever contributed? When I shoot I contribute nothing. All the world understands that. How much money do you owe me? I owe you nothing that I've ever promised to pay. And now you think it a sign of a fine gentleman to go and talk openly at a club about matters which you've heard from me in confidence? I don't. I think it a very a very watts of Francis. I have not done as you allege but you are going to observe a very what was it? It must be here explained that Dick Ross was not a man who feared many things but that Sir Francis feared much. Dick had little to lose by a row whereas the baronet would be injured. The baronet therefore declined to fill in the epithet which he had admitted. He knew from former experience what Dick would and what he would not bear. I don't choose to descend to Billingsgate said Sir Francis. I have my own ideas as to your conduct. Very gentleman-like, isn't it? said Dick with a smile meaning thereby to impute it to Sir Francis' cowardice that he was unwilling to say the reverse. But under all the circumstances it will be quite as well that you should leave the lodge. You must feel that yourself. Oh quite so. I'm delighted to think that I shall be able to leave without having had any unpleasant words. Perhaps tomorrow will do. Just as you please. Then I shall be able to add a few drops to all those buckets of claret which you threw in my teeth just now. I wonder whether any gentleman was ever before asked by another gentleman how much wine he had drunk in his house or how many dinners he had eaten. When you asked me did you expect me to pay for my dinners and wine? Sir Francis refused to make any reply to this question and when you delicately hinted at my poverty had you found my finances to be lower than you'd always known them? It is disagreeable to be a penniless younger brother. I have found it so all my life and I admit that I ought to have earned my bread. It would have been much better for me had I done so. People may declare that I'm good for nothing and may hold me up as an example to be shunned but I flatter myself that nobody has called me a blaggard. I have told no lies to injure men behind their backs. Much less have I done so to injure a woman. I have sacrificed no girl to my revenge simply because she has thrown me over. In the little transactions I have had I have always run straight. Now I think that upon the whole I'd better go before dinner and not add anything to the bucket of claret. Just as you please said Sir Francis. Then Dick Ross left the room and went away to make such arrangements for his departure as was possible to him and the readers of this story shall see him and hear him no more. Sir Francis when he was left alone took out Miss Altefuel's letter and read it again. He was a man who could assume grand manners in his personal intercourse with women but he was peculiarly apt to receive impression from them. He loved to be flattered and was prone to believe anything good of himself that was said to him by one of them. He therefore took the following letter for more than it was worth. My dear Sir Francis I know that you would have been quite quick enough to have understood when you received my former little scrawl what my answer would be. When a woman attempts to deceive a man in such a matter she knows beforehand that the attempt will be vain and I certainly did not think that I could succeed with you but yet a feeling of shame-facedness what some ladies consider as modesty though it might more properly be called mauvaise aunt forced me into temporary silence. What could I wish better than to be loved by such a one as you? In the first place there is the rank which goes for much with me then there is the money which I admit counts for something. I would never have allowed myself to marry even if I had chance to love a poor man. Then there are the manners and the peculiar station before the world which is quite separate from the rank. To me these alone are irresistible shall I say too that personal appearance does count for much? I can fancy myself marrying an ugly man but I can fancy also that I could not do it without something of disgust. Miss Altifuola when she wrote this had understood well that vanity and love of flattery were conspicuous traits in the character of her admirer. Having owned so much what is there more to say than that I am the happiest woman between the seas? The reader must be here told that this letter had been copied out a second time because in the first copy she had allowed the word girl to pass in the above sentence something told her that she had better write woman instead and she had written it. What more is there for me to add to the above except to tell you that I love you with all my heart. Months ago it seems to be years now when Cecilia Holt had caught your fancy I did regard her as the most fortunate girl but I did not regard you as the happiest of men because I felt sure that there was something between you which would not suit. There isn't asperity rather than strictness about her which I knew your spirit would not brook. She would have borne the battlings which would have arisen with an equal temper. She can indeed bear all things with equanimity as she does her present position but you though you would have battled and have conquered would still have suffered. I do not think that the wife you now desire is one with whom you will have to wage war. Shall I say that if you marry her whom you have now asked to join her lot with yours there will be no such fighting. I think that I shall know how to hold my own against the world as your wife but with you I shall only attempt to hold my own by making myself one with you in all your desires and aspirations. I am yours with all my heart with all my body and soul Francesca. I say nothing about the immediate future but I hope it will please your highness to visit your most worthy clerical relations in this cathedral city before long. I shall say nothing to any of your clerical relations as to my prospects in life until I shall have received your sanction for doing so but the sooner I do receive it the better for my peace of mind. So Frances was upon the whole delighted with the letter and the more delighted as he now read it for the third time. There is such an air of truth in every word of it. It was thus that he spoke to himself about the letter as he sucked in the flattery. It was thus that Miss Altifiola had intended that he should receive it. She knew herself too well to suspect that her flattery should fail not a word of it failed. In nothing was he more gratified than in her allusions to his matrimonial efforts with Miss Holt. She had assured him that he would have finally conquered that strong-minded young woman but she had at the same time told him of the extreme tenderness of his heart. He absolutely believed her when she whispered to him her secret that she had envied Cecilia her lot when Cecilia was supposed to be the happy bride. He quite understood these allusions to his own pleasures and her assurance that she would never interfere with him. There was just a doubt whether a thing so easily got could be worth keeping but then he remembered his cousin and determined to be a man of his word. End of Chapter 19 Chapter 20 of Kept in the Dark This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer please visit LibriVox.org Kept in the Dark by Anthony Trollop Chapter 20 The Secret Escapes Alright, see you soon. Ever yours, FG. Such was the entire response which Miss Altifiola received from her now declared lover. Sir Francis had told himself that he hated the bother of writing love letters but in truth there was with him also an idea that it might be as well that he should not commit himself to declarations that were in their nature very strong. It was not that he absolutely thought of any possible future event in which his letters might be used against him but there was present to him a feeling that the least said might be the soonest mended. Miss Altifiola when she received the above scroll was quite satisfied with it. She too was cautious in her nature but not quite so clever as her lover. She did indeed feel that she now had caught her fish. She would not let him escape by any such folly as that which Cecilia Holt had committed. The baronet should be allowed his full swing till she was entitled to call herself Lady Geraldine. Then perhaps there might be a tussle between them as to which she'd have his own way or hers. The great thing at present was to obtain the position and she did feel that she had played her cards uncommonly well as far as the game had gone at present. But there came upon her an irresistible temptation to make her triumph known among her friends at Exeter. All her girlfriends had got themselves married. There was Mrs. Green and Mrs. Thorn and Mrs. Weston. Poor Cecilia had not gained much but still she was Mrs. Weston. Miss Altifiola did in truth regard herself as Miss Altifiola with but small satisfaction. She had her theories about women's rights and the decided advantages of remaining single and the sufficiency of a lady