He Knew He Was Right by Anthony Trollope (books you need to read .txt) 📕

gentleman of whom you have been speaking is an old friend of my

father’s, and has become my friend. Nevertheless, had Mr Trevelyan

given me any plain order about him, I should have obeyed him. A wife

does not feel that her chances of happiness are increased when she

finds that her husband suspects her of being too intimate with another

man. It is a thing very hard to bear. But I would have endeavoured to

bear it, knowing how important it is for both our sakes, and more

especially for our child. I would have made excuses, and would have

endeavoured to think that this horrid feeling on his part is nothing

more than a short delusion.’

‘But, my dear—’

‘I must ask you to hear me out, Lady Milborough. But when he tells me

first that I am not to meet the man, and so instructs the servants;

then tells me that I am to meet him, and go on just as I was going

before, and then again tells me that I am not to see him, and again

instructs the servants and, above all, the cook that Colonel Osborne is

not to come into the house, then obedience becomes rather difficult.’

‘Just say now that you will do what he wants, and then all will be

right.’

‘I will not say so to you, Lady Milborough. It is not to you that I

ought to say it. But as he has chosen to send you here, I will explain

to you that I have never disobeyed him. When I was free, in accordance

with Mr Trevelyan’s wishes, to have what intercourse I pleased with

Colonel Osborne, I received a note from that gentleman on a most

trivial matter. I answered it as trivially. My husband saw my letter,

closed, and questioned me about it. I told him that the letter was

still there, and that if he chose to be a spy upon my actions he could

open it and read it.’

‘My dear, how could you bring yourself to use the word spy to your

husband?’

‘How could he bring himself to accuse me as he did? If he cares for me

let him come and beg my pardon for the insult he has offered me.’

‘Oh, Mrs Trevelyan!’

‘Yes; that seems very wrong to you, who have not had to bear it. It is

very easy for a stranger to take a husband’s part, and help to put down

a poor woman who has been ill used. I have done nothing wrong, nothing

to be ashamed of; and I will not say that I have. I never have spoken a

word to Colonel Osborne that all the world might not hear.’

‘Nobody has accused you, my dear.’

‘Yes; he has accused me, and you have accused me, and you will make all

the world accuse me. He may put me out of his house if he likes, but he

shall not make me say I have been wrong, when I know I have been right.

He cannot take my child from me.’

‘But he will.’

‘No,’ shouted Mrs Trevelyan, jumping up from her chair, ‘no; he shall

never do that. I will cling to him so that he cannot separate us. He

will never be so wicked, such a monster as that. I would go about the

world saying what a monster he had been to me.’ The passion of the

interview was becoming too great for Lady Milborough’s power of

moderating it, and she was beginning to feel herself to be in a

difficulty. ‘Lady Milborough,’ continued Mrs Trevelyan, ‘tell him from

me that I will bear anything but that. That I will not bear.’

‘Dear Mrs Trevelyan, do not let us talk about it.’

‘Who wants to talk about it? Why do you come here and threaten me with

a thing so horrible? I do not believe you. He would not dare to

separate me and my child.’

‘But you have only to say that you will submit yourself to him.’

‘I have submitted myself to him, and I will submit no further. What

does he want? Why does he send you here? He does not know what he

wants. He has made himself miserable by an absurd idea, and he wants

everybody to tell him that he has been right. He has been very wrong;

and if he desires to be wise now, he will come back to his home, and

say nothing further about it. He will gain nothing by sending

messengers here.’

Lady Milborough, who had undertaken a most disagreeable task from the

purest motives of old friendship, did not like being called a

messenger; but the woman before her was so strong in her words, so

eager, and so passionate, that she did not know how to resent the

injury. And there was coming over her an idea, of which she herself was

hardly conscious, that after all, perhaps, the husband was not in the

right. She had come there with the general idea that wives, and

especially young wives, should be submissive. She had naturally taken

the husband’s part; and having a preconceived dislike to Colonel

Osborne, she had been willing enough to think that precautionary

measures were necessary in reference to so eminent, and notorious, and

experienced a Lothario. She had never altogether loved Mrs Trevelyan,

and had always been a little in dread of her. But she had thought that

the authority with which she would be invested on this occasion, the

manifest right on her side, and the undeniable truth of her grand

argument, that a wife should obey, would carry her, if not easily,

still successfully through all difficulties. It was probably the case

that Lady Milborough when preparing for her visit, had anticipated a

triumph. But when she had been closeted for an hour with Mrs Trevelyan,

she found that she was not triumphant. She was told that she was a

messenger, and an unwelcome messenger; and she began to feel that she

did not know how she was to take herself away.

