The Way We Live Now (91 page)

‘I have come because I thought I could do some good,' she said, trembling with anger and fear. ‘I was speaking to your daughter at your party.'

‘Oh, you were there; – were you? It may be as you say, but how is one to tell? When one has been deceived like that, one is apt to be suspicious, Miss Carbury.' Here was one who had spent his life in lying to the world, and who was in his very heart shocked at the atrocity of a man who had lied to him! ‘You are not plotting another journey to Liverpool – are you?' To this Hetta could make no answer. The insult was too much, but alone, unsupported, she did not know how to give him back scorn for scorn. At last he proposed to take her across to Bruton Street himself, and at his bidding she walked by his side. ‘May I hear what you say to her?' he asked.

‘If you suspect me, Mr Melmotte, I had better not see her at all. It is only that there may no longer be any doubt.'

‘You can say it all before me.'

‘No; – I could not do that. But I have told you, and you can say it for me. If you please, I think I will go home now.'

But Melmotte knew that his daughter would not believe him on such a subject. This girl she probably would believe. And though Melmotte himself found it difficult to trust anybody, he thought that there was more possible good than evil to be expected from the proposed interview. ‘Oh, you shall see her,' he said. ‘I don't suppose she's such a fool as to try that kind of thing again.' Then the door in Bruton Street was opened, and Hetta, repenting her mission, found herself almost pushed into the hall. She was bidden to follow Melmotte upstairs, and was left alone in the drawing-room, as she thought, for a long time. Then the door was slowly opened and Marie crept into the room. ‘Miss Carbury,' she said, ‘this is so good of you – so good of you! I do so love you for coming to me! You said you would love me. You will; will you not?' and Marie, sitting down by the stranger, took her hand and encircled her waist.

‘Mr Melmotte has told you why I have come.'

‘Yes; – that is, I don't know. I never believe what papa says to me.' To
poor Hetta such an announcement as this was horrible. ‘We are at daggers drawn. He thinks I ought to do just what he tells me, as though my very soul were not my own. I won't agree to that – would you?' Hetta had not come there to preach disobedience, but could not fail to remember at the moment that she was not disposed to obey her mother in an affair of the same kind. ‘What does he say, dear?'

Hetta's message was to be conveyed in three words, and when those were told, there was nothing more to be said. ‘It must all be over, Miss Melmotte.'

‘Is that his message, Miss Carbury?' Hetta nodded her head. ‘Is that all?'

‘What more can I say? The other night you told me to bid him send you word. And I thought he ought to do so. I gave him your message, and I have brought back the answer. My brother, you know, has no income of his own – nothing at all.'

‘But I have,' said Marie with eagerness.

‘But your father –'

‘It does not depend upon papa. If papa treats me badly, I can give it to my husband. I know I can. If I venture, cannot he?'

‘I think it is impossible.'

‘Impossible! Nothing should be impossible. All the people that one hears of that are really true to their loves never find anything impossible. Does he love me, Miss Carbury? It all depends on that. That's what I want to know.' She paused, but Hetta could not answer the question. ‘You must know about your brother. Don't you know whether he does love me? If you know I think you ought to tell me.' Hetta was still silent ‘Have you nothing to say?'

‘Miss Melmotte –' began poor Hetta very slowly.

‘Call me Marie. You said you would love me – did you not? I don't even know what your name is.'

‘My name is – Hetta.'

‘Hetta – that's short for something. But it's very pretty. I have no brother, no sister. And I'll tell you, though you must not tell anybody again – I have no real mother. Madame Melmotte is not my mamma, though papa chooses that it should be thought so.' All this she whispered, with rapid words, almost into Hetta's ear. ‘And papa is so cruel to me! He beats me sometimes.' The new friend, round whom Marie still had her arm, shuddered as she heard this. ‘But I never will yield a bit for that When he boxes and thumps me I always turn and gnash my teeth at him. Can you wonder that I want to have a friend? Can you be
surprised that I should be always thinking of my lover? But – if he doesn't love me, what am I to do then?'

‘I don't know what I am to say,' ejaculated Hetta amidst her sobs. Whether the girl was good or bad, to be sought or to be avoided, there was so much tragedy in her position that Hetta's heart was melted with sympathy.

