BIEN PERDU, BIEN CONNU

Keep, therefore, a true woman’s eye,
And love me still, but know not why;
So hast thou the same reason still
To doat upon me ever!

“It’s very nice to be at home again,” I said to Mrs. Throckmorton, as I broke a great lump of coal in pieces, and watched the flames with pleasure.

“Yes,” said Mrs. Throckmorton, putting another piece of sugar in her coffee, for she was still at the table. “That is, if you call this home; I must confess it doesn’t feel so to me altogether.”

“Well, it’s our own dear, noisy, raging, racketing, bustling old city, if it isn’t our own house, and I’m sure we’re very comfortable.”

“Very,” said Mrs. Throckmorton, who was always pleased.

“Every time I hear the tinkle of a car-bell, or the roar of an omnibus, I feel a thrill of pleasure,” I said; “I never was so glad to get anywhere before.”

“That’s something new, isn’t it?” said Mrs. Throckmorton, briefly.

“I don’t know; I think I am always glad to get back home.”

“And very glad to go away again too, my dear.”

“I don’t think I shall travel any more,” I returned. “The fact is, I am getting too old to care about it, I believe.”

Mrs. Throckmorton laughed, being considerably over forty, and still as fond of going about as ever.

We were only de retour two days. We had started eighteen months ago, for at least three years in Europe, and I had found myself unaccountably tired of it at the end of a year and a half; and here we were.

Our house was rented, but that I had not allowed to be any obstacle, though Mrs. Throckmorton, who was very well satisfied with the easy life abroad, had tried to make it so. I had secured apartments which were very pretty and complete. We had found them in order, and we had come there from the steamer. I was eminently happy at being where I wanted to be.

“How odd it seems to be in town and have nobody know it,” I said, thinking, with a little quiet satisfaction, how pleased several people I could name would be, if they only knew we were so near them.

“Nobody but Mr. Vandermarck, I suppose,” said Mrs. Throckmorton.

“Not even he,” I answered, “for he can’t have got my letter yet; it was only mailed the day we started. It was only a chance, you know, our getting those staterooms, and we were in such a hurry. I was so much obliged to that dear, old German gentleman for dying. We shouldn’t have been here if he hadn’t.”

“Pauline, my dear!”

“Well, I can’t think, as he’s probably in heaven, that he can have begrudged us his tickets to New York.”

“I should think not,” said Mrs. Throckmorton, with a little sigh. For New York was not heaven to her, and she had spent a good deal of the day in looking up the necessary servants for our establishment, which, little as it was, required just double the number that had made us comfortable abroad.

She had too much discretion to trouble me with her cares, however, so she said cheerfully, after a few moments, by way of diverting my mind and her own

“Well, I heard some news to-day.”

“Ah!” (I had been unpacking all day; and Mrs. Throckmorton in the interval of servant-hunting had not been able to refrain from a visit or two, en passant to dear friends.)

“Yes: Kilian Vandermarck was married yesterday.”

“Yesterday! how odd. And pray, who has he married? Not Mary Leighton, I should hope.”

“Leighton. Yes, that’s the name. No money, and a little passe. Everybody wonders.”

“Well, he deserves it. That is even-handed justice, I’m not sorry for him. He’s been trifling all his days, and now he’s got his punishment. It serves Sophie right, too. I know she can’t endure her. She never thought there was the slightest danger. But I’m sorry for Richard, that he’s got to have such a girl related to him.”

“Oh, well,” said Mrs. Throckmorton, “I don’t know whether that’ll affect him very much, for they say he’s going to be married too.”

“Richard!”

“Yes; and to that Benson girl, you know.”

“Who told you?”

“Mary Ann. She’s heard it half a dozen times, she says. I believe it’s rather an old affair. His sister made it up, I’m told. The young lady’s been spending the summer with them, and this autumn it came out.”

“I don’t believe it.”

“I’m sure I don’t know; only that’s the talk. It would be odd, though, if we’d just come home in time for the wedding. You’ll have to give her something handsome, being your guardian, and all.”

I wouldn’t give her anything, and she shouldn’t marry Richard, I thought, as I leaned back in my chair and looked into the fire; a great silence having fallen on us since the delivery of that piece of news.

