The Waghorns returned to England towards the end of October, and forthwith took up their residence in a stately house in the neighbourhood of Regent’s Park. The first intimation Helen Norman received of their presence in London was a personal visit. One day they drove up together in a brougham, and, as Mrs. Cumberbatch happened to be out, Helen had to receive them in solitary grandeur. It was not an enviable task, for, considering the terms on which she had last parted from Maud, she might reasonably be in doubt as to how she should behave towards her.
The commencement of the interview was formal. Mr. John Waghorn, respectable as ever, was profuse in expressions of interest. He feared that Miss Norman was not so well as when he had last seen her; certainly she looked somewhat pale. He feared she overworked herself in her never-to-besufficiently-lauded philanthropic undertakings. Helen, in her turn, manifested absorbing interest in her visitors. Maud was looking wonderfully well, and Mr. Waghorn appeared to enjoy something more than his usual robustness.
“And Mr. Gresham?” inquired the gentleman. “Have you heard from Mr. Gresham lately, Miss Norman?”
“We heard from Berlin about a fortnight ago,” replied Helen. “Mr. Gresham was then in the enjoyment of good health.”
“Would you believe it?” pursued Mr. Waghorn. “We became slightly acquainted, at Venice, with a gentleman who is one of Mr. Gresham’s intimate friends, and who had left him not a fortnight before in Germany. That was the first intimation we had of his being on the Continent.”
“Did he leave suddenly?” asked Maud, who was lolling hack in a low easy-chair, going lazily over the patterns of the carpet with the end of her umbrella. She spoke in a somewhat affected and languid tone, and without looking up.
“Rather suddenly,” replied Helen, somewhat at a loss for a reply.
“Ah, I feared his health would give way,” put in Mr. Waghorn. “I sincerely hope, Miss Norman, that you may not experience a similar misfortune. Indeed you are too devoted. You do not consider yourself sufficiently.”
“You don’t live altogether alone, I suppose?” asked Maud, glancing up for a moment at Helen’s face.
“No,” replied Helen. “An aunt of Mr. Gresham’s, Mrs. Cumberbatch, is living here now. I am sorry to say she is out at present.”
The conversation dragged on in this manner for some ten minutes, when Maud suddenly turned round towards her husband (she had been sitting with her back to him), and said —
“Don’t you think it would be as well to go on into Oxford Street, and call for me here when you come back?”
“Possibly it might, my dear,” replied Mr. Waghorn, with a slight cough and a quick glance at Helen. “You might perhaps ask, however, if Miss Norman is at liberty just now?”
Helen affirmed that she was entirely so.
“In that case I might do as you propose,” said Mr. Waghorn. “I shall perhaps be a little more than half-an-hour. I will say good-bye for the present, Miss Norman.”
And he withdrew with much grace of manner. The moment the door had closed upon him, Maud suddenly jumped up from her seat and, with a laugh of delight, flung her arms round Helen’s neck.
“Come, come and sit down by me, you dear old beauty!” she exclaimed, kissing her friend and laughing heartily between the kisses. “Here, on the sofa. Don’t be afraid of spoiling my dress. It was all I could do to keep from bursting into fits of laughter whilst that man was by — it was so absurdly comical to see you receiving us with that stately dignity which becomes you so well, and to hear you talking polite small-talk in a way which didn’t become you at all! Now confess, you didn’t know whether to treat me as a friend or an enemy, did you?”
“It is true,” returned Helen, “that I scarcely felt safe speaking to Mrs. Waghorn as I had once been used to talk to Maud Gresham. I can’t tell you how glad I am, Maud, to hear you speak in your old way.”
“Yes, yes,” cried the other; “call me Maud. Let Mrs. Waghorn go to — the old gentleman, as far as we two are concerned, Helen! That name is a mere outward garment, something I put on occasionally for show, as I do these silks and satins when I go out to pay visits. If you love me, Pallas, never a word of Mrs. Waghorn!”
Helen was pained to hear her friend speaking thus. It confirmed old fears, and once more clouded her countenance.
“Are you not happy in your marriage, Maud?” she asked, quietly.
“Happy? Oh, as the day is long! I have enough to eat and drink, a good house to live in, what I like to wear, and carriage to drive about to my friends. Why should I not be happy, 0, goddess of wisdom?”
“But your husband, Maud. Does not Mr. Waghorn enter into your list of blessings?”
“What a delightfully innocent creature you are!” exclaimed Maud, passing her arm round her companion’s waist. “Have you the felicity to think that a husband can by any possibility be a blessing? Now let us understand each other once for all. Waghorn is neither a blessing nor a curse to me, but something totally indifferent. He lives his life, and I live mine, and as long as that life of his doesn’t encroach upon my peculiar privileges I have nothing to say to him good or bad. You understand?”
Helen looked into the speaker’s face with pained surprise.
“Why bless you, Pallas!” cried Maud, “what is there in all this to trouble one’s head about! Don’t you know that this is marriage à-la-mode, the way in which every matrimonial establishment with any pretension to elegance is conducted?”
“I am very ignorant in such matters,” returned Helen, “but it appears to me very dreadful.”