‘I wonder whether you love anybody, and whether he loves you,' said Marie. Hetta certainly had not come there to talk of her own affairs, and made no reply to this. ‘I suppose you won't tell me about yourself.'

‘I wish I could tell you something for your own comfort.'

‘He will not try again, you think?'

‘I am sure he will not'.

‘I wonder what he fears. I should fear nothing – nothing. Why should not we walk out of the house, and be married any way. Nobody has a right to stop me. Papa could only turn me out of his house. I will venture if he will.'

It seemed to Hetta that even listening to such a proposition amounted to falsehood – to that guilt of which Mr Melmotte had dared to suppose that she could be capable. ‘I cannot listen to it Indeed I cannot listen to it. My brother is sure that he cannot – cannot –'

‘Cannot love me, Hetta! Say it out, if it is true.'

‘It is true,' said Hetta. There came over the face of the other girl a stern hard look, as though she had resolved at the moment to throw away from her all soft womanly things. And she relaxed her hold on Hetta's waist. ‘Oh, my dear, I do not mean to be cruel, but you ask me for the truth.'

‘Yes; I did.'

‘Men are not, I think, like girls.'

‘I suppose not,' said Marie slowly. ‘What liars they are, what brutes –what wretches! Why should he tell me lies like that? Why should he break my heart? That other man never said that he loved me. Did he never love me – once?'

Hetta could hardly say that her brother was incapable of such love as Marie expected, but she knew that it was so. ‘It is better that you should think of him no more.'

‘Are you like that? If you had loved a man and told him of it, and agreed to be his wife and done as I have, could you bear to be told to think of him no more – just as though you had got rid of a servant or a horse? I won't love him. No; – I'll hate him. But I must think of him. I'll marry that other man to spite him, and then, when he finds that we are rich, he'll be broken-hearted.'

‘You should try to forgive him, Marie.'

‘Never. Do not tell him that I forgive him. I command you not to tell him that. Tell him – tell him, that I hate him, and that if I ever meet him, I will look at him so that he shall never forget it I could – oh! –you do not know what I could do. Tell me – did he tell you to say that he did not love me?'

‘I wish I had not come,' said Hetta.

‘I am glad you have come. It was very kind. I don't hate you. Of course I ought to know. But did he say that I was to be told that he did not love me?'

‘No; – he did not say that.'

‘Then how do you know? What did he say?'

‘That it was all over.'

‘Because he is afraid of papa. Are you sure he does not love me?'

‘I am sure.'

‘Then he is a brute. Tell him that I say that he is a false-hearted liar, and that I trample him under my foot.' Marie as she said this thrust her foot upon the ground as though that false one were in truth beneath it –and spoke aloud, as though regardless who might hear her. ‘I despise him – despise him. They are all bad, but he is the worst of all. Papa beats me, but I can bear that. Mamma reviles me and I can bear that He might have beaten me and reviled me, and I could have borne it But to think that he was a liar all the time – that I can't bear.' Then she burst into tears. Hetta kissed her, tried to comfort her, and left her sobbing on the sofa.

Later in the day, two or three hours after Miss Carbury had gone, Marie Melmotte, who had not shown herself at luncheon, walked into Madame Melmotte's room, and thus declared her purpose. ‘You can tell papa that I will marry Lord Nidderdale whenever he pleases.' She spoke in French and very rapidly.

On hearing this Madame Melmotte expressed herself to be delighted. ‘Your papa,' said she, ‘will be very glad to hear that you have thought better of this at last. Lord Nidderdale is, I am sure, a very good young man.'

‘Yes,' continued Marie, boiling over with passion as she spoke. ‘I'll marry Lord Nidderdale, or that horrid Mr Grendall who is worse than all the others, or his old fool of a father – or the sweeper at the crossing – or the black man that waits at table, or anybody else that he chooses to pick up. I don't care who it is the least in the world. But I'll lead him such a life afterwards! I'll make Lord Nidderdale repent the hour he saw
me! You may tell papa.' And then, having thus intrusted her message to Madame Melmotte, Marie left the room.

