Middlemarch, Page 75

  CHAPTER LXXV.

  "Le sentiment de la faussete des plaisirs presents, et l'ignorance de la vanite des plaisirs absents causent l'inconstance."--PASCAL.

  Rosamond had a gleam of returning cheerfulness when the house was freedfrom the threatening figure, and when all the disagreeable creditorswere paid. But she was not joyous: her married life had fulfilled noneof her hopes, and had been quite spoiled for her imagination. In thisbrief interval of calm, Lydgate, remembering that he had often beenstormy in his hours of perturbation, and mindful of the pain Rosamondhad had to bear, was carefully gentle towards her; but he, too, hadlost some of his old spirit, and he still felt it necessary to refer toan economical change in their way of living as a matter of course,trying to reconcile her to it gradually, and repressing his anger whenshe answered by wishing that he would go to live in London. When shedid not make this answer, she listened languidly, and wondered what shehad that was worth living for. The hard and contemptuous words whichhad fallen from her husband in his anger had deeply offended thatvanity which he had at first called into active enjoyment; and what sheregarded as his perverse way of looking at things, kept up a secretrepulsion, which made her receive all his tenderness as a poorsubstitute for the happiness he had failed to give her. They were at adisadvantage with their neighbors, and there was no longer any outlooktowards Quallingham--there was no outlook anywhere except in anoccasional letter from Will Ladislaw. She had felt stung anddisappointed by Will's resolution to quit Middlemarch, for in spite ofwhat she knew and guessed about his admiration for Dorothea, shesecretly cherished the belief that he had, or would necessarily come tohave, much more admiration for herself; Rosamond being one of thosewomen who live much in the idea that each man they meet would havepreferred them if the preference had not been hopeless. Mrs. Casaubonwas all very well; but Will's interest in her dated before he knew Mrs.Lydgate. Rosamond took his way of talking to herself, which was amixture of playful fault-finding and hyperbolical gallantry, as thedisguise of a deeper feeling; and in his presence she felt thatagreeable titillation of vanity and sense of romantic drama whichLydgate's presence had no longer the magic to create. She evenfancied--what will not men and women fancy in these matters?--thatWill exaggerated his admiration for Mrs. Casaubon in order to piqueherself. In this way poor Rosamond's brain had been busy before Will'sdeparture. He would have made, she thought, a much more suitablehusband for her than she had found in Lydgate. No notion could havebeen falser than this, for Rosamond's discontent in her marriage wasdue to the conditions of marriage itself, to its demand forself-suppression and tolerance, and not to the nature of her husband;but the easy conception of an unreal Better had a sentimental charmwhich diverted her ennui. She constructed a little romance which wasto vary the flatness of her life: Will Ladislaw was always to be abachelor and live near her, always to be at her command, and have anunderstood though never fully expressed passion for her, which would besending out lambent flames every now and then in interesting scenes.His departure had been a proportionate disappointment, and had sadlyincreased her weariness of Middlemarch; but at first she had thealternative dream of pleasures in store from her intercourse with thefamily at Quallingham. Since then the troubles of her married life haddeepened, and the absence of other relief encouraged her regretfulrumination over that thin romance which she had once fed on. Men andwomen make sad mistakes about their own symptoms, taking their vagueuneasy longings, sometimes for genius, sometimes for religion, andoftener still for a mighty love. Will Ladislaw had written chattyletters, half to her and half to Lydgate, and she had replied: theirseparation, she felt, was not likely to be final, and the change shenow most longed for was that Lydgate should go to live in London;everything would be agreeable in London; and she had set to work withquiet determination to win this result, when there came a sudden,delightful promise which inspirited her.

  It came shortly before the memorable meeting at the town-hall, and wasnothing less than a letter from Will Ladislaw to Lydgate, which turnedindeed chiefly on his new interest in plans of colonization, butmentioned incidentally, that he might find it necessary to pay a visitto Middlemarch within the next few weeks--a very pleasant necessity, hesaid, almost as good as holidays to a schoolboy. He hoped there washis old place on the rug, and a great deal of music in store for him.But he was quite uncertain as to the time. While Lydgate was readingthe letter to Rosamond, her face looked like a reviving flower--it grewprettier and more blooming. There was nothing unendurable now: thedebts were paid, Mr. Ladislaw was coming, and Lydgate would bepersuaded to leave Middlemarch and settle in London, which was "sodifferent from a provincial town."

