The Way We Live Now by Anthony Trollope (best fiction novels of all time .TXT) 📕

her answer to Paul Montague; and, as she would have no further personal correspondence with him, she took the brooch to her mother with a request that it might be returned.

“Of course, my dear, I will send it back to him. Is there nothing else?”

“No, mamma;⁠—nothing else. I have no letters, and no other present. You always knew everything that took place. If you will just send that back to him⁠—without a word. You won’t say anything⁠—will you, mamma?”

“There is nothing for me to say if you have really made him understand you.”

“I think he understood me, mamma. You need not doubt about that.”

“He has behaved very, very badly⁠—from the beginning,” said Lady Carbury.

But Hetta did not really think that the young man had behaved very badly from the beginning, and certainly did not wish to be told of his misbehaviour. No doubt she thought that the young man had behaved very well in falling in love with her directly he saw her;⁠—only that he had behaved so badly in taking Mrs. Hurtle to Lowestoft afterwards! “It’s no good talking about that, mamma. I hope you will never talk of him any more.”

“He is quite unworthy,” said Lady Carbury.

“I can’t bear to⁠—have him⁠—abused,” said Hetta sobbing.

“My dear Hetta, I have no doubt this has made you for the time unhappy. Such little accidents do make people unhappy⁠—for the time. But it will be much for the best that you should endeavour not to be so sensitive about it. The world is too rough and too hard for people to allow their feelings full play. You have to look out for the future, and you can best do so by resolving that Paul Montague shall be forgotten at once.”

“Oh, mamma, don’t. How is a person to resolve? Oh, mamma, don’t say any more.”

“But, my dear, there is more that I must say. Your future life is before you, and I must think of it, and you must think of it. Of course you must be married.”

“There is no of course at all.”

“Of course you must be married,” continued Lady Carbury, “and of course it is your duty to think of the way in which this may be best done. My income is becoming less and less every day. I already owe money to your cousin, and I owe money to Mr. Broune.”

“Money to Mr. Broune!”

“Yes⁠—to Mr. Broune. I had to pay a sum for Felix which Mr. Broune told me ought to be paid. And I owe money to tradesmen. I fear that I shall not be able to keep on this house. And they tell me⁠—your cousin and Mr. Broune⁠—that it is my duty to take Felix out of London⁠—probably abroad.”

“Of course I shall go with you.”

“It may be so at first; but, perhaps, even that may not be necessary. Why should you? What pleasure could you have in it? Think what my life must be with Felix in some French or German town!”

“Mamma, why don’t you let me be a comfort to you? Why do you speak of me always as though I were a burden?”

“Everybody is a burden to other people. It is the way of life. But you⁠—if you will only yield in ever so little⁠—you may go where you will be no burden, where you will be accepted simply as a blessing. You have the opportunity of securing comfort for your whole life, and of making a friend, not only for yourself, but for me and your brother, of one whose friendship we cannot fail to want.”

“Mamma, you cannot really mean to talk about that now?”

“Why should I not mean it? What is the use of indulging in high-flown nonsense? Make up your mind to be the wife of your cousin Roger.”

“This is horrid,” said Hetta, bursting out in her agony. “Cannot you understand that I am brokenhearted about Paul, that I love him from my very soul, that parting from him is like tearing my heart in pieces? I know that I must, because he has behaved so very badly⁠—and because of that wicked woman! And so I have. But I did not think that in the very next hour you would bid me give myself to somebody else! I will never marry Roger Carbury. You may be quite⁠—quite sure that I shall never marry anyone. If you won’t take me with you when you go away with Felix, I must stay behind and try and earn my bread. I suppose I could go out as a nurse.” Then, without waiting for a reply she left the room and betook herself to her own apartment.

Lady Carbury did not even understand her daughter. She could not conceive that she had in any way acted unkindly in taking the opportunity of Montague’s rejection for pressing the suit of the other lover. She was simply anxious to get a husband for her daughter⁠—as she had been anxious to get a wife for her son⁠—in order that her child might live comfortably. But she felt that whenever she spoke common sense to Hetta, her daughter took it as an offence, and flew into tantrums, being altogether unable to accommodate herself to the hard truths of the world. Deep as was the sorrow which her son brought upon her, and great as was the disgrace, she could feel more sympathy for him than for the girl. If there was anything that she could not forgive in life it was romance. And yet she, at any rate, believed that she delighted in romantic poetry! At the present moment she was very wretched; and was certainly unselfish in her wish to see her daughter comfortably settled before she commenced those miserable roamings with her son which seemed to be her coming destiny.

In these days she thought a good deal of Mr. Broune’s offer, and of her own refusal. It was odd that since that refusal she had seen more of him, and had certainly known much more of him than she had ever seen or known before. Previous to