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

you can say to me can change my mind.” Of course the girl’s mind would be changed. The girl’s mind, indeed, required no change. Mrs. Hurtle could see well enough that the girl’s heart was set upon the man. Nevertheless she did not doubt but that she could tell the story after such a fashion as to make it impossible that the girl should marry him⁠—if she chose to do so.

At first she thought that she would not answer the letter at all. What was it to her? Let them fight their own lovers’ battles out after their own childish fashion. If the man meant at last to be honest, there could be no doubt, Mrs. Hurtle thought, that the girl would go to him. It would require no interference of hers. But after a while she thought that she might as well see this English chit who had superseded herself in the affections of the Englishman she had condescended to love. And if it were the case that all revenge was to be abandoned, that no punishment was to be exacted in return for all the injury that had been done, why should she not say a kind word so as to smooth away the existing difficulties? Wild cat as she was, kindness was more congenial to her nature than cruelty. So she wrote to Hetta making an appointment.

Dear Miss Carbury⁠—

If you could make it convenient to yourself to call here either Thursday or Friday at any hour between two and four, I shall be very happy to see you.

Yours sincerely,

Winifred Hurtle.

XCI The Rivals

During these days the intercourse between Lady Carbury and her daughter was constrained and far from pleasant. Hetta, thinking that she was ill-used, kept herself aloof, and would not speak to her mother of herself or of her troubles. Lady Carbury watching her, but not daring to say much, was at last almost frightened at her girl’s silence. She had assured herself, when she found that Hetta was disposed to quarrel with her lover and to send him back his brooch, that “things would come round,” that Paul would be forgotten quickly⁠—or laid aside as though he were forgotten⁠—and that Hetta would soon perceive it to be her interest to marry her cousin. With such a prospect before her, Lady Carbury thought it to be her duty as a mother to show no tendency to sympathise with her girl’s sorrow. Such heart-breakings were occurring daily in the world around them. Who were the happy people that were driven neither by ambition, nor poverty, nor greed, nor the cross purposes of unhappy love, to stifle and trample upon their feelings? She had known no one so blessed. She had never been happy after that fashion. She herself had within the last few weeks refused to join her lot with that of a man she really liked, because her wicked son was so grievous a burden on her shoulders. A woman, she thought, if she were unfortunate enough to be a lady without wealth of her own, must give up everything, her body, her heart⁠—her very soul if she were that way troubled⁠—to the procuring of a fitting maintenance for herself. Why should Hetta hope to be more fortunate than others? And then the position which chance now offered to her was fortunate. This cousin of hers, who was so devoted to her, was in all respects good. He would not torture her by harsh restraint and cruel temper. He would not drink. He would not spend his money foolishly. He would allow her all the belongings of a fair, free life. Lady Carbury reiterated to herself the assertion that she was manifestly doing a mother’s duty by her endeavours to constrain her girl to marry such a man. With a settled purpose she was severe and hard. But when she found how harsh her daughter could be in response to this⁠—how gloomy, how silent, and how severe in retaliation⁠—she was almost frightened at what she herself was doing. She had not known how stern and how enduring her daughter could be. “Hetta,” she said, “why don’t you speak to me?” On this very day it was Hetta’s purpose to visit Mrs. Hurtle at Islington. She had said no word of her intention to anyone. She had chosen the Friday because on that day she knew her mother would go in the afternoon to her publisher. There should be no deceit. Immediately on her return she would tell her mother what she had done. But she considered herself to be emancipated from control. Among them they had robbed her of her lover. She had submitted to the robbery, but she would submit to nothing else. “Hetta, why don’t you speak to me?” said Lady Carbury.

“Because, mamma, there is nothing we can talk about without making each other unhappy.”

“What a dreadful thing to say! Is there no subject in the world to interest you except that wretched young man?”

“None other at all,” said Hetta obstinately.

“What folly it is⁠—I will not say only to speak like that, but to allow yourself to entertain such thoughts!”

“How am I to control my thoughts? Do you think, mamma, that after I had owned to you that I loved a man⁠—after I had owned it to him and, worst of all, to myself⁠—I could have myself separated from him, and then not think about it? It is a cloud upon everything. It is as though I had lost my eyesight and my speech. It is as it would be to you if Felix were to die. It crushes me.”

There was an accusation in this allusion to her brother which the mother felt⁠—as she was intended to feel it⁠—but to which she could make no reply. It accused her of being too much concerned for her son to feel any real affection for her daughter. “You are ignorant of the world, Hetta,” she said.

“I am having a