  That was a bright bit of morning. But soon the sky became black overpoor Rosamond. The presence of a new gloom in her husband, about whichhe was entirely reserved towards her--for he dreaded to expose hislacerated feeling to her neutrality and misconception--soon received apainfully strange explanation, alien to all her previous notions ofwhat could affect her happiness. In the new gayety of her spirits,thinking that Lydgate had merely a worse fit of moodiness than usual,causing him to leave her remarks unanswered, and evidently to keep outof her way as much as possible, she chose, a few days after themeeting, and without speaking to him on the subject, to send out notesof invitation for a small evening party, feeling convinced that thiswas a judicious step, since people seemed to have been keeping alooffrom them, and wanted restoring to the old habit of intercourse. Whenthe invitations had been accepted, she would tell Lydgate, and give hima wise admonition as to how a medical man should behave to hisneighbors; for Rosamond had the gravest little airs possible aboutother people's duties. But all the invitations were declined, and thelast answer came into Lydgate's hands.

  "This is Chichely's scratch. What is he writing to you about?" saidLydgate, wonderingly, as he handed the note to her. She was obliged tolet him see it, and, looking at her severely, he said--

  "Why on earth have you been sending out invitations without telling me,Rosamond? I beg, I insist that you will not invite any one to thishouse. I suppose you have been inviting others, and they have refusedtoo." She said nothing.

  "Do you hear me?" thundered Lydgate.

  "Yes, certainly I hear you," said Rosamond, turning her head aside withthe movement of a graceful long-necked bird.

  Lydgate tossed his head without any grace and walked out of the room,feeling himself dangerous. Rosamond's thought was, that he was gettingmore and more unbearable--not that there was any new special reason forthis peremptoriness. His indisposition to tell her anything in whichhe was sure beforehand that she would not be interested was growinginto an unreflecting habit, and she was in ignorance of everythingconnected with the thousand pounds except that the loan had come fromher uncle Bulstrode. Lydgate's odious humors and their neighbors'apparent avoidance of them had an unaccountable date for her in theirrelief from money difficulties. If the invitations had been acceptedshe would have gone to invite her mamma and the rest, whom she had seennothing of for several days; and she now put on her bonnet to go andinquire what had become of them all, suddenly feeling as if there werea conspiracy to leave her in isolation with a husband disposed tooffend everybody. It was after the dinner hour, and she found herfather and mother seated together alone in the drawing-room. Theygreeted her with sad looks, saying "Well, my dear!" and no more. Shehad never seen her father look so downcast; and seating herself nearhim she said--

  "Is there anything the matter, papa?"

  He did not answer, but Mrs. Vincy said, "Oh, my dear, have you heardnothing? It won't be long before it reaches you."

  "Is it anything about Tertius?" said Rosamond, turning pale. The ideaof trouble immediately connected itself with what had beenunaccountable to her in him.

  "Oh, my dear, yes. To think of your marrying into this trouble. Debtwas bad enough, but this will be worse."

  "Stay, stay, Lucy," said Mr. Vincy. "Have you heard nothing about youruncle Bulstrode, Rosamond?"
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  "No, papa," said the poor thing, feeling as if trouble were notanything she had before experienced, but some invisible power with aniron grasp that made her soul faint within her.

  Her father told her everything, saying at the end, "It's better for youto know, my dear. I think Lydgate must leave the town. Things havegone against him. I dare say he couldn't help it. I don't accuse himof any harm," said Mr. Vincy. He had always before been disposed tofind the utmost fault with Lydgate.

  The shock to Rosamond was terrible. It seemed to her that no lot couldbe so cruelly hard as hers to have married a man who had become thecentre of infamous suspicions. In many cases it is inevitable that theshame is felt to be the worst part of crime; and it would have requireda great deal of disentangling reflection, such as had never enteredinto Rosamond's life, for her in these moments to feel that her troublewas less than if her husband had been certainly known to have donesomething criminal. All the shame seemed to be there. And she hadinnocently married this man with the belief that he and his family werea glory to her! She showed her usual reticence to her parents, andonly said, that if Lydgate had done as she wished he would have leftMiddlemarch long ago.

  "She bears it beyond anything," said her mother when she was gone.

  "Ah, thank God!" said Mr. Vincy, who was much broken down.

  But Rosamond went home with a sense of justified repugnance towards herhusband. What had he really done--how had he really acted? She didnot know. Why had he not told her everything? He did not speak to heron the subject, and of course she could not speak to him. It came intoher mind once that she would ask her father to let her go home again;but dwelling on that prospect made it seem utter dreariness to her: amarried woman gone back to live with her parents--life seemed to haveno meaning for her in such a position: she could not contemplateherself in it.

