MISS MARLYN INQUIRES.
AT the beginning of the present chapter it was very late. The old clock at the stair-head of Raby had struck twelve some time ago. Agnes Marlyn had been sitting up in Rachel’s room, gossiping with her about many things, as young ladies will sit up together sometimes in a chatty mood; still she was there, narrating French adventures and experiences, describing rural scenes and school vexations, happy hours and regrets, tyrants, and friends, oh! so dear, and all the story tinged with that sentiment, so sad and pure, which she knew how, with tones and looks, almost without the help of words, to shed, like a sunset light, over her little gossipings.
She had now got up to bid her companion good night, for the twentieth time, yet she still hesitated for a moment.
“So there is some one coming here — have you heard?” asked Agnes, as she stood by the little dressing-table in Rachel’s room.
“Yes, Sir Roke Wycherly,” answered the girl. “Sir Roke Wycherly!” repeated Miss Marlyn, slowly; “what a very odd name!”
“Yes, an odd name,” answered Rachel, who was brushing her rich fair hair before the glass, “and, I fancy, an odd person, too.”
“Ha, ha! there are so many odd persons in England,” said Agnes Marlyn. “Sir Roke Wycherley: — an old friend of your papa’s, I dare say?”
“An old friend! yes, a cousin. They were at Eton together, mamma says, and he’s an invalid.”
“A cousin?”
“Yes; some kind of cousin. I suppose, having been schoolfellows, he and papa are very fond of one another.”
“I am sorry he’s coming,” said Miss Marlyn. “Why? What are you afraid of?” said Rachel, gaily. “I think it a blessing — I really do: quite a mercy anyone coming; although, I dare say I shall be horribly afraid of him; but I’m very glad, for all that.”
“I am sorry,” repeated Agnes Marlyn.
“And why?” reiterated Rachel.
“Why? I don’t know: that is, I do know.”
“Well?” said Rachel, looking over her shoulder, and expecting an explanation.
Agnes laughed suddenly, paused, and then said, in her usual tone:
“I am sorry, and I’ll tell you why. I like quiet; I love this so quiet place; I love you; I love your mamma; there is no one coming can make it happier.”
“And do you like papa?” asked Miss Rachel, a little abruptly.
Agnes Marlyn looked at her rather oddly, and laughed again. The girl was looking at herself straight and frankly in the glass as she arranged her soft golden hair.
“Your papa! I am sure he is a good man, but I cannot say I like him, for I do not know him: and, to say truth, I think I am a little afraid of him — and so are you, are you not?”
“I am afraid of him. I always was; and yet he never was cruel — no, of course, not cruel! — I mean, he never was harsh; he was never unkind to me,” said Rachel.
“Nor ever kind,” said Agnes Marlyn, and laughed once more.
“He’s so clever!” said Rachel.
“How do you know? He never speaks to you,” said Miss Marlyn.
“Mamma says — that’s how I know — he was quite different when he was young: very gay.”
“Gay, was he?”
“Gay spirits, I mean — a witty man — and very much admired; but, you know, those creditors — who are always distracting him about money — they have made him so gloomy: things they call mortgages. Horrid cruelty, I call it, to torment a fellow creature the way mamma says they worry papa!” said Miss Rachel, with spirit.
“Nine men out of ten have debts, dear,” said Miss Marlyn. “He ought to be happy: he loves you and your mamma very much.” Miss Rachel looked round from the glass upon her handsome companion. She saw nothing in her countenance but a listless melancholy.
“Yes, of course, he loves mamma very much, and that, I dare say, makes him suffer more, because he knows she must suffer with him.”
“That is very generous,” said Agnes Marlyn. Again Rachel looked at her, but no sign of irony appearing, she turned again to her glass, and a little silence ensued.
“But, my dear Rachel,” resumed Agnes Marlyn, “though he is so generous— “
“I did not say he’s generous, though I dare say he is,” said Rachel; “of course he is — too generous, or he would not be so much worried with debts as he is.”
“Well, I mean so good, and all that; yet, I think he is a very stern man; and you must not be angry, but I am always afraid of him, and would rather not see him coming — would rather not meet him, and I never feel quite at ease while he is in the room.”