‘I am sure I have done everything for the best,’ she said, getting up

from her chair.

‘The best will be to send him back, and make him feel the truth.’

‘The best for you, my dear, will be to consider well what should be the

duty of a wife.’

‘I have considered, Lady Milborough. It cannot be a wife’s duty to

acknowledge that she has been wrong in such a matter as this.’

Then Lady Milborough made her curtsey and got herself away in some

manner that was sufficiently awkward, and Mrs Trevelyan curtseyed also

as she rang the bell; and, though she was sore and wretched, and, in

truth, sadly frightened, she was not awkward. In that encounter, so far

as it had gone, she had been the victor.

As soon as she was alone and the carriage had been driven well away

from the door, Mrs Trevelyan left the drawing-room and went up to the

nursery. As she entered she clothed her face with her sweetest smile.

‘How is his own mother’s dearest, dearest, darling duck’ she said,

putting out her arms and taking the boy from the nurse. The child was

at this time about ten months old, and was a strong, hearty, happy

infant, always laughing when he was awake and always sleeping when he

did not laugh, because his little limbs were free from pain and his

little stomach was not annoyed by internal troubles. He kicked, and

crowed, and sputtered, when his mother took him, and put up his little

fingers to clutch her hair, and was to her as a young god upon the

earth. Nothing in the world had ever been created so beautiful, so

joyous, so satisfactory, so divine! And they told her that this apple

of her eye was to be taken away from her! No that must be impossible.

‘I will take him into my own room, nurse, for a little while—you have

had him all the morning,’ she said; as though the ‘having baby’ was a

privilege over which there might almost be a quarrel. Then she took her

boy away with her, and when she was alone with him, went through such a

service in baby-worship as most mothers will understand. Divide these

two! No; nobody should do that. Sooner than that, she, the mother,

would consent to be no more than a servant in her husband’s house. Was

not her baby all the world to her?

On the evening of that day the husband and wife had an interview

together in the library, which, unfortunately, was as unsatisfactory as

Lady Milborough’s visit. The cause of the failure of them all lay

probably in this, that there was no decided point which, if conceded,

would have brought about a reconciliation. Trevelyan asked for general

submission, which he regarded as his right, and which in the existing

circumstances he thought it necessary to claim, and though Mrs

Trevelyan did not refuse to be submissive she would make no promise on

the subject. But the truth was that each desired that the other should

acknowledge a fault, and that neither of them would make that

acknowledgment. Emily Trevelyan felt acutely that she had been

illused, not only by her husband’s suspicion, but by the manner in

which he had talked of his suspicion to others, to Lady Milborough and

the cook, and she was quite convinced that she was right herself,

because he had been so vacillating in his conduct about Colonel

Osborne. But Trevelyan was equally sure that justice was on his side.

Emily must have known his real wishes about Colonel Osborne; but when

she had found that he had rescinded his verbal orders about the

admission of the man to the house, which he had done to save himself and

her from slander and gossip, she had taken advantage of this and had

thrown herself more entirely than ever into the intimacy of which he

disapproved!

When they met, each was so sore that no approach to terms was made by

them.

‘If I am to be treated in that way, I would rather not live with you,’

said the wife. ‘It is impossible to live with a husband who is

jealous.’

‘All I ask of you is that you shall promise me to have no further

communication with this man.’

‘I will make no promise that implies my own disgrace.’

‘Then we must part; and if that be so, this house will be given up. You

may live where you please in the country, not in London; but I shall

take steps that Colonel Osborne does not see you.’

‘I will not remain in the room with you to be insulted thus,’ said Mrs

Trevelyan. And she did not remain, but left the chamber, slamming the

door after her as she went.

‘It will be better that she should go,’ said Trevelyan, when he found

himself alone. And so it came to pass that that blessing of a rich

marriage, which had as it were fallen upon them at the Mandarins from

out of heaven, had become, after an interval of but two short years,

anything but an unmixed blessing.