  The next two days Lydgate observed a change in her, and believed thatshe had heard the bad news. Would she speak to him about it, or wouldshe go on forever in the silence which seemed to imply that shebelieved him guilty? We must remember that he was in a morbid state ofmind, in which almost all contact was pain. Certainly Rosamond in thiscase had equal reason to complain of reserve and want of confidence onhis part; but in the bitterness of his soul he excused himself;--washe not justified in shrinking from the task of telling her, since nowshe knew the truth she had no impulse to speak to him? But adeeper-lying consciousness that he was in fault made him restless, andthe silence between them became intolerable to him; it was as if theywere both adrift on one piece of wreck and looked away from each other.

  He thought, "I am a fool. Haven't I given up expecting anything? Ihave married care, not help." And that evening he said--

  "Rosamond, have you heard anything that distresses you?"

  "Yes," she answered, laying down her work, which she had been carryingon with a languid semi-consciousness, most unlike her usual self.

  "What have you heard?"

  "Everything, I suppose. Papa told me."

  "That people think me disgraced?"

  "Yes," said Rosamond, faintly, beginning to sew again automatically.

  There was silence. Lydgate thought, "If she has any trust in me--anynotion of what I am, she ought to speak now and say that she does notbelieve I have deserved disgrace."

  But Rosamond on her side went on moving her fingers languidly.Whatever was to be said on the subject she expected to come fromTertius. What did she know? And if he were innocent of any wrong, whydid he not do something to clear himself?

  This silence of hers brought a new rush of gall to that bitter mood inwhich Lydgate had been saying to himself that nobody believed inhim--even Farebrother had not come forward. He had begun to questionher with the intent that their conversation should disperse the chillfog which had gathered between them, but he felt his resolution checkedby despairing resentment. Even this trouble, like the rest, she seemedto regard as if it were hers alone. He was always to her a beingapart, doing what she objected to. He started from his chair with anangry impulse, and thrusting his hands in his pockets, walked up anddown the room. There was an underlying consciousness all the whilethat he should have to master this anger, and tell her everything, andconvince her of the facts. For he had almost learned the lesson thathe must bend himself to her nature, and that because she came short inher sympathy, he must give the more. Soon he recurred to his intentionof opening himself: the occasion must not be lost. If he could bringher to feel with some solemnity that here was a slander which must bemet and not run away from, and that the whole trouble had come out ofhis desperate want of money, it would be a moment for urging powerfullyon her that they should be one in the resolve to do with as littlemoney as possible, so that they might weather the bad time and keepthemselves independent. He would mention the definite measures whichhe desired to take, and win her to a willing spirit. He was bound totry this--and what else was there for him to do?

  He did not know how long he had been walking uneasily backwards andforwards, but Rosamond felt that it was long, and wished that he wouldsit down. She too had begun to think this an opportunity for urging onTertius what he ought to do. Whatever might be the truth about allthis misery, there was one dread which asserted itself.

  Lydgate at last seated himself, not in his usual chair, but in onenearer to Rosamond, leaning aside in it towards her, and looking at hergravely before he reopened the sad subject. He had conquered himselfso far, and was about to speak with a sense of solemnity, as on anoccasion which was not to be repeated. He had even opened his lips,when Rosamond, letting her hands fall, looked at him and said--

  "Surely, Tertius--"

  "Well?"

  "Surely now at last you have given up the idea of staying inMiddlemarch. I cannot go on living here. Let us go to London. Papa,and every one else, says you had better go. Whatever misery I have toput up with, it will be easier away from here."

  Lydgate felt miserably jarred. Instead of that critical outpouring forwhich he had prepared himself with effort, here was the old round to begone through again. He could not bear it. With a quick change ofcountenance he rose and went out of the room.

  Perhaps if he had been strong enough to persist in his determination tobe the more because she was less, that evening might have had a betterissue. If his energy could have borne down that check, he might stillhave wrought on Rosamond's vision and will. We cannot be sure that anynatures, however inflexible or peculiar, will resist this effect from amore massive being than their own. They may be taken by storm and forthe moment converted, becoming part of the soul which enwraps them inthe ardor of its movement. But poor Lydgate had a throbbing painwithin him, and his energy had fallen short of its task.

  The beginning of mutual understanding and resolve seemed as far off asever; nay, it seemed blocked out by the sense of unsuccessful effort.They lived on from day to day with their thoughts still apart, Lydgategoing about what work he had in a mood of despair, and Rosamondfeeling, with some justification, that he was behaving cruelly. It wasof no use to say anything to Tertius; but when Will Ladislaw came, shewas determined to tell him everything. In spite of her generalreticence, she needed some one who would recognize her wrongs.