“No doubt it does, my dear child. And to you it would be dreadful. But for me, who knew exactly what it would be like before I actually experienced it, I assure you it is the most natural thing in the world. You are as different from me and the million other women who resemble me, Helen, as chalk is from cheese. Suppose I saw you suddenly seized with an infatuation for a man like Waghorn, and on the point of marrying him, do you know what I should do? I should hang upon you night and day till I had forced you to break off the engagement; I would let you have no peace; if I couldn’t prevail otherwise, I would bring out one of the beautiful little pistols I carry about in my dressing-case and shoot the man that was to marry you. I would do anything rather than see you plunge into such a gulf of misery!”
“But why would you take such pains to save me from what you encounter yourself with your eyes open?”
“Because I have got brains to recognise a merit superior to my own, and a heart to cherish affection for an old friend. And that is what I want you to understand, Helen. Come, will you make a compact with me? Will you promise me that, however you see me behave before other people, however much you learn to despise me, you will still keep one little corner of your heart open to me? Promise that you will come and see me often, and that you will let me come and see you. In all London I shall not have any one but you that I can really call a friend; I know very well I shall not. You must let me come and talk seriously for a few minutes with you when I am weary of chattering nonsense to a houseful of fools. Now will you promise me all this, Pallas?”
“But it seems very sad, Maud,” replied Helen, “that you should see so clearly into all your errors, and yet lack the resolution to correct them. Instead of making a friend of me in your tired-out moments only, why not let me be your friend at all times? Why not throw away all this affectation of giddiness — I am sure it can be nothing but affectation — and settle down to a steady useful life?”
“Why not? Why, because I am not Helen Norman, nor anything like her. That is the reason, my dear girl. You must not try to reason me out of my nature, Helen. The leopard can’t change his spots, you know. But upon my word I speak the truth when I say that I have a little bit of brain and a little bit of heart still available. Possibly they may be made to expand and grow with judicious watering, I won’t deliver any opinion on the point. Shall we be friends on these terms, Helen?”
“It is impossible for me to regard you otherwise than with kindness, Maud,” replied her companion; “but how can real friendship subsist under such circumstances as these?”
“Oh, never mind the name!” cried Maud, impatiently. “Let us call it enmity, if you will, provided you agree to live on these terms. Shall I whisper a secret into your chaste ear, Pallas. I feel within myself now and then possibilities of wickedness which would startle you if I dared name them How shall I combat these? You know already that I have no such thing as principle to fall back upon, and as to the world’s opinion, well, that can be preserved under any circumstances by one who possesses a little tact. So the fact is, Helen, I must look upon you as my principle, personified. I must have this friendship of yours to stand fast upon if I feel that which it used to be the fashion to call the devil getting hold of me. Do you understand!”
Helen was on the point of replying when suddenly the door opened and admitted Mrs. Cumberbatch. Helen had to perform the ceremony of introduction, after which the conversation once more assumed a commonplace character. Mrs. Cumberbatch’s sharp little eyes never ceased to examine Maud’s; whilst the latter seemed to find amusement in “drawing out” her grand-aunt. The conversation was chiefly carried on between these two, as Helen was too much occupied in reflecting upon Maud’s words to take much part in it. It was a relief to her when at length Mr. Waghorn reappeared. Once more the introduction had to be gone through, after which followed a few more polite commonplaces from each one present, and then Mr. and Mrs. Waghorn rose to depart. As Maud shook hands with Helen, she whispered —
“Remember.”
Helen’s thoughts followed the two home in their carriage, wondering greatly whether Maud had not exaggerated the indifference between herself and her husband. We, who are privileged to intrude into the most private recesses of the heart, need hesitate little to take a seat in the brougham of a lately-married couple and overhear their conversation.
“Where to now?” was Maud’s question, as Mr. Waghorn, after giving directions to the coachman, entered and took his seat opposite her. She did not look at him as she spoke, but occupied herself in rustling over the leaves of a novel from Mudie’s.
“To the Edwards’s,” replied her husband, with something of a scowl upon his face.
There was silence for a few minutes, and Mr. Waghorn was the first to break it.
“I want you to pay attention to me for a minute,” he said, bending slightly forward.
“Well?” returned Maud, without raising her face.
“Look at me!” exclaimed the other, stamping his foot.
“I can hear quite well,” persisted Maud, still rustling her pages.
“Look at me!” he almost shouted, clenching his fist; “or, by God ——”
Maud raised her face for a moment, and it was rather pale. But she did not speak.
“I want you to understand one thing,” went on Mr. Waghorn, satisfied with having forced her to submit, and preserving in his tone but little of that suave politeness which distinguished him in society. “You may be as damned sulky as you please when we’re alone together; for that I don’t care a snap. But when we’re obliged to be seen in each other’s company, I’ll thank you to show me a little more politeness. Do you hear?”
“I can hear quite well, as I said before. If you wish the coachman to hear too, why not beg him to take a seat here for a few minutes? It would save you raising your voice, and I should feel somewhat safer with his protection to look to.”
