The Ladies Lindores. Mrs. Oliphant
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night and get no dancing?"
It was on this occasion that Miss Barbara Erskine won the heart of the persecuted girl. She said to her in a strong whisper which went through Carry's ear like a—skewer (the simile is undignified, but suits the fact)—"My dear, there's that eediot, Jean Sempill, drawing attention to you. If you want to get out of the way, slip away behind me; there's a door there that leads into the corridor, and so you can get back to your mother. Stay by your mother—that's your safest way." Thus Carry was delivered for the moment. But, alas! her mother could not protect her effectually. When Pat Torrance came boldly up with his dark face glowing, and his projecting eyes ready, as a spectator remarked, to jump out of his head, and said, "This is our dance," what could any one do for her? Lady Lindores had become alarmed, not knowing what to make of Carry's agitation; but even a mother in these circumstances can do so little. "I am afraid she is tired, Mr. Torrance," Lady Lindores said; but Carry's arm was already in his. She had not presence of mind even to take the advantage of such an excuse.
When he brought her back, however, to her mother's side, nobody could have helped seeing that something had happened. Poor Carry was as white as her dress: she seemed scarcely able to hold herself upright, and sank down by her mother's side as if she neither saw nor heard anything that was going on round her. On the other hand, Pat Torrance was crimson, his eyes were rolling in his head. He said almost roughly—"You were right, Lady Lindores. Lady Car is tired; but I make no doubt she will be herself again to-morrow." It was a curious speech to make, and there was a tone of threatening and anger in his somewhat elevated voice which roused the liveliest displeasure in the mind of Lady Lindores; but he was gone before she could say anything. "What is the matter?" she said, taking her daughter's hand. "Rouse yourself, Carry; everybody is staring. What has happened?" "Oh, nothing, nothing! Oh, mamma, let us go home," the poor girl cried. Her lips, her very eyelids, trembled. She looked as if she were about to faint. Lady Lindores was glad to see her husband approaching; but he too had a threatening and stern look. She called him to her, and begged him to ask for the carriage. "Carry is quite ill," she said. "If you will stay with Edith, I can send it back for you;—but poor Car has looked like a ghost all night." "She has looked much more like a fool—as she is," said her father, between his set teeth; but at last he consented that she should be taken home, seeing the state of collapse in which she was. He took her down-stairs, supporting her on his arm, which was necessary, as she could scarcely walk; but when they skirted the dance, in which the master of the house was performing, talking loudly and laughing with forced merriment all the time the Earl, though he was a well-bred man, could not help giving his daughter's arm a sharp pressure, which hurt her. "I might have known you would behave like a fool," he said in a low undertone, which nobody but Carry could hear. She wavered for a moment, like a young tree in the wind, but clung to him and hurried past replying nothing. Lady Lindores following, formed her own conclusions, though she did not hear what her husband said. She took her child into her arms when they were safe in the carriage, rolling along the dark roads in the dimness of the summer night, and Carry cried and sobbed on her mother's breast. "I understand that you have refused him," Lady Lindores said. "But what then? Why should you be so wretched about it, Carry? It is a kind of vanity to be so sorry for the man. You may be sure Mr. Torrance will get over it, my love."
Then Carry managed to stammer forth the real source of her terror. She was not thinking of Mr. Torrance, but of papa. What would he say to her? would he ever forgive her? And then it was Lady Lindores's turn to be amazed. "My darling, you must compose yourself," she said; "this is greater nonsense than the other. Papa! What can it matter to your father? He will never force your inclinations; and how can this coarse bumpkin interest such a man as he is?" She became almost angry at the sight of Carry's tears. "Allow me to know your father a little better than you do," she cried. "Mr. Torrance! who is Mr. Torrance? I can't believe that he would favour such a suitor for a moment. But supposing that he did so—supposing he thought, as people are apt to do, that money covers a multitude of sins—your father is not a worldly-minded man, Carry; he is ambitious, but not for money—supposing just for the sake of argument——Anyhow, my dear, that could only be if the man happened to please you in his own person. We might like the match better because the pretender was rich, nothing more. Can you really think that papa would be a tyrant to you—that he would compel you to marry any one? Carry, my love, you have got an attack of the nerves; it is your good sense that has given way."
Carry wept abundantly while her mother thus talked to her, and the agitation which she had so long shut up in her heart calmed down. Every word Lady Lindores said was perfectly reasonable, and to have represented her kind father to herself as a domestic tyrant was monstrous, she felt; but yet—she could not tell her mother all the trifling circumstances, the tones, the looks which had forced that conviction upon her. But she was willing, very willing, to allow herself to be persuaded that it was all a mistake, and to accept the gentle reproof and banter with which Lady Lindores soothed her excitement. "To refuse a man is always disagreeable," she said, philosophically, "especially as one must always feel one is to blame in letting him come the length of a proposal, and self-esteem whispers that he will find it hard to console himself. No, my Carry, no; don't distress yourself too much. I don't want to be cynical; but men of Mr. Torrance's type soon console themselves. Men have died and worms have eaten them, but not for love."
"It is not that, it is not that," Carry protested among her tears.
But her mother would hear of nothing more alarming. "It is a wrong to your father to think he would take up the cause of such a man," she said, indignantly; "and I should have been horribly disappointed in you, Carry, if you had thought of him for a moment." Carry was so soothed, so comforted, so almost happy in her trouble, that the inmost doors of her heart opened to her mother. "Whatever he had been, oh, mother, do you think I could forget Edward?" she said. His name had not been mentioned between them for months before.
"Edward," said Lady Lindores, shaking her head; and then she kissed the pleading expectant face, which she could only feel, not see. "He should have showed more energy, Carry. Had he been worthy of you, he would not have left this question unsettled till now."
"What could he do?" cried Carry, roused out of her prostration; "he could not invent business for himself." Again Lady Lindores shook her head; but by this time they had reached their own door, and in the fervour of her defence and championship of her lover, Carry got out of the carriage a very different creature from the prostrate and fainting girl who had been put into it at Tinto. She went with her mother to her room, feverish and anxious to plead the cause of Edward. Lady Lindores was a romantic woman, who believed in love, and had taught her children to do the same. But she was disappointed that her daughter's lover had not been inspired by his love; that he had not found success, and secured his own cause beyond the power of evil fortune. Arguing against this adverse opinion, and defending Edward on every question, Carry recovered her courage and her composure. She felt able to fight for him to her last gasp when she left her mother, shaking her head still, but always well disposed to every generous plea; for the moment she had forgotten all the nearer dangers which had seemed so terrible to her an hour before.
Lady Lindores sat up in her dressing-gown till her husband and Edith came back. He was very gloomy, she excited and breathless, with a feverish sparkle in her eyes, which her mother noticed for the first time. She wondered if little Edith was in the secret too—that secret which she had herself scarcely thought of till to-night; and her husband's aspect filled her with strange anxieties. Was it possible that she, who had known them so long, her husband for all the most important time of his life, her child since her first breath, should have discoveries to make in them now? The thought was painful to her, and she tried to dismiss it from her mind. "Carry is better," she said, with an attempt to treat the subject lightly. "It was the glare of these rooms, I suppose. They are very handsome, but there was too much heat and too much light."
"I hope it is the last time we shall have any such scenes from Carry," said the Earl. "You ought to speak to her very seriously. She has been behaving like a fool."
"Dear Robert," said Lady Lindores, "it is trying to a girl of any feeling to have a proposal made to her in a ball-room, and I daresay Mr. Torrance was rude and pressing. It is exactly what I should have expected of him."
"Since when," said the Earl, sternly, "have you studied Mr. Torrance