There had been no need to urge upon Esmond the necessity of a separation between him and Beatrix: Fate had done that completely; and I think from the very moment poor Beatrix had accepted the Duke’s offer, she began to assume the majestic air of a Duchess, nay, Queen Elect, and to carry herself as one sacred and removed from us common people. Her mother and kinsman both fell into her ways, the latter scornfully perhaps, and uttering his usual gibes at her vanity and his own. There was a certain charm about this girl of which neither Colonel Esmond nor his fond mistress could forego the fascination; in spite of her faults and her pride and wilfulness, they were forced to love her; and, indeed, might be set down as the two chief flatterers of the brilliant creature’s court.
Who, in the course of his life, hath not been so bewitched, and worshipped some idol or another? Years after this passion hath been dead and buried, along with a thousand other worldly cares and ambitions, he who felt it can recall it out of its grave, and admire, almost as fondly as he did in his youth, that lovely queenly creature. I invoke that beautiful spirit from the shades and love her still; or rather I should say such a past is always present to a man; such a passion once felt forms a part of his whole being, and cannot be separated from it; it becomes a portion of the man of today, just as any great faith or conviction, the discovery of poetry, the awakening of religion, ever afterwards influence him; just as the wound I had at Blenheim, and of which I wear the scar, hath become part of my frame and influenced my whole body, nay, spirit subsequently, though ’twas got and healed forty years ago. Parting and forgetting! What faithful heart can do these? Our great thoughts, our great affections, the Truths of our life, never leave us. Surely, they cannot separate from our consciousness; shall follow it whithersoever that shall go; and are of their nature divine and immortal.
With the horrible news of this catsstrophe, which was confirmed by the weeping domestics at the Duke’s own door, Esmond rode homewards as quick as his lazy coach would carry him, devising all the time how he should break the intelligence to the person most concerned in it; and if a satire upon human vanity could be needed, that poor soul afforded it in the altered company and occupations in which Esmond found her. For days before, her chariot had been rolling the street from mercer to toyshop — from goldsmith to laceman: her taste was perfect, or at least the fond bridegroom had thought so, and had given her entire authority over all tradesmen, and for all the plate, furniture and equipages, with which his Grace the Ambassador wished to adorn his splendid mission. She must have her picture by Kneller, a duchess not being complete without a portrait, and a noble one he made, and actually sketched in, on a cushion, a coronet which she was about to wear. She vowed she would wear it at King James the Third’s coronation, and never a princess in the land would have become ermine better. Esmond found the ante-chamber crowded with milliners and toyshop women, obsequious goldsmiths with jewels, salvers, and tankards; and mercers’ men with hangings, and velvets, and brocades. My Lady Duchess elect was giving audience to one famous silversmith from Exeter Change, who brought with him a great chased salver, of which he was pointing out the beauties as Colonel Esmond entered. “Come,” says she, “cousin, and admire the taste of this pretty thing.” I think Mars and Venus were lying in the golden bower, that one gilt Cupid carried off the war-god’s casque — another his sword — another his great buckler, upon which my Lord Duke Hamilton’s arms with ours were to be engraved — and a fourth was kneeling down to the reclining goddess with the ducal coronet in her hands, God help us! The next time Mr. Esmond saw that piece of plate, the arms were changed, the ducal coronet had been replaced by a viscount’s; it formed part of the fortune of the thrifty goldsmith’s own daughter, when she married my Lord Viscount Squanderfield two years after.
“Isn’t this a beautiful piece?” says Beatrix, examining it, and she pointed out the arch graces of the Cupids, and the fine carving of the languid prostrate Mars. Esmond sickened as he thought of the warrior dead in his chamber, his servants and children weeping around him; and of this smiling creature attiring herself, as it were, for that nuptial death-bed. “’Tis a pretty piece of vanity,” says he, looking gloomily at the beautiful creature: there were flambeaux in the room lighting up the brilliant mistress of it. She lifted up the great gold salver with her fair arms.
“Vanity!” says she, haughtily. “What is vanity in you, sir, is propriety in me. You ask a Jewish price for it, Mr. Graves; but have it I will, if only to spite Mr. Esmond.”
“Oh, Beatrix, lay it down!” says Mr. Esmond. “Herodias! you know not what you carry in the charger.”
She dropped it with a clang; the eager goldsmith running to seize his fallen ware. The lady’s face caught the fright from Esmond’s pale countenance, and her eyes shone out like beacons of alarm:—“What is it, Henry!” says she, running to him, and seizing both his hands. “What do you mean by your pale face and gloomy tones?”
“Come away, come away!” says Esmond, leading her: she clung frightened to him, and he supported her upon his heart, bidding the scared goldsmith leave them. The man went into the next apartment, staring with surprise, and hugging his precious charger.
“Oh, my Beatrix, my sister!” says Esmond, still holding in his arms the pallid and affrighted creature, “you have the greatest courage of any woman in the world; prepare to show it now, for you have a dreadful trial to bear.”
She sprang away from the friend who would have protected her:—“Hath he left me?” says she. “We had words this morning: he was very gloomy, and I angered him: but he dared not, he dared not!” As she spoke a burning blush flushed over her whole face and bosom. Esmond saw it reflected in the glass by which she stood, with clenched hands, pressing her swelling heart.
“He has left you,” says Esmond, wondering that rage rather than sorrow was in her looks.
“And he is alive,” cried Beatrix, “and you bring me this commission! He has left me, and you haven’t dared to avenge me! You, that pretend to be the champion of our house, have let me suffer this insult! Whe............