I said I didn’t believe it, and yet I’m afraid I did. It was so like a man to give in at last; at least, like any man but Richard. He had always liked Charlotte Benson, and known how clever she was, and Sophie had been so set upon it, (particularly since Richard had had so much money that he had given her a handsome settlement that nothing would affect.) And now that Kilian was married and would have the place, unless Richard wanted it, it was natural that Sophie should approve Richard having his wife there instead of Kilian having his; Kilian’s being one that nobody particularly approved.

Yes, it did sound very much like probability. I wasn’t given to self-analysis; but I acknowledged to myself, that I was very much disappointed, and that if I had known that this was going to happen, I should have stayed in Europe.

I had never felt as if there were any chance of Richard marrying any one; I had not said to myself, that his love for me still had an existence, nor had I any reason to believe it. But the truth had been, I had always felt that he belonged to me, and was my right, and I felt a bitter resentment toward this woman, who was supposed to have usurped my place. How dared Richard love anybody else! I was angry with him, and very much hurt, and very, very unhappy.

Long after Mrs. Throckmorton went to her middle-aged repose, I sat up and went through imaginary scenes, and reviewed the situation a hundred times, and tried to convince myself of what I wanted to believe, and ended without any satisfaction.

One thing was certain. If Richard was going to marry Charlotte Benson, he was not going to do it because he loved her. He might not be prevented from doing it because he loved me; but he did not love her. I could not say why exactly. But I knew she was not the kind of woman for him to think of loving, and I would not believe it till I heard it from himself, and I would hear it from himself at the earliest possible date. I did not like to be unhappy, and was very impatient to get rid of this, if it were not true, and to know the worst, at once, if it were.

“My dear Throcky,” I said to my companion, at the breakfast-table, “I think you’d better go and take dinner with your niece to-day. I’ve sent for Mr. Vandermarck to come and dine, and I thought perhaps you’d rather not be bored; we shall have business to talk about, and business is such a nuisance when you’re not interested in it.”

“Very well, my dear,” said Mrs. Throckmorton, with indestructible good-humor.

“Or you might have a headache, if you’d rather, and I’ll send your dinner up to you. I’ll be sure Susan takes you everything that’s nice.”

“Well, then, I think I’ll have a headache; I’m afraid I’d rather have it than one of Mary Ann’s poor dinners. (I’d be sure of one to-morrow if I went.)”

“Paris things have spoiled you, I’m afraid,” I said. “Only see that I have something nice for Richard, won’t you? How do you think the cook is going to do?” This was the first sign of interest I had given in the matter of ménage; by which it will be seen I was still a little selfish, and not very wise. But Throckmorton was a person to cultivate my selfishness, and there had not been much to develop the wisdom of common life.

She promised me a very pretty dinner, no matter at what trouble, and made me feel quite easy about her wounded feelings. One of the best features of Throckmorton was, she hadn’t any feelings; you might treat her like a galley-slave, and she would show the least dejection. It was a temptation to have such a person in the house.

I had sent a note to Richard which contained the following:

“DEAR RICHARD:

“I am sure you will be surprised to know we have returned. But the fact is, I got very tired of Italy; and we were disappointed in the apartments we wanted in Berlin, and some of the people we expected to have with us had to give it up, and altogether it seemed dull, and we thought it would be just as pleasant to come home. We were able to get staterooms that just suited us, and it didn’t seem worth while to lose them by waiting to send word. We had a very comfortable voyage, and I am glad to find myself at home, though Mrs. Throckmorton doesn’t think the rooms are very nice. I want to know if you won’t come to dinner. We dine at six. Send a line back by the boy. I want to ask you about some business matters.

“Affectionately yours,

PAULINE.

And I had received for answer:

“MY DEAR PAULINE:

“Of course I am astonished to think you are at home. I enclosed you several letters by the steamer yesterday, none of them of any very great importance, though, I think. I will come up at six.

“Always yours,

“RICHARD VANDERMARCK.

P.S. I am very glad you wanted to come home.

I read this letter over a great many times, but it did not enlighten me at all as to his intentions about marrying Charlotte Benson. It was very matter-of-fact, but that Richard’s letters always were. Evidently he had thought the same of it himself, as he read it over, and had added the postscript. But that did not seem very enthusiastic. Altogether I was not happy, waiting for six o’clock to come.