Another pause followed.
“And you are afraid, also,” added Miss Marlyn.
“I said so — yes — but afraid is hardly the right word; it is more a strangeness. When I was a little thing, I was always told to be silent when he was in the room; as long as I can remember, he was always melancholy and— “
“Cross,” suggested Miss Marlyn.
“Cross. No,” replied Rachel, whose pride was touched by this girl’s daring to criticise her papa so boldly; “he has a great deal to vex him, and — and — let us talk of something else.”
“Well, Rachel, we are very happy here: I love this old place, so grand and forlorn, for I, too, am a melancholy person like your papa, more perhaps, and I love this solitary Raby better, I dare say, than he does; I love you, Rachel, as I said, and I love your mamma; I wonder does she love — no, not love — like me!” There was inquiry in Miss Marlyn’s plaintive tone, but it was like the inquiry of a soliloquy, in low and dreamy notes, with her fine eyes lowered to the table, and her pretty hand to her chin.
There came a little silence here. There were moments when Rachel felt oddly towards this young governess, a disposition to challenge and snub her suddenly. Why should there be loving and liking so soon? what, in seven months’ time, had she done for them, or they for her, that could found a serious sentiment of that kind? Was it a suspicion of a sham, with the impatience that accompanies it? She could not tell; only, having finished the arrangement of her hair, she leaned back in her chair, with her chin a little raised and her eyes nearly closed, and answered nothing.
Miss Marlyn sighed softly, and looked full and sadly on her pupil, and said, as if she had divined what was in her mind:
“I am, perhaps, a fool to talk of loving and liking.”
“I don’t expect you to like me much, or love me at all, on so short an acquaintance, said Rachel.
“Yes, that is true; you are all so good to me, I forget how short it is: it is gratitude that makes attachment in a day. I owe it all to you; you can owe none to me — so it is.”
Agnes Marlyn said this with a sad sort of sincerity, that touched the girl, who opened her blue eyes, and placed her hand kindly on that of her governess.
“What can put such things in your head? — you are not to talk so,” said Rachel, repentant.
“And I shall leave you soon — yes — yes, dear, not voluntarily, but it must be; you cannot long need a governess, in effect — it is almost time I should go.”
“But I must have some friend with me here always, mamma says, and she would prefer you to any other — she says so, and so should I, Pucelle,” answered Rachel; “therefore you are not to fancy that, because I have no sentiment, I don’t like people, for I like you — I do, indeed; I like you very much.”
“No sentiment! I fancied the same of myself once,” said Miss Marlyn, “but it needed only time and affliction to prove to me that I had — time will make a like discovery to you, dear Rachel.”
“I hope not, Pucelle she called Agnes by that name, from a fancied resemblance to a pretty old print in her bedroom. “Mamma says that all romantic people are unhappy.”
“That is true,” said Miss Marlyn, with a sigh; “I am romantic; you are too young, dear Rachel, to understand the force of that word — I am unhappy — I care not for money — I care not for the world.”
“I like you the better for that, Pucelle,” said Rachel; “I hate to see people always making up sums, and counting their gains and losses; and, besides, the Bible says it’s wicked to love money, and I don’t know, really, why they do, or what they can want of all the money they are always wishing for.”
And Rachel thought over these propositions; being very young and innocent of tradesmen’s bills, and, I dare say, it was one of her axioms that one’s house, and one’s meals, and all that sort of common-place, came by nature.
“Yes, I have been a fool; I have lived too much from my heart, too little from my head. It is very necessary to be a little selfish. I will try; but, hélas! I know I shall not be able — so impetuous! — so volatile! so foolish!” and, with these words, Miss Marlyn stamped her foot lightly on the ground, and pressed her shut hand to her brow.
“Agnes, I think I’m like you, I’m sure I am,” said Rachel. “I know, at all events, I like you for that kind of feeling, and I hope you may never succeed in changing your character. Don’t try; you’ll only injure it.”
“Ah! thank heaven, then, there is one person on earth who does understand me. Yes, Rachel, you do. Good night, dearest; it is very late.” And with a kiss, she hurried from the room.