to stand alone in the world. There was probably some vague glimmering of truth in her ideas. Some half-formed belief in her own doctrine but still it had ever been an uncomfortable creed and one which she was ready to desert at the slightest provocation. Her friends had all deserted it and had left her as we say high and dry on the barren bank while they had been carried away by the fertilizing stream. She too would now swim down the river of matrimony with a beautiful name and a handle to it as the owner of a fine family property. Women's rights was an excellent doctrine to preach but for practice could not stand the strain of such temptation and though in boasting of her good fortune she must no doubt confess that she had been wrong still there would be much more of glory than of shame in the confession. It was chance probably that made her tell her secret in the first instance to Mrs. Thorn. Mrs. Thorn had been mauled hipstly and was nieced to Sir Francis Geraldine. Miss Altifiola had pledged herself to Sir Francis not to make known her engagement at the denary but such pledges go for very little. Mrs. Thorn was not now an inhabitant of Exeter and was so to say the most bosom friend left to her after her disruption from Mrs. Weston. Was it probable that such a secret should be kept from a bosom friend? Mrs. Thorn who had a large circle of friends in the county would hardly have admitted the claim but she would be more likely to do so after receiving the intimation. Of course it would be conveyed under the seal of a sacred promise which no doubt would be broken as soon as she reached the denary. On this occasion she called on Miss Altifiola to ask questions in reference to poor Cecilia. With herself and the Dean and Mrs. Dean there was real sorrow at Cecilia's troubles and there was also no mode of acquiring true information. Do tell me something about poor Cecilia said Mrs. Thorn. Poor Cecilia indeed she is there all alone and sees almost no one. Of course you've heard that Lady Grant was here. We thought it so nice of Lady Grant to come all the way from Scotland to see her sister-in-law. Lady Grant is of course anxious to get her brother to take back his wife. They haven't a great deal of money among them and when Mrs. Hall died Cecilia's fortune would be a nice addition. I don't think Lady Grant can have thought of that said Mrs. Thorn. Lady Grant would be quite prudent in thinking of it and like the rest of the world her husband was only a regimental officer in India who got knighted for doing something that came in his way. There isn't any family property among them and of course she is anxious. This solicitude as to family property on the part of Miss Altie Fuehler did strike Mrs. Thorn as droll but she went on with her inquiries. And what is Cecilia doing? Not very much said Miss Altie Fuehler. What is there for her to do, poor girl? She has played her card so uncommonly badly when she took up with Mr. Weston after having been dropped by Mr. Francis. After dropping Sir Francis Miss Altie Fuehler smiled was it likely that Cecilia Halt should have dropped Sir Francis? It doesn't much matter now if it does her wounded pride good to say so of course she can say it. We always believed it was so at the denry. At any rate she made a mess of it and now she has to bear the fortune which her fates have sent her. I own that I am a little angry with Cecilia not for having dropped Sir Francis as you called it but for managing her matters so badly with Mr. Weston. She seems to me to have no idea of the sort of duties which fall to the lot of a wife. I should have thought you'd have liked her the better for that said Mrs. Thorn with a smile. Why so? I think you must have misunderstood my theory of life. When a woman elects to marry and does so from sheer love and regard for the man she should certainly make her duty to him the first motive of all her actions. What a grand lesson! It is a pity that my husband should not be here to hear it. I have no doubt he finds that you do so. Or Sir Francis Geraldine I suppose my uncle is still in search of a wife and if he knew where to find such excellent principles he would be able to make his choice. What a joke it would be should he again try his luck at Exeter. He has again tried his luck at Exeter said Miss Altifiola in a tone in which some slight shade of ridicule was mixed with the grand eloquence which she wished to assume. What on earth do you mean? said Mrs. Thorn. Simply what I seem to mean. I had not intended to have told you at present though I would sooner tell you than any person living. You must promise me however that it shall go no further. Sir Francis Geraldine has done me the honor to ask me to be his wife. Thus she communicated her good news and did so in a tone of voice that was very low and intended to be humble. My uncle going to marry you good gracious. Is it more wonderful than that he should have thought of marrying Cecilia Holt? Well yes not that I know why it should be except that Cecilia came first and that you and she was so intimate. Was he doomed to remain alone in the world because of that? asked Miss Altifiola. Well no I don't exactly mean that but it is droll. I hope that the Dean and Mrs. Hipsley will be satisfied with his choice. I do particularly hope that all his friends will feel that he is doing well but she added perceiving that her tidings had not been received with any strong impression of family satisfaction. But I trust that as Lady Geraldine I may at any rate be the means of keeping the family together. There was to Mrs. Thorn almost a joke in this as she knew that her father did not at all approve of Sir Francis and was with difficulty induced to have him at the Deenery and she knew also that the Dean did in his heart greatly dislike Miss Altifiola though for the sake of what was generally called peace within the Cathedral precincts he had hitherto put up also with her. What might happen in the Dean's mind or what determination the Dean might take when the two should be married she could not say but she felt that it might probably be beyond the power of the then Lady Geraldine to keep the family together. Well I am surprised said Mrs. Thorn and I am to tell nobody. I don't see any good in publishing the thing in High Street just at present. Then Mrs. Thorn understood that she need not treat the communication as a strict secret. In fact I don't see why it should be kept specially in the dark. Francis has not enjoined anything like secrecy. This was the first time that she had allowed herself the use of the Baronet's name without the prefix. When it is to be I have not as yet even begun to think of course he is in a hurry men I believe generally are but in this case there may be some reasons for delay. Arrangements as to the family property must be made and Castle Gerald must be prepared for our reception. I don't suppose we can be married just off hand like some happier folks. Mrs. Thorn did not know whether to take this to herself as she had been married herself at last rather in a scramble or whether it was intended to apply to poor Cecilia whose husband though he was in comfortable circumstances cannot be said to have possessed family property. And now dear continued Miss Artifula what am I to do for bright mate? You three have all been married before me. There are his two unmarried sisters of course. Mrs. Thorn was aware that her uncle had absolutely quarrelled with his mother and sisters and had not spoken to them for years. I suppose that it will come off in the cathedral and that your father will perform the ceremony. I don't know indeed whether Francis might not wish to have the bishop. Mrs. Thorn was aware that the bishop who was a strict man would not touch the Francis Geraldine with a pair of tongs. But all these things will shake themselves down comfortably no doubt. In the meantime I am in a twitter of ecstatic happiness. You who have gone through it all will quite understand what I mean. It seems that as a lover he is the most exigent of gentlemen. He requires constant writing to and will be tied me if I do not obey his behests. However I do not complain and must confess that I am at the present moment the most happy of young women. Mrs. Thorn of course expressed her congratulations and took her departure without having committed herself to a word as to the other inhabitants of the denary. But when she got to her father's house where she was for the present staying she in truth startled them all by the news. The dean had just come into the drawing room to have his afternoon tea and a little gossip with his wife and his own sister, Mrs. Forrester from London. Who do you think is going to be married and to whom? said Mrs. Thorn. I'll give you all three guesses apiece and bet you a pair of gloves all round that you don't make it out. Not Miss Altifuola, said her mother. That's only one. Our marriage requires two personages. I still hold good by my bet. Miss Altifuola going to be married, said the dean, who was the unfortunate victim. Papa do not be ill-natured. Why should not Miss Altifuola be