Melmotte did not return home in time to hear the good news that day – good news as he would regard it, even though, when told to him it should be accompanied by all the extraneous additions with which Marie had communicated her purpose to Madame Melmotte. It was nothing to him what the girl thought of the marriage – if the marriage could now be brought about. He, too, had cause for vexation, if not for anger. If Marie had consented a fortnight since he might have so hurried affairs that Lord Nidderdale might by this time have been secured. Now there might be – must be, doubt, through the folly of his girl and the villainy of Sir Felix Carbury. Were he once the father-in-law of the eldest son of a marquis, he thought he might almost be safe. Even though something might be all but proved against him – which might come to certain proof in less august circumstances – matters would hardly be pressed against a member for Westminster whose daughter was married to the heir of the Marquis of Auld Reekie! So many persons would then be concerned! Of course his vexation with Marie had been great. Of course his wrath against Sir Felix was unbounded. The seat for Westminster was his. He was to be seen to occupy it before all the world on this very day. But he had not as yet heard that his daughter had yielded in reference to Lord Nidderdale.

There was considerable uneasiness felt in some circles as to the manner in which Melmotte should take his seat. When he was put forward as the Conservative candidate for the borough a good deal of fuss had been made with him by certain leading politicians. It had been the manifest intention of the party that his return, if he were returned, should be hailed as a great Conservative triumph, and be made much of through the length and the breadth of the land. He was returned – but the trumpets had not as yet been sounded loudly. On a sudden, within the space of forty-eight hours, the party had become ashamed of their man. And, now, who was to introduce him to the House? But with this
feeling of shame on one side, there was already springing up an idea among another class that Melmotte might become as it were a Conservative tribune of the people – that he might be the realization of that hitherto hazy mixture of radicalism and old-fogyism, of which we have lately heard from a political master,
¹
whose eloquence has been employed in teaching us that progress can only be expected from those whose declared purpose is to stand still. The new farthing newspaper,
The Mob
, was already putting Melmotte forward as a political hero, preaching with reference to his commercial transactions the grand doctrine that magnitude in affairs is a valid defence for certain irregularities. A Napoleon, though he may exterminate tribes in carrying out his projects, cannot be judged by the same law as a young lieutenant who may be punished for cruelty to a few negroes.
The Mob
thought that a good deal should be overlooked in a Melmotte, and that the philanthropy of his great designs should be allowed to cover a multitude of sins. I do not know that the theory was ever so plainly put forward as it was done by the ingenious and courageous writer in
The Mob
, but in practice it has commanded the assent of many intelligent minds.

Mr Melmotte, therefore, though he was not where he had been before that wretched Squercum had set afloat the rumours as to the purchase of Pickering, was able to hold his head much higher than on the unfortunate night of the great banquet He had replied to the letter from Messrs Slow and Bideawhile, by a note written in the ordinary way in the office, and only signed by himself. In this he merely said that he would lose no time in settling matters as to the purchase of Pickering. Slow and Bideawhile were of course anxious that things should be settled. They wanted no prosecution for forgery. To make themselves clear in the matter, and their client – and if possible to take some wind out of the sails of the odious Squercum – this would suit them best. They were prone to hope that for his own sake Melmotte would raise the money. If it were raised there would be no reason why that note purporting to have been signed by Dolly Longestaffe should ever leave their office. They still protested their belief that it did bear Dolly's signature. They had various excuses for themselves. It would have been useless for them to summon Dolly to their office, as they knew from long experience that Dolly would not come. The very letter written by themselves – as a suggestion – and given to Dolly's father, had come back to them with Dolly's ordinary signature, sent to them – as they believed – with other papers by Dolly's father. What justification could be clearer? But still the money had not been paid. That was the fault of Longestaffe senior. But
if the money could be paid, that would set everything right. Squercum evidently thought that the money would not be paid, and was ceaseless in his intercourse with Bideawhile's people. He charged Slow and Bideawhile with having delivered up the title-deeds on the authority of a mere note, and that a note with a forged signature. He demanded that the note should be impounded. On the receipt by Mr Bideawhile of Melmotte's rather curt reply Mr Squercum was informed that Mr Melmotte had promised to pay the money at once, but that a day or two must be allowed. Mr Squercum replied that on his client's behalf he should open the matter before the Lord Mayor.