"Oh, Edith, it will be impossible," Caroline said. And then the two sisters looked at each other—the one astonished, indignant, full of resistance; the other pale, drooping, without vigour or hope.
"What does impossible mean?" said the younger, not with any affectation or grandiloquence; for probably she had never heard of any heroic utterance on the subject. "You mean very, very hard. So it will be. I have wanted to speak to you since ever we came here. I want to know what he says himself, and if papa has said anything, and what mamma thinks. We don't seem to live together now," she added, with a clouded countenance. "It's always, 'Oh, Lady Caroline has gone out,' or, 'Her ladyship is in the library with my lord,' It seemed very nice at first, but I begin to hate ladyships and lordships with all my heart."
"So do I," said Caroline, with a sigh.
"If you marry a man without a title, couldn't you give it up? Perhaps one wouldn't like that either, now," said the girl, candidly. "It was far, far nicer, far more natural, in the old days; but perhaps one wouldn't like to go back."
"I suppose not," said Carry, drearily. She was not a beautiful girl, as in her romantic position she ought to have been. Her nose was too large; her complexion deficient; her eyes were grey, sweet, and thoughtful, but not brilliant or shining. Her figure had the willowy grace of youth, but nothing more imposing. She had a very sweet radiant smile when she was happy; this was the chief attraction of her face: but at present she was not happy, and her pale gentle countenance was not one to catch the general eye.
"But I hope you are going to make a stand, Carry," said the energetic little Edith. "You won't, surely—you can't be so lâche as to give in? I would not!—not if it cost me my life!"
"Ah, if it was a question of one's life! but no one wants your life," said Carry, shaking her head. "No one will touch us, or lock us up, or any of these old-fashioned things. If they only would! The poets say 'I could die for you,' as if that was difficult! Oh no, it is far harder, far harder to live."
"Carry! you have been thinking a great deal about it, then?"
"What else could I think about? Since the first moment papa looked at me that day—you remember that day?—I knew in a moment what he meant. He gave me just one glance. You know he never said that he would consent."
Edith's youthful countenance gathered a sympathetic cloud. "Papa has been so changed ever since," she said.
"He never would allow that he had consented even before—and while we were all poor, what did it matter? So long as he does not ask me to——"
"To what?" Edith asked, with a wondering perception of the shudder which ran over her sister's slight figure. "Are you cold, Car?"
"To—marry some one else," cried poor Caroline, with a heavy sigh—so heavy that it was almost a groan.
Edith sprang to her feet with indignant vehemence. "That is not possible; nobody could be so cowardly, so cruel, as that," she said, clasping her hands together. "Carry, you speak as if papa was a bad man; you slander him; it is not true, it is not true!"
"He would not think it cruel," said Caroline, shaking her head sadly. "He would not mean any harm; he would say to himself that it was for my good."
Her despondency quenched the passion and energy of the younger girl. Carry's drooping head and heavy eyes were enough to damp even the liveliest courage. "Are you thinking of—any one in particular?" Edith said in hushed and tremulous tones.
Carry put out her hands as if to push some spectre away. "Oh, don't ask me, don't ask me; I don't know; I can't tell you," she cried.
What could Edith say? she was appalled. The fresh inexperienced heart received a first lesson in the mysterious evils of life. She who had fretted and chafed so at the partial separation that had arisen between them, she was glad of a pretext to leave her sister. She could scarcely believe this to be possible, and yet so it was. Nor did she wish to run to her mother with her discovery, to appeal to her against Carry's misconception, against the monstrous character of the suggestion altogether, as would have been her first impulse in any other case. No; she was convinced of the reality of it, little as she desired to be convinced. A gleam of painful light seemed to fall across the new tenor of their life. She thought for a moment that she saw the very earth, solid and unyielding, break into dangerous pits and chasms before her feet. The pain of this discovery was two-fold—both poignant, yet one worse than the other. To think that her father, whom she had hitherto loved and trusted, not with any excess of devotion, but yet with an honest confidence that he would ask nothing wrong, nothing unreasonable from his children, should thus threaten to become a domestic tyrant, an enemy of truth, was terrible; but still more terrible was the conviction which overwhelmed the girl that Carry, with all her imagination and feeling—Carry, the poet of the family, the first one to have a romance and a lover—would not have strength to resist any attempted coercion. Oh, if it had only been me! Edith said to herself, clenching her hands tight. But then she had no Edward, no romance—she was fancy free: even were it possible to force her into any connection she disliked (which Edith did not think it would be), at all events she could not be made false to another. But Carry—Carry, who was all heart—to force her to deny that heart would be doubly cruel. Little Edith woke out of her careless youth to see this wonderful and great danger at her very side, with all that bewilderment of feeling which attends the first disclosure of the evils in life. She could not believe it, and yet she knew it was true. She remembered tones in her father's voice, lights in his eyes, which she never seemed to have understood before. Was this what they meant? that when his time and opportunity came, he would be a tyrant, a remorseless and unfaltering ruler, suffering no rebellion? Edith trembled a little. Perhaps she, too, might fall under that despotism one day. But she did not feel afraid for herself. Oh, if it had only been me! she said, ungrammatical, as excitement generally is. It would be hard to say what ground she had for her self-confidence. Carry was the genius of the family, and little Edith only the youngest, the household pet, whom nobody regarded as in a position to make decisions or form opinions for herself. Why was it to her eyes that this sudden insight had been given? It is not usually a happy gift. Blessed are they, we may rather say, who can deceive themselves—whose eyes are made blind, and not more fatally clear, by love. Edith hastened out of doors, out of sight or speech of any one, to try if she could escape from this revelation which had opened upon her, so much against her will. It was a misty dull day, with a great deal of moisture in the air—moisture which seemed to communicate itself to Edith's eyes, and get into her throat. She hastened down the path which wound through the birches, the poetical "birks of Lindores," to the river lying far below, and already sending a soft sound of running water to soothe her. About half-way down was a great beech-tree, round which a seat had been placed. Here there was a view, not of the wide champaign, like that at Dalrulzian, but of a portion of the highroad, just where it began to mount the hill towards the Castle. On the other side lay the river, visible at the foot of the bank, and running somewhat strong and wild under the cliffs on the opposite side, which threw it into deep shadow. But it was not the river, though so much the more beautiful of the two, it was the highroad which attracted Edith's attention. As she stood looking out upon it, some one passed, riding slowly along, but turning his head to catch the first glimpse of the Castle. His appearance seemed to throw a sudden light upon her thoughts. He was a heavy, large man, upon a powerful black horse—an apparition big enough to be identified, even at that distance. The ladies had all been very free in their remarks upon this representative of their county neighbours. They had not given him a very encouraging reception, yet he had repeated his visits, too stolid, they had thought, to perceive that he was not wanted. As Edith stood and gazed at him, with the blood curdling about her heart, it flashed upon her that her father had given no countenance to their criticisms. He had told them that Mr. Torrance was one of the richest commoners in Scotland, and Tinto such a house as any one might be proud to possess. She had paid little attention to these words at the time, but they seemed to repeat themselves in the very air now. It was a day of revelation to Edith. She saw all that it meant, and foresaw all it was coming to, with a gleam of terrible insight. Oh no, no! she moaned to herself in a kind of helpless protest against fate.
CHAPTER