Works of Ellen Wood, page 1322
For the little domestic episode had been given during the passage from the hotel to the diligence, under Madame’s polite escort. The narration bore witness to Mrs. Wood’s immediate influence upon people — the more remarkable that she never sought or invited confidences, and in manner with strangers was quiet almost to reticence.
La Patrone was resplendent in gold chain and earrings and picturesque Norman cap, bodice and petticoat — garments not assumed every day, she declared. She had been a very handsome woman, as so many of the Normans are, with fine heads well set upon their shoulders, magnificent figures, and a carriage upright as a dart — the heritage of a long line of ancestors, humble though they may be.
Such was the hostess of Eu; but she had long passed her youth, and indeed talked of retiring to the little propriete in Lille which had been so cavalierly treated by the missing tenants. They could just live upon their rentes, she said; and after all it was no use slaving until you dropped into the grave, where you certainly could enjoy nothing. There were no children, and no one to put by for — only themselves to think about. She longed to leave sleepy Eu, with its ugly Place, no two sides alike, where the only distraction was change of weather and the daily diligence. In Lille there was always something going on; and they had relations there — sisters and cousins of her husband. She herself had originally come from Duclair, a pretty village not far from Rouen, on the road to Caudebec and Havre, with its fine old church, wonderful marble pillars, and dragon mouths which supported the roof. Perhaps Madame knew Caudebec too, with its mascaret — that great wave which came twice a year, in March and October, and which people foretold just as astronomers foretold eclipses of the sun and moon. It was wonderful. On a given day excursionists would arrive, take their standing on the Plage, and all at once, as sure as the sky above them, the enormous wave came rolling in. Who knew whether, some fine day, it would not be so enormous as to drown them all?
The omnibus was ready to start. The coachman was mounting his box; the whip sent off its fireworks.
“Jean le cocher,” cried la Patrone, “have a care to Madame in the interior. Don’t drive too fast, and avoid the big stones on the road. They are so reckless,” she explained, “and sometimes drive furiously, especially if they have had a glass or two of absinthe before starting, or get it en route. Au plaisir, Madame,” as the reckless Jean whipped up his horses, and began to rattle over the stones of the little square. “If Madame will only descend here for a few days on her return from Dieppe, I shall be proud to wait upon her.”
And with her best bow, and looking a very picturesque member of society, la Patrone stood watching the diligence, straight and motionless as another Joan of Arc at the stake, until it turned the corner and was seen no more. But the result of the visit to Lille was never known, for the “few days’ descent” at Eu never took place. As women rule the world, it is probable that la Patrone had her way, and they retired to their little propriete, finding happiness in a life of leisure, and escaping the dangers of uncertain tenants.
CHAPTER XVI
“So, dearest, now thy brows are cold,
I see thee what thou art, and know
Thy likeness to the wise below,
Thy kindred with the great of old.”
THE journey to Dieppe was much the same as the first part of the journey from Abbeville, excepting that it appeared somewhat longer and more tedious. The scenery was still flat and unvarying, and grew a little monotonous; long straight roads that seemed interminable; whilst the dust under the horses’ feet flew in endless white clouds.
The omnibus had not gone very far before it stopped, and a picturesque nun entered and took her seat quietly. She glanced at Mrs. Wood, and then, with a graceful inclination and a “Bon jour, Madame,” threw back her black veil, which must have been trying in the heat of the day. In spite of the placid face, one seemed to read sorrow and disappointment in its expression. In youth she must have been beautiful.
Presently, with another glance at her fellow-traveller, she spoke again.
“Madame est Anglaise,” she said, more as an assertion than a question. Her voice was soft and pleasant, her French such as the upper classes spoke; she was evidently of gentle birth. Her age, as far as could be guessed, was about fifty. “It is not often that English ladies are seen in the uncomfortable Dieppe diligence,” she continued; “and today to make it still more uncomfortable we have only the omnibus.”
“We crossed over to Boulogne,” explained Mrs. Wood, “and intended to go round by St. Valery-sur-Somme, but there is no longer any correspondence.”
“They are always changing their plans,” remarked the nun, “and not always for the better. Madame has come round by Abbeville, where she must have stayed the night. It may chance that Madame is acquainted with Madame de St. Ange?”
“No,” returned Mrs. Wood, smiling, and preparing for another coincidence; “I never met Madame de St. Ange; but her sister, Madame de Marseine, is my great friend. We spent the evening together yesterday.”
“How singular that we should meet, you and I, Madame, and in a public conveyance, and in this remote spot!” cried the nun, with more enthusiasm than she had probably shown for many a day. “Of course I know Madame de Marseine as well as I know Madame de St. Ange; but I have seen more of the latter, having passed much of my life in the same neighbourhood. We are related; their father and mine were first cousins.”
“Yet you seem much younger than they,” remarked Mrs. Wood.
“I am younger, but not so much so as you might imagine,” laughed the nun; for nuns laugh sometimes. “I know that I look about fifty, but I am really sixty-two. Our quiet life, in which the emotions are suppressed and the days run calmly as a river, keeps the lines out of our faces.”
Then, after a few moments’ pause and a keen glance at Mrs. Wood, she added:
“I am sure you must be Madame Wood, of whom I have heard Madame de Marseine so often speak. Yet you also puzzle me, for you look only about thirty, and Madame Wood must be much more.”
“I am Madame Wood, and I am quite fifty,” was the laughing reply; “yet I am not a nun, and have had my share of sorrow. I too have heard of you from Madame de Marseine; I am sure you must be Soeur Marie-Blanche.”