“If you give me any of your blasted impudence,” returned Mr. Waghorn, his face livid with passion, “you’ll have need for protection in earnest. You’ve heard what I said. Just heed it, or I’ll make you!”
And so the colloquy ended. It was not the first of the kind that had taken place between the two. In all probability it would not be the last.
Mr. John Waghorn had not been altogether wrong when he said that Helen did not look so well as she had once done, and as the year drew to a close she continued to grow paler. Her eyes seemed to lose something of their wonted joyous brightness, and oftener showed instead a dull and fixed intensity of gaze which unmistakably denoted over-application. For several months now she had been working with an energy which only a strong man would have been able to support long. Daily she spent many hours in her toil among the poor and miserable, breathing air charged with all manner of foulness, omitting no possible chance of making her work as complete as possible. As we have heard Lucy Venning testify, she would not allow herself to be withheld by any fear of evil consequences to her bodily health, penetrating into sickness — haunted homes where others were afraid to go, finding her sole reward in the increased opportunities for exertion which there lay before her. In several cases she had already spent whole nights watching by sick beds, fulfilling all the duties of a hospital nurse, and deriving a sense of pleasure from her increasing skill and knowledge. Then she had her school two nights of the week, on which she toiled with unceasing energy, for here she felt,that she was making clearly visible progress, and every lesson well learnt, every, good habit inculcated, cheered her on to renewed exertions. In addition to all this she never failed to spend some portion of the day in self-improvement, pursuing a course of severe technical study which she had laid out for herself. Most generally the early hours of the morning were spent thus, for she was never later than six in rising. So completely was her life one of stern self-sacrifice that, in her moments of calm reflection, she felt that she was growing to understand something of the ascetic’s zeal, and asked herself with a smile whether she might not possibly develop into a veritable ascetic, loving to toil merely for the sake of toiling and the sweetness of self-imposed pain? Indeed it is not at all unlikely that to the increasing sternness of her temperament was due the course of thought she pursued with regard to Maud. A year ago she would hardly have met Maud’s appeal as now she did. Her affection had become less effusive, her mind more used to stern combat with the bitterest problems of life.
Though severe application of any kind has a tendency to increase seriousness, it is only labour which has in it very much of the distasteful and disappointing that embitters the spirit. There was in Helen’s character far too much of genuine firmness, of exalted purpose, of inexhaustible sympathy to permit of her ever being soured by tasks of whatever distastefulness; and yet in all probability it was the circumstance of her having so often to encounter grievous disappointment, and experience deep disgust in the course of her work, which began by degrees to impart to her perseverance a character of grim stubbornness where there had at first been only cheerful persistence. Many times was she obliged to confess in her inmost heart that, prepared as she had been to combat with horrors, her imagination had been far from encompassing the full extent of hideous suffering and wickedness which it was her daily lot to strive against. When she confessed to Mr. Heatherley that she was often brought to a pause by ingratitude, stubborn lack of confidence, and similar evils among the poor, she was only on the threshold of her labour; when she passed over from the old year to the new she had grown inured to these evils, and, as I have said, they were gradually converting her cheerfulness into stubbornness. On New Year’s eve she spent several hours in reflection upon the past half-year, and the result of it was a night made sleepless by discontent and fear — fear for the future lest her bodily strength should give way or her resolution faint. She concluded that her aims had been too high, that she must cease to hope for such great results, and be content if she made any progress at all. The dispensary had now been open for three months, and was doing good work — there was certainly satisfaction in that. Then again when she thought of her school she obtained a glimpse of true encouragement. There was toil enough there, it is true, but not toil of such a hopeless and repulsive kind as that among nature petrified by long years of vice and crime. Among the bright young faces which met her each Tuesday and Saturday night, Helen always recovered her cheerfulness and her hope, and it was in thinking of these and in making plans for their better instruction during the year to come that she at length sunk to sleep.
Her life at home was a very lonely one. With Mrs. Cumberbatch she had no sympathy whatever, and, though the latter frequently forced her society upon her, she regarded this as an infliction rather than a relief. From time to time she saw Maud, and listened, half in wonder, half in pain, to the strange revelation which that young lady seemed to delight in making of her own cynicism and frivolity, but it appeared so impossible to penetrate to any source of genuine feeling that Helen grew somewhat weary of these bizarre conversations. Very occasionally indeed she visited Maud’s house, but the certainty of finding it full of people who excited nothing but disgust in her soon led her almost entirely to cease these visits. To one of these, however, we must refer more in detail, seeing that it was the occasion of her meeting once more with very old acquaintances.
She had called rather early in the morning and was shown by the servant into the small drawing-room where she usually saw Maud in private. After she had waited nearly a quarter of an hour the door opened, but no one immediately entered. Helen could distinctly hear Maud’s voice chattering to some one, and interrupting her chattering with bursts of laughter.
“Come,” said Maud, at length, pushing the door wide open, “we shall be safe from interruption here. But mind, you mustn’t tell me any more of those ridiculous stories. I shall positively die of laughing!”
Helen had risen to her feet, and, before she was herself perceived, saw Maud entering ............