married as well as another? In the first place my dear, said Mrs. Forrester, because I understand that the lady has always expressed herself as being in favour of a single life. I go beyond that, said the dean, and maintain that any single life would be preferable to a marriage with Miss Altifuola. Considering that she is my friend Papa I think that you are very unkind. But who is to be the gentleman? asked her mother. Ah, there's the question. Why don't you guess? Then Mrs. Dean did name three or four of the most unpromising unmarried elderly gentlemen in Exeter, and the dean, in that spirit of satire against his own order, which is common among clergymen, suggested an old widowed minor canon, who was in the habit of chanting litany. You are none of you near the mark. You ought to come nearer home. Nearer home, said Mrs. Dean, with a look of discomfort in her face. Yes, Mamar, a great deal nearer home. It can't be your Uncle Septimus, said the dean. Now Uncle Septimus was the unmarried brother of old Mr. Thorne, and was regarded by all the Thorne family as a perfect model of an unselfish, fine, old, lovable gentleman. Good gracious no, said Mrs. Thorne. What a horrible idea. Fancy Uncle Septimus doomed to pass his life in company with Miss Altifuola. The happy man in question is, Sir Francis Geraldine. No, said Mrs. Hipsley, jumping from her seat. It is impossible, said the dean, who, though he greatly disliked his brother-in-law, still thought something of the family into which he had married, and thoroughly despised Miss Altifuola. I do not think that Sir Francis could be so silly as that. It cannot be, said Mrs. Hipsley. What has the young lady done to make it impossible? asked Mrs. Forrester. Nothing on earth, said Mrs. Thorne. She is my special friend, and is, in my opinion, a great deal more than worthy of my Uncle Francis. Only Papa, who dislikes them both, would like to make it out that the two of them are going to cut their own throats each by marrying the other. I wish Papa could have heard the way in which she said that he would have to marry them, unless the bishop should like to come forward and perform the ceremony. I shall do nothing of the kind, said the dean angrily. If you had heard, continued his daughter, all that she had to say about the family name, and the family property, and the family grandeur, generally, you would have thought her the most becoming young woman in the country to be the future Lady Geraldine. I wish you wouldn't talk of it, my dear, said Mrs. Hipsley. We shall have to talk of it, and had better become used to it among ourselves. I don't suppose that Miss Altifuola has invented the story out of her own head. She would not say that she was engaged to marry my Uncle, if it were not true. It's my belief, said the dean, getting up and walking out of the room in great anger, that Sir Francis Geraldine will never marry Miss Altifuola. I don't think my brother will ever marry Miss Altifuola, said Mrs. Dean. He is very silly and very vicious, but I don't think he'll ever do anything so bad as that. Poor Miss Altifuola, said Mrs. Thorne afterwards to her Aunt Forrester. That same evening, Miss Altifuola, feeling that she had broken the ice, and, oppressed by the weight of the secret, which was a secret still in every house in Exeter, except the Deenery, wrote to her other friend, Mrs. Green, and begged her to come down. She had tidings to tell of the greatest importance. So Mrs. Green put on her bonnet and came down. My dear, said Miss Altifuola, I have something to tell you. I am going to be not married, said Mrs. Green. Yes, I am. How very odd that you should guess. But yet, when I come to think of it, I don't know that it is odd, because after all, there does come a time in a lady's life when it is probable that she will marry. Miss Altifuola hesitated, having in the first instance desired to use the word girl. That's as may be, said Mrs. Green. Your principles used to be on the other side. Of course, all that changes when the opportunity comes. It wasn't so much that I disliked the idea of marriage, for myself, as that I was proud of the freedom which I enjoyed. However, that is all over. I am free no longer. And who is it to be? Ah, who is it to be? Can you make a guess? Not in the least. I don't know of anybody who has been spooning you. Oh, what a term to use. No one can say that anyone ever spooned me. It is a horrible word, and I cannot bear to hear it fall from my own lips. It is what young men do do, said Mrs. Green. That, I think, depends on the rank in life which the young men occupy, and also the young women. I can understand that a bank clerk should do it to an attorney's daughter. Well, who is it you are going to marry without spooning, which, in my vocabulary, is simply another word for two young people being fond of each other. Miss Altifuola remains silent for a while, feeling that she owed it to herself to awe her present companion by her manner before she should crush her altogether by the weight of the name she would have to pronounce. Mrs. Green had received her communication flippantly, and had probably felt that her friend intended to demean herself by some mere common marriage. Who is to be the happy swain? asked Mrs. Green. Swain, said Miss Altifuola, unable to repress her feelings. Well, lover, young man, suitor, husband, as is to be, some word common on such occasion will, I suppose, fit him. Miss Altifuola felt that no word common on such occasions would fit him, but yet it was necessary that she should name him having gone so far. And, having again been silent for a minute, so as to bethink herself in what most dignified language this might be done, she proceeded, I am to be allied, again there was a little pause, to Sir Francis Geraldine. Him, Cecilia Holt, rejected. Him, who I think was fortunate enough to escape Cecilia Holt. Goodness gracious, it seems but the other day. Cecilia Holt has since recovered from her wounds and married another husband, and is now suffering from fresh wounds. Is it all that the gentleman should have found someone else to love, when the lady has had time not only to love but to marry, and to be separated from another man? Sir Francis Geraldine ejaculated Mrs. Green. Well, I am sure I wish you all the joy in the world. When is it to be? But Mrs. Green had so offended Miss Altifuola by her manner of accepting the news, that she could not bring herself to make any further gracious answer. Mrs. Green therefore took her leave, and the fact of Miss Altifuola's engagement was soon known all over Exeter. End of Chapter 20. Chapter 21 of Kept in the Dark This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org. Kept in the Dark by Anthony Trollop. Chapter 21 Lady Grant at Dresden You have first to believe the story as I tell it to you, and get out of your head altogether the story as you have conceived it. This was said by Lady Grant to her brother, when she had travelled all the way to Dresden with the purpose of inducing him to take his wife back. She had come there solely with that object, and it must be said of her that she had well done her duty as a sister. But she found it by no means easy to induce her brother to look at the matter with her eyes. In fact it was evident to her that he did not believe the story as she had told it. She must go on and din it into his ears till by perseverance she should change his belief. He still thought that credit should be given to that letter from Sir Francis. Although he was aware that to Francis himself as a man, he would have given no credit whatsoever. It had suited his suspicions to believe that there had been something in common between Sir Francis and his wife, up to the moment in which the terrible fact of her engagement had been made known to him, and from that belief he could not free his mind. He had already been persuaded to say that she should come back to him, but she should come as a sinner confessing her sin. He would take her back, but as one whom he had been justified in expelling, and to whom he should be held as extending great mercy. But Lady Grant would not accept of his mercy, nor would she encourage her coming back with such a purpose. It would not be good in the first place for him that he should think that his wife had been an offender. His future happiness must depend on his fixed belief in her purity and truth. And, as for her, Lady Grant was sure that no entreaties would induce her to own that she had been in the wrong. She desired to have no pardon asked, but would certainly ask for no pardon on her own behalf. Why was it that he came then to my house, asked Mr Weston? Am I, or rather is she, to account for the conduct of such a man as that? Are you to make her responsible for his behaviour? She was engaged to him. Undoubtedly, it should have been told to you. Though I can understand the reasons which kept her silent from day to day, the time will come when you will understand it also, and know as I do how gracious and how feminine has been her silence. Then there came across her brother's face a look of doubt as indicating his