“I am indeed that most unfortunate personage,” returned the nun sadly. “But this is one of the unexpected pleasures of my life. I have so long wanted to know you. You have bewitched Madame de Marseine, and we never meet but she talks of you. Of late years it has been to bewail your broken intercourse. I have also heard much of you from your cousin, Soeur Marie-Ursule, who is a nun of the Visitation. I do not belong to that order, but have sometimes stayed a week at a time in her convent. What a charming voice she had, what a wonderful harpist, and how truly good a woman. Her placid face bears the expression of a saint. She was a Miss Osborne, I think, in the old days.”
“Yes. She belonged to the Osbornes of Chelsley. They were Roman Catholics, as you may know. She was beautiful and accomplished, and was to have married in early life, but she had no dowry, and somehow it came to nothing. In her disappointment — I believe it really broke her heart — she took the veil and became a cloistered nun of that very strict order; her beauty, accomplishments, goodness, all lost to the world. Do you know that she has never even seen a train, or any modern improvement?”
“Yet I do not pity her,” returned Soeur Marie-Blanche, “for she has never repented the step. She has been happy in her life. She found her vocation; whilst I —— —”
She paused. Mrs. Wood looked at her with sympathy. It was one of those life - histories in which she was ever interested. She did not speak, but waited for more.
“Well I have not been happy,” laughed Soeur Marie-Blanche. “As Marie-Ursule found her vocation, so I missed mine. As Marie de Kerkadé I was to have married the Baron de Keruen — the head of a Breton family. We were much attached to each other — it was really a marriage d’amour, not merely de convenance. Everything was arranged, the wedding-day fixed. Three days before the event he went out shooting — and was brought home dead. Inconsolable, I seemed to lose all interest in life. My mother, a great devote, had often expressed a wish that I should take the veil — a singular and unhealthy wish, as I look upon it, for of all vocations it should never be forced upon any one. Again she proposed it, and I, not caring in my sorrow what became of me, yielded. I was to have become a cloistered nun, but it was soon seen that it would never do for me. I could never have borne the restraint and confinement. It would have driven me mad or killed me; at the very least have uprooted what little good might be in me. My headquarters, as I may call them, are near Abbeville — my convent; but I go about the world on all sorts of missions: sometimes nursing the sick; sometimes on important business connected with our order. They look upon me as a female diplomatist. I must be actively engaged, and my happiest times are when I have most to do. Not infrequently I spend a whole week with my cousin, Madame de St. Ange, and so have kept up my interest with the world. I am really only half a nun, for I am allowed far more freedom than is often given to those buried women. My family, as you know, has great influence in certain quarters, and it is supposed that I have great influence with them. Now, the Osbornes were Roman Catholic; but you, chere Madame—”
“Am a Protestant,” quickly responded Mrs. Wood. “I have lived amongst Roman Catholics, some of my best friends are Roman Catholic, and some of my relatives; but I am a Protestant, and hope to die in the faith of my fathers.”
“You are quite right,” replied Soeur Marie - Blanche. “Though I should not dare to say it aloud — it would almost mean excommunication — I would not lift a finger to make a convert. I would have the world more large-minded, and let each keep to his faith — so long as the foundations of that faith are the same. We go to the same Fountain-head: let that suffice. But we must not enter upon a religious argument in a public conveyance. It might stop and admit some bigoted priest, who would report me and bring upon me all sorts of trouble and penances. Besides, I firmly believe that the birds of the air carry tales. I have opened my heart to you,” she smiled; “but though we have only just met, I seem to have known you long. You are of those who inspire confidence. Madame de Marseine has told me so many a time; now I judge for myself. I did not know she was at Abbeville, though I knew she would probably go there. I have just come from Blangy, where I have had some work to do: Blangy with its ruins of St. Berthe as sole attraction for the explorer. Madame de St. Ange has fallen into the nervous condition which sometimes attacks elderly people: she is always thinking that she is going to die. Of course the inevitable must come to all some time. She is not strong and needs sympathy. Unfortunately her frigid husband does not understand even the meaning of the virtue, though an excellent man in his way. Madame de Marseine, I need not tell you, is brimming over with it.”
“And are you now bound for Dieppe?” asked Mrs. Wood.
“Yes, truly. I have an important mission to perform there, which will take me quite a fortnight. So I trust we may often meet, that I may know you better. It will be a mutual topic of conversation with Madame de Marseine in days to come. I can go about as I please; shall even be able to join you for an hour or two every day at the casino, if I do not make myself too conspicuous. Levity and frivolity are forbidden,” she laughed, “but I may mix a little with the world. Du reste, levity never attracted me; life is too serious, and mine especially has been all sadness and sorrow — the sadness and sorrow of being constantly haunted with what might have been. But at sixty-two the most frivolous coquette would surely have become earnest and sober.”
So talking, the afternoon passed into evening, the shades of night fell, and it was almost dark when Dieppe was reached.
“You go to the hotel,” said Soeur Marie-Blanche, as the omnibus entered the narrow rattling streets of the old town; “I to the convent. But what a benediction that I may come and go as I please!”
“Will you be allowed sometimes to spend an evening with us?” asked Mrs. Wood.
“Oh yes, provided I am in by ten o’clock. There are of course certain rules and conditions that I must observe, and that is one of them.”
“You will see Madame de Marseine, I hope, who has promised to spend ten days here; but it will be a week before she arrives. Then she returns to Abbeville