feeling that nothing could have justified her silence. Yes, George, the time will come that you will understand her altogether, although you are far from doing so now. I believe you think her to be perfect, said he. Hardly perfect, because she is a human being. But although I know her virtues, I have not known her faults. It may be that she is too proud, a little unwilling perhaps to bend. Most women will bend whether they be in fault or not. But would you wish your wife to do so? I, at any rate, have not asked her. You, at any rate, have not given her the opportunity. My accusation against you is that you sent her away from you on an accusation made solely by that man, and without waiting to hear from herself whether she would plead guilty to it. I deny it. Yes, I hear your denial, but you will have to acknowledge it, at any rate to yourself, before you can ever hope to be a happy man. When he wrote to me, I believe the whole story to be a lie from first to last. And when you found that it was not all a lie, then it became to you a gospel throughout. You could not understand that the very faults which had induced her to break her engagement were of a nature to make him tell his story untruly. When she acknowledged herself to have been engaged to him, it nearly broke my heart. Just so, and with your heart broken, you would not sift the truth. She had committed no offense against you in engaging herself. She should have told me as soon as we knew each other. She should have told you before she accepted your offer. But she had been deterred from doing so by your own revelation to her. You cannot believe that she intended you always to be in the dark. You cannot imagine that she had expected that you should never hear of her adventure with Sir Francis Geraldine. I do not know. I had heard it, and she knew that I had heard it. Why did you not tell me then? Do you suppose that I wish to interfere between you and your wife? Of course I told her that you ought to know. Of course I told her that you ought to have known it already. But she excused herself with great sorrow. Things had presented themselves in such a way that the desired opportunity of telling you had never come. He shook his head. I tell you that it was so, and you are bound to believe it of one of whom in all other respects you had thought well, of one who loved you with the fondest devotion. Instead of that there came this man with his insidious falsehoods, with his implied lies, this man of whom you have always thought so badly, and him you believed instead. I tell you that you can justify yourself before no human being. You were not entitled to repudiate your wife for such a fence as she had committed. You were not entitled, even had there been no mutual affection to bind you together. How much less so in your present condition, and in hers? People will only excuse you by saying that you were mad. And now in order to put yourself right, you expect that she shall come forward and own herself to have been the cause of this misfortune. I tell you that she will not do it. I would not even ask her to do it, not for her sake, nor for your own. I am then to go, said he, and grovel in the dust before her feet. There need be no groveling. There need be no confessions. How then? Go to Exeter and simply take her. Disregard what all the world may say, for the sake of her happiness and for your own. She will make no stipulation. She will simply throw herself into your arms with unaffected love. Do not let her have to undergo the suffering of bringing forth your child without the comfort of knowing that you are near to her. Then she left him to think in solitude over the words she had spoken to him. He did think of them, but he found it to be impossible to put absolute faith in them. It was not that he thought that his sister was deceiving him, that he distrusted her, who had taken this long journey at great personal trouble altogether on his behalf, but that he could not bring himself to believe that he himself had been so cruel as to reject his young wife without adequate cause. It had gradually come across his mind that he had been most cruel, most unjust, if he had done so, and to this judgment passed by himself on himself he would not submit. In concealing her engagement she had been very wrong, but it must be that she had concealed more than her engagement, and to have been engaged as such a man added much to the fault in his estimation. He would not acknowledge that she had been deceived as to the man's character, and had set herself right before it was too late. Why had the man come to his house and asked for him after what had passed between them, if not in compliance with some understanding between him and her? But yet he would take her back if she would confess her fault and beg his pardon, for then he would be saved the disgrace of having to acknowledge that he had been in fault from the first. His sister left him alone without saying a word on the subject for twenty-four hours, and then again attacked him. George, she said, I must go back tomorrow, I have left my children all alone and cannot stay longer away from them. Must you go tomorrow? he asked. Indeed, yes, had not the matter been one of almost more than life and death I should not have come. Am I to return and feel that my journey has been for nothing? What would you have me do? Return with me and Goet wants to exit her. He almost tore his hair in his agony as he walked about the room before he replied to her, but she remained silent watching him. You must leave me here till I think about it. Then I might as well not have come at all, she said. He moved about the room in an agony of spirit. He knew it to be essential to his future happiness in life that he should be the master in his own house, and he felt that he could not be so unless he should be known to have been right in this terrible misfortune with which their married life had been commenced. There was no obliterating it, no forgetting it, no ignoring it. He had in his passion sent her away from him, and passionately she had withdrawn. Let them not say a word about it, there would still have been this terrible event in both their memories. And for himself he knew that unless it could be settled from the first that he had acted with justice, his life would be intolerable to him. He was a man, and it behoved him to have been just. She was a woman, and the feeling of having had to be forgiven would not be so severe with her. She, when taken a second time into grace and pardoned, might still rejoice and be happy. But for himself, he reminded himself over and over again that he was a man, and assured himself that he could never lift up his head, were he by his silence to admit that he had been in the wrong. But still his mind was changed, was altogether changed by the coming of his sister. Till she had come all had been a blank with him, in which no light had been possible. He could see no life before him, but one in which he should be constantly condemned by his fellow men because of his cruelty to his young wife. Men would not stop to ask whether he had been right or wrong, but would declare him at any rate to have been stern and cruel. And then he had been torn to the heart by his memory of those passages of love which had been so sweet to him. He had married her to be the joy of his life, and she had become so to his entire satisfaction when in his passion he had sent her away. He already knew that he had made a great mistake. Angry as he had been, he should not have thus sought to avenge himself. He should have known himself better than to think that because she had been in fault he could therefore live without her. He had owned to himself when his sister had come to him that he must use her services in getting his wife once again. Was she not the one human being that suited him at all points? But still, but still his honour must be saved. If she in truth desired to come back to him, she would not hesitate to own that she had been in fault. What am I to say to her? What message will you send to her? You will hardly let me go back without some word. This was said to him by his sister as he walked about the room in his misery. What message could he send? He desired to return himself, and was willing to do so at a moment's notice. If only he could be assured that if he did so, she would as a wife do her duty by owning that she had been in the wrong. How should he live with a wife who would always be asserting to herself and able to assert to him that in this extremity of their trouble he had been the cause of it? Not that she would so assert it aloud, but that the power of doing so would always be present to her and to him. And yet he was resolved to return, and if he allowed his sister to go back without him, never would there come so fair an opportunity again. I have done my duty by you, said his sister. Yes, yes, I need hardly tell you that I'm grateful to you. And now do your duty by her. If she will write to me one line to beg me to come, I will do so. You have absolutely driven her away from you, and left her abruptly, so that she should have no opportunity of imploring you to spare her. And now you expect that she should do so? Yes, if she were wrong, by your own showing she was the first to sin against me. You do not know the nature of a woman, and especially you do not know hers. I have nothing further to say. I shall leave this by the early train tomorrow morning, and you can go with me or let me go alone as you please. I have said what I came to say, and if I have said it without effect, it will only show me how hard a man's heart may become by living in the world. Then she left him alone, and went away. He took his hat and escaped from the hotel, and walked along the Elba all alone. He went far down the river and did not return for many hours. At first his thoughts were full of anger against his sister, though he acknowledged that she had taken great trouble in coming there on a mission intended to be beneficent to them both. With the view solely of doing her duty to her brother and to her sister-in-law, she had taken infinite trouble. Yet he was very angry with her. Being a woman, she had most unjustly taken the part of another woman against him. Cecilia would have suffered but little in having been forced to acknowledge her great sin. But he would suffer greatly, he who had sinned not at all, by the tacit confession which he would be thus compelled to make. It was true that it was necessary that he should return. The happiness of them all, including that unborn child, required it. His sister, knowing this, demanded that he should sacrifice himself in order that his wife might be indulged in her pride. And yet he knew that he must do it. Though he might go to her in silence, and in silence renew his married life, he would, by doing so, confess that he had been wrong. To such confession he should not be driven. In the very gall of bitterness and with the sense of injustice strong upon him, he did resolve that he would return to England with his sister. But having so resolved with his wrath hot against Lady Grant, his mind was gradually turned to Cecilia and her condition. How sweet would it be to have her once again sitting at his table, once again leaning on his arm, once again looking up into his face with almost comical doubt, seeking to find in his eyes what answer he would best like her to make when referring to her for some decision. It is your opinion that I want, he would say. Ah, but if I only knew yours, I should be so much better able to have one of my own. Then there would come a look over her face, which almost maddened him when he thought that he should never see it again. It was the idea that she who could so look at him should have looked with the same smile into the face of that other man which had driven him to fury, that she should have so looked in those very days in which she had gazed into his own. Could it be that though she had been engaged to the man she had never taken delight in so gazing at him, that girl whom he had thought to make his wife, and who had so openly jilted him, had never understood him as Cecilia had done. Had never looked at him as Cecilia had looked, but he, after he had been so treated, happily so treated, had certainly never desired ever to see the girl. But this wife of his, who was possessed of all the charms which a woman could own, of whom he acknowledged to himself day after day that she was, as regarded his taste, peerless and unequaled. She, after breaking from that man, that man unworthy to be called a gentleman, still continued to hold into course with him. Was it not clear that she had still remained on terms of intimacy with him? His walk along the Elba was very bitter, but yet he determined to return to England with his sister. are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, recording by Alan Brown, kept in the dark by Anthony Trollop, Chapter 22. Mr. Western yields. The fact that Lady Grant had gone to Dresden was not long in reaching the ears of Mrs. Western. Dick Ross had heard at the club at Perth that she had gone, and had told Sir Francis. Sir Francis passed on the news to Miss Alte Fiorla, and from her it had reached the deserted wife. Miss Alte Fiorla had not told it direct, because at that time she and Cecilia were not supposed to be on friendly terms. But the tidings had got about, and Mrs. Western had heard them. She's a good woman, said Cecilia to her mother. I knew her to be that, the first moment that she came to me. She is rough as he is, and stern, and has a will of her own, but her heart is tender and true, as is his also at the core. I don't know about that, said Mrs. Holt, with the angry tone which she allowed herself to use only when speaking of Mr. Western. Yes, he is, Mama. In your affection for me, you will not allow yourself to be just to him. In truth, you hardly know him. I know that he has destroyed your happiness forever, and made me very wretched. No, Mama, not forever. It may be that he will come for me, and that then we shall be as happy as the day is long. As she said this, a vision came before her eyes of the birth of her child, and of her surroundings at the time, the anxious solicitude of a loving husband, the care of attendants who would be happy because she was happy, the congratulations of friends, and the smiles of the world. But above all, she pictured to herself her husband standing by her bedside with the child in his arms. The dream had been dreamed before, and was redreamed during every hour of the day. Lady Grant is strong, she continued, and can plead for me better than I could plead for myself. Plead for you? Why should there be anyone who wanted to plead for you? Will Lady Grant plead with you for her brother? It is not necessary. My own heart pleads for him. It is because he has been in the wrong that an intercessor is necessary for me. It is they who commit the injury that have a difficulty in forgiving. If he came to me, do you not know that I should throw myself into his arms and be the happiest woman in the world without a word spoken? The conversation was not then carried further, but Mrs. Holt continued to shake her head as she said at her knitting. In her estimation, no husband could have behaved worse than had her son-in-law. And she was of opinion that he should be punished for his misconduct before things could be made smooth again. Some days afterwards, Miss Artefiola called at the house and sent in a note while she stood waiting in the hall. In the note, she merely asked whether her dear Cecilia would be willing to receive her after what had passed. She had news to tell of much importance, and she hoped that her dear Cecilia would receive her. There had been no absolute quarrel, no quarrel known to the servants, and Cecilia did receive her. Oh my dear, she said, bustling into the room with an air of affected importance. You will be surprised. I think that you must be surprised at what I have to tell you. I will be surprised if you wish it, said Cecilia. Let me first begin by assuring you that you must not make light of my news. It is of the greatest importance, not only to me, but of some importance also to you. It shall be of importance. Because you begin with that little sneer which has become so common with you. You must be aware of it amidst the troubles of your own life, which we all admit to be very grievous. There has come upon you a way of thinking that no one else's affairs can be of any importance. I'm not aware of it. It is so little, and pray believe me that I am not in the least angry about it. I knew that it would be so when I came to you this morning, and yet I could not help coming. Indeed, as the thing has now been made known to the Dean's family, I could not bear that you should be left any longer in ignorance. What is the thing? There it is again, that sneer I cannot tell you unless you will interest yourself. Does nothing interest you now beyond your own misfortunes? Alas, no, I fear not. But this shall interest you. You must be awaked to the affairs of the world. Especially such an affair as this, you must be shaken up. This, I suppose, will shake you up. If not, you must be past all hope. What on earth is it? Sir Francis Geraldine. You've heard it in a rate of Sir Francis Geraldine. Well, yes, I have not yet forgotten the name. I should think not. Sir Francis Geraldine has, and then she paused again. Cut his little finger, said Cecilia. Had she dreamed of what was to come, she would not have turned Sir Francis into ridicule. But she had been aware of Ms. Altifurla's friendship with Sir Francis, or rather what she had regarded as an affection of friendship, and it did not, for a moment, anticipate such a communication as was to be made to her. Cecilia Holt. That, at any rate, is not my name. I daresay you wish it were. I would not change my real name for that of any woman under the sun. Perhaps not. But there are other women in a position of less grandeur. I am going to change mine. No. I thought you would be surprised, because it would look as though I were about to abandon my great doctrine. It is not so. My opinions on that great subject are not in the least changed, but of course there must be some women whom the exigencies of the world will require to marry a good many first and last. About the good many I do not at this moment concern myself. My duty is clearly before me, and I mean to perform it. I have been asked to ally myself. Then there was a pause, and the speaker discovered when it was too late that she was verging on the ridiculous in declaring her purpose of forming an alliance. That is to say, I am going to marry Sir Francis Geraldine. Sir Francis Geraldine, do you see any just cause or impediment? Not in the least, and yet how am I to answer such a question? I saw cause or impediment why I should not marry him. You both saw it, I suppose, said Miss Altifiola, with an air of grandeur. You both suppose that you were not made for each other, and wisely determined to give up the idea. You did not remain single, and I suppose we need not either. Certainly not for my sake. Our intimacy since that time has been increased by circumstances, and we have now discovered that we can both of us best suit our own interests by an alliance suggested Mrs. Weston. If you please, though I am quite aware that you use the term as a sneer, after this Mrs. Weston was too honest to deny the truth, and remain silent. I thought it proper, continued Miss Altifiola, as we had been so long friends to inform you that it will be so. You had your chance, and as you let it slip, I trust that you will not envy me, mine, not in the least. At any rate, you do not congratulate me. I have been very remiss, I acknowledge it. But upon my word the news has so startled me that I have been unable to remember the common courtesies of the world. I thought, when I heard of your traveling up to London together, that you were becoming very intimate. Oh, it had been never so much before that, the intimacy at least. Of course, I did not know him before he came to this house, but a great many things have happened since that. Have they not? Well, goodbye, dear. I have no doubt we shall continue as friends, especially as we shall be living almost in the neighborhood. Castle Gerald is to be at once fitted up for me, and I hope you will forget all our little tiffs, and often come and stay with me. So saying, Miss Altifiola, having told her grand news, made her adieu, and went away. A great many things have happened since that, said Cecilia, repeating to herself her friend's words. It seemed to her to be so many that a lifetime had been wasted since Sir Francis had first come to that house. She had won the love of the best man she had ever known and married him, and had then lost his love. And now she had been left as a widowed wife with all the coming troubles of maternity on her head. She had understood well the ill-natured sarcasm of Miss Altifiola. We shall be living almost in the same neighborhood. Yes, if her separation from her husband was to be continued, then undoubtedly she would live at Exeter. And as far as the limits of the county were concerned, she would be the neighbor of the future Lady Geraldine. That she should ever willingly be found under the same roof with Sir Francis was, as she knew well, as impossible to Miss Altifiola as to herself. The invitation contained the sneer and was intended to contain it, but it created no anger. She too had sneered at Miss Altifiola quite as bitterly. They had each learned to despise the other and not to sneer was impossible. Miss Altifiola had come to tell of her triumph and to sneer in return. But it mattered nothing. What did matter was whether that threat should come true. Should she always be left living at Exeter with her mother? Then she dreamed her dream again that he had come back to her and was sitting by her bedside with his hand in hers and whispering sweet words to her, while a baby was lying in her arms, his child. As she thought of the bliss of the fancied moment, the still possible bliss, her anger, seemed to fade away. What would she not do to bring him back? What would she not say? She had done a miss in keeping that secret so long. And though the punishment had been severe, it was not altogether undeserved. It had come to him as a terrible blow, and he had been unable to suppress his agony. He should not have treated her so. No, he should not have sent her away. But she could make excuses now, which put a few weeks since seen to her to be impossible. And she understood. She told herself that she understood the difference between herself as a woman and him as a man. He had a right to command, a right to be obeyed, a right to be mastered. He had a right to know all the secrets of her heart and to be offended when one so important had been kept from him. He had lifted his hand in great wrath, and the blow he had struck had been awful. But she would bear it without a word of complaint, if only he would come back to her. As she thought of it, she declared to herself that she must die if he did not come back, to live as she was living now, would be impossible to her. But if he would come back, how absolutely would she disregard all that the world might say as to their short quarrel. It would indeed be known to all the world, but what could the world do to her if she once again had her husband by her side? When the blow first fell on her, she had thought much of the ignominy which had befallen her, and which must ever rest with her, even though she should be taken back again. People would know that she had been discarded, but now she told herself that for that she cared not at all. Then she again dreamed her dream. Her child was born, and her husband was standing by her with that sweet manly smile upon his face. She put out her hand as though he would touch it, and was conscious of an involuntary movement as though she were bending her face towards him for a kiss. Surely he would come to her. His sister had gone to him, and would have told him the absolute truth. She had never sinned against him, even by intentional silence. There had been no thought of her since she had been his wife, which he had not been welcome to share. It had in truth been for his sake, rather than for her own, that she had been silent. She was aware that from cowardice her silence had been prolonged, but surely now at last he would forgive her that offense. Then she thought of the words she would use as she owned her fault. He was a man, and as a man had a right to expect that she would confess it. If he would come to her and stand once again with his arm round her waist, she would confess it. My dear, here is a letter. The postman has just brought it. She took the letter from her mother's hand, and hardly knew whether to be pleased or disappointed when she found that the address was in the handwriting of Lady Grant. Lady Grant would, of course, write whether with good news or with bad. The address told her nothing, but yet she could not tear the envelope. Well, my dear, what is it? said her mother. Why don't you open it? She turned a soft, supplicating, painful look up to her mother's face as she begged for grace. I will go upstairs, mama. It will tell you by and by. Then she left the room with the letter unopened in her hand. It was with difficulty that she could examine its contents. So apprehensive was she, and yet so hopeful, so confident at one moment of her coming happiness, and yet so fearful at another that she should be again enveloped in the darkness of her misery. But she did at last persuade herself to read the words which Lady Grant had written. They were very short and ran as follows. My dear Cecilia, my brother returns with me, and will at once go down to Exeter. The shock of her joy was so great that she could hardly see what followed. He will hope to reach that place on the fifteenth by the train, which leaves London at nine in the morning. That was all, but that was enough. She was sure that he would not come with the purpose of telling her that he must again leave her. And she was sure also that if he would once put himself within the sphere of her personal influence, it should be so used that he would never leave her again. Of course he's coming. I knew he would come. Why should he not come? This she exclaimed to her mother, and then went on to speak of him with a wild rhapsody of joy, as though there had hardly been any breach in her happiness. And she continued to sing the praises of her husband till Mrs. Holt hardly knew how to bear her enthusiasm in a fitting mood. For she, who was not in love, still thought that this man's conduct had been scandalous, wicked, and cruel. And if to be forgiven, only to be forgiven because of the general wickedness and cruelty of man. It had not been without great difficulty that Lady Grant induced her brother to assent to her writing the letter which has been given above. When he had agreed to return with her to England, he had no doubt assented to her assertion that he was bound to take his wife back again, even without any confession. And this had been so much to gain, had been so felt to be the one only material point necessary, that he was not pressed as to his manner of doing it. But before they reached London, it was essential that some arrangement should be made for bringing them together. Could not I go down to Dyrton, he had said, and could not she come to me there? No doubt he might have gone to Dyrton, and no doubt she would have gone to him if asked. She would have flown to him at Dresden or to Jerusalem at a word spoken by him. Absence had made him so precious to her that she would have obeyed the slightest behest with joy as long as the order given were to bring them once more together. But of this Lady Grant was not aware, and had she been so, the sense of what was becoming would have restrained her. I think, George, that you had better go to Exeter, she said. Should we not be more comfortable at Dyrton? I think that when at Dyrton you will be more happy if you shall yourself have fetched her from her mother's home. I think you owe it to your wife to go to her and make the journey with her. What is your objection? I do not wish to be seen in Exeter, he replied. Nor did she, you may be sure, when she returned there alone. But what does it matter? If you can be happy in once more possessing her, it cannot signify who shall see you. There can be nothing to be ashamed of in going for your wife, nor can any evil happen to you. As this thing is to be done, that it be done in a noble spirit. End of Chapter 22. Chapter 23 of Captain the Dark. This is a LibriVox recording. All LibriVox recordings are in the public domain. For more information or to volunteer, please visit LibriVox.org, reading by Matt Perard. Kept in the Dark by Anthony Trollop. Chapter 26 Sir Francis' Escape When she had told the Dean's family, and Mrs. Green and Cecilia, Mrs. Altie Viarla began to feel that there was no longer a secret worth the keeping. And indeed it became necessary to her happiness to divulge this great step in life, which she was about to take. She had written very freely and very frequently to Sir Francis, and Sir Francis, to tell the truth, had not responded in the same spirit. She had received but two answers to six letters, and each answer had been conveyed in about three lines. There had been no expressions from him of confiding love, nor any pressing demand for an immediate marriage. They had all been commenced without even naming her, and had been finished by the simple signature of his initials. But to Miss Altie Viarla they had been satisfactory. She knew how silly she would be to expect from such an one as her intended husband, long epistles, such as a schoolgirl would require, and in order to keep him true to her, had determined to let him know how little exacting she was inclined to be. She would willingly do all the preliminary writing if only she could secure her position as Lady Geraldine. She wrote such letters, letters so full of mingled wit and love and fun, that she was sure that he must take delight in reading them. Easy reading requires hard writing, she said to herself, as she copied for the third time one of her epistles, and copied it studiously in such handwriting that it should look to have been the very work of negligence. In all this she had been successful, as she thought, and told herself over and over again how easy it was for a clever woman to make captive a man of mark, provided that she set herself assiduously to the task. She soon descended from her friends to the shopkeepers, and found that her news was received very graciously by the mercantile interests of the city. The milleners, the haberdashers, the furriers, and the bootmakers of Exeter, received her communication and her orders with pleased alacrity. With each of them she held a little secret conference, telling each with a smiling whisper what fate was about to do for her. To even the upholsterers, the bankers, the hotel keepers, and the owners of post horses, she was communicative, making every one the gratified recipient of her tidings. Thus, in a short time, all Exeter knew that Sir Francis Geraldine was about to lead to the hymenial altar, Miss Alti Fiora, and it must be acknowledged that all Exeter expressed various opinions on the subject. They who understood that Miss Alti Fiora was to pay for the supplies ordered out of her own pocket, declared for the most part how happy a man was Sir Francis, but those who could only look to Sir Francis for possible future custom were surprised that the baronet should have allowed himself to be so easily caught, and then the aristocracy expressed its opinion, which it must be acknowledged was for the most part hostile to Miss Alti Fiora. It was well known through the city that the dean had declared that he would never again see his brother-in-law at the denary. And it was whispered that the Reverend Dr. Pigram, one of the cannons, had stated, quote, that no one in the least knew where Miss Alti Fiora had come from, unquote. This hit Miss Alti Fiora very hard, so much so that she felt herself obliged to write an indignant letter to Dr. Pigram, giving it length her entire pedigree. To this Dr. Pigram made a reply as follows, quote, Dr. Pigram's compliments to Miss Alti Fiora and is happy to learn the name of her great-grandmother, unquote. Dr. Pigram was supposed to be a wag, and the letter soon became the joint property of all the ladies in the clothes. This interfered much with Miss Alti Fiora's happiness. She even went across to Cecilia, complaining of the great injustice done to her by the cathedral clergyman, generally. Men from whom one should expect charity instead of scandal, but that their provincial ignorance is so narrow. Then she went on to remind Cecilia how much older was the Roman branch of her family than even the blood of the Geraldines. You oughtn't to have talked about it, said Cecilia, who in her present state of joy did not much mind Miss Alti Fiora and her husband. Do you suppose that I intend to be married under a bushel, said Miss Alti Fiora, grandly? But this little episode only tended to renew the feeling of enmity between the ladies. But there appeared a paragraph in the Western Telegraph which drove Miss Alti Fiora nearly mad. It is understood that one of the aristocracy in this county is soon about to be married to a lady who has long lived among us in Exeter. Sir Francis Geraldine is the happy man, and Miss Alti Fiora is the lady about to become Lady Geraldine. Miss Alti Fiora is descended from an Italian family of considerable note in its own country. Her great-grandmother was a fiasco, and her great-great-grandmother a dysgrasia. We are delighted to find that Sir Francis is to ally himself to a lady of such high birth. Now Miss Alti Fiora was well aware that there was an old feud between Sir Francis and the Western Telegraph, and she observed also that the paper made allusion to the very same relatives whom she had named in her unfortunate letter to Dr. Pigram. The vulgarity of the people of this town is quite unbearable, she exclaimed, to Mrs. Green. But when she was left alone she had once wrote a funnier letter than ever to Sir Francis. It might be that Sir Francis should not see the paragraph at any rate, she did not mention it. But unfortunately Sir Francis did see the paragraph, and unfortunately also he had not appreciated the wit of Miss Alti Fiora's letters. Oh, laws, he had been hard to ejaculate on receipt of a former letter. It's the kind of thing a man has to put up with when he gets married, said Captain McCullough, a gentleman who had already in some sort succeeded Dick Ross. I don't suppose you think a man ever ought to be married. Quite the contrary, when a man has a property he must be married. I suppose I shall have the McCullough Acres some of these days myself. The McCullough Acres were said to lie somewhere in Caithness, but no one knew their exact locality. But a man will naturally put off the evil day as long as he can. I should have thought that you might have allowed yourself to run another five years, yet the flattery did touch Sir Francis, and he began to ask himself whether he had gone too far with Miss Alti Fiora. Then came the western telegraph, and he told himself that he had gone too far. By God, she has told everybody in that beastly hole, said he. The beastly hole was intended to represent Exeter. Of course she has. You didn't suppose but that she would begin to wear her honor and glory as soon as they were wearable. She pledged herself not to mention it to a single soul, said Sir Francis. Upon this Captain McCullough merely shrugged his shoulders. I'm damned if I put up with it. Look here. All her filthy progenitors put into the newspaper to show how grand she is. I shouldn't care so very much about that, said the cautious Captain, who began to perceive that he need not be especially bitter against the lady. You're not going to marry her? Well, no, that's true. Nor am I, said Sir Francis, with an air of great decision. She hasn't got a word of mine in writing to show, not a word that would go for anything with a jury. Hasn't she indeed? Not a word. I have taken precious good care of that. Between you and me, I don't mind acknowledging it, but it had never come to more than that. Then in fact you are not bound to her. No, I am not. Not what I call bound. She's a handsome woman, you know. Very handsome. I suppose so. And she'd do the drawing room well, and the sitting at the top of the table, and all that kind of thing. But it's such a ducent heavy price to pay, said Captain McCullough. I should not have minded the price, said Sir Francis, not quite understanding his friend's remark. If she hadn't made me ridiculous in this way, the fiascos and the discrasias, what the devil are they to our old English families? If she had let it remain as it was, I might have gone through with it. But as she has told all Exeter and got that stuff put into the newspapers, she must take the consequences. One is worse than another, as far as I can see. By this Sir Francis intended to express his opinion. That Miss Altifiorla was at any rate quite as bad as Cecilia Holt. But the next thing to be decided was the mode of escape. Though Sir Francis had declared that he was not what he called a bound, yet he knew that he must take some steps in the matter to show that he considered himself to be free. And as the Captain was a clever man, and well conversant with such things, he was consulted. I should say, take a run abroad for a short time, said the Captain. Is that necessary? You'd avoid some of the disagreeables. People will talk, and your relatives at Exeter might kick up a row. Oh, damn my relatives. With all my heart. But people have such a way of making themselves disgusting. What do you say to taking a run through the states? Would you go with me? asked the Baronette. If you wish it, I shouldn't mind, said the Captain considerably, only to do any good we should be off quickly. But you must write to someone first. Before I start, you think? Oh yes, certainly. If she didn't hear from you before you went, you'd be persecuted by her letters. There is no end to her letters. I've quite made up my mind what I'll do about them. I won't open one of them. After all, why should she write to me when the affair is over? You've heard Mrs. Western, I suppose. Yes, I've heard of her. I didn't write to her when that affair was over. I didn't pester her with long-winded scrawls. She changed her mind. And I've changed mine. And so we're equal. I've paid her and she can pay me if she knows how. I hope Miss Altifiora will look at it in the same light, said the Captain. Why shouldn't she? She knew all about it when that other affair came to an end. I wasn't treated with any particular ceremony. The truth is, people don't look at these things now as they used to do. Men and women mostly do as they like till they're absolutely fixed themselves. There used to be duels and all that kind of nonsense. There is none of that now. No, you won't get shot. I don't mind being shot any more than another man, but you must take the world as you find it. One young woman treated me awfully rough to tell the truth. And why am I not to treat another just as roughly? If you look at it all round, you'll see that I have used them just as they have used me. At any rate, said Captain McCullough after a pause, if you have made up your mind, you'd better write the letter. Sir Francis did not see the expediency of writing the letter immediately, but at last he gave way to his friend's arguments. And he did so the more readily as his friend was there to write the letter for him. After some attempts on his own part, he put the writing of the letter into the hands of the Captain, and left him alone for an entire morning to perform the task. The letter, when it was sent, after many corrections and revises, ran as follows. My dear Miss Alte Fiorlo, I think that I am bound in honor without a moment's delay to make you aware of the condition of my mind in regard to marriage. I ain't quite sure, but what I shall be better without it altogether. I'd rather marry her twice over than let my cousin have the title and the property, said the baronet, with energy. Needing teller that, said McCullough. Of course, when you've cleared the ground in this quarter, you can't begin again with another lady. I think that perhaps I may have expressed myself badly, so as to warrant you in understanding more than I have meant. If so, I am sure the fault has been mine, and I am very sorry for it. Things have turned up, with which I need not, perhaps, trouble you, and compel me to go for a while to a very distant country. I shall be off almost before I can receive a reply to this letter. Indeed, I may be gone before an answer can reach me, but I have thought it right not to let a post go by without informing you of my decision. I have seen that article in the Exeter newspaper respecting your family in Italy, and think it must be very gratifying to you. I did understand, however, that not a word was to have been spoken. As to the matter, nothing had escaped from me at any rate. I fear that some of your intimate friends at Exeter must have been indiscreet. Believe me yours, with the most sincere admiration, Francis Geraldine. He was not able to start for America immediately after writing this, but he quitted his lodge in Scotland, leaving no immediate address, and bid himself for a while among his London clubs, where he trusted that the lady might not find him. In a week's time he would be off to the United States. Who shall picture the rage of Miss Alti Fiora when she received this letter? This was the very danger which she had feared, but had hardly thought it worth her while to fear. It was the one possible breakdown in her triumph. But, had been, she thought, so unlikely as to be hardly possible. But now, on reading the letter, she felt that no redress was within her reach. To whom should she go for succor? Though her ancestors had been so noble, she had no one near her to take up the cudgels on her behalf. With her friends in Exeter, she had become a little proud of late, so that she had turned from her those who might have assisted her. The coward, she said to herself, the base coward, he dares to treat me in this way because he knows that I am alone. Then she became angry in her heart against Cecilia, who she felt had set a dangerous example in this practice of jilding. Had Cecilia not treated Sir Francis so unceremoniously, he certainly would not have dared to so, to treat her. There was truth in this, as in that case Sir Francis would at this moment have been the husband of Mrs. Western, but what should she do? She took out every scrap of letter that she had received from the man and read each scrap with the greatest care. In the one letter, there certainly was an offer very plainly made, as he had intended it, but she doubted whether she could depend upon it in a court of law. Don't you think that you and I know each other well enough to make a match of it? It was certainly written as an offer, and her two answers to him would make it plain that it was so. But she had an idea that she would not be allowed to use her own letters against him, and then to have her gushing words read as a reply to so cold a proposition would be death to her. There was not another syllable in the whole correspondence written by him to signify that he had, in truth, intended to become her husband. She felt sure that he had been wickedly crafty in the whole matter, and had learned her on to expose herself in her innocence. But what should she do? Should she write to him an epistle full of tenderness? She felt sure that it would be altogether ineffectual. Should she fill sheets with indignation? It would be of no use unless she could follow up her indignation by strong measures. Should she let the thing pass by in silence as though she and Sir Francis had never known each other? She would certainly do so, but that she had allowed her matrimonial prospects to become common through all Exeter. She must also let Exeter know how badly Sir Francis intended to treat her. To her, too, the idea of a prolonged sojourn in the United States presented itself. In former days there had come upon her a great longing to lecture at Chicago, at St. Paul's and Omaha, on the distinctive duties of the female sex. Now again, the idea returned to her. She had thought that in one of those large Western halls full of gas and intelligence she could rise to the height of her subject with a tremendous eloquence, but then would knock the name of Sir Francis, travel with her, and crush her. She did resolve upon informing Mrs. Green. She took three days to think of it, and then she sent for Mrs. Green. Of all human beings, she said, you, I think, are the truest to me. Mrs. Green, of course, expressed herself as much flattered, and therefore I will tell you no false pride shall operate with me to make me hold my tongue. Of all the false deceivers that have ever broken a woman's heart, that man is the basest and the falsest. In this way she let all Exeter know that she was not to be married to Sir Francis Geraldine. And another paragraph appeared in the Western Telegraph declaring that, after all, Sir Francis Geraldine was not to be allied to the fiascos and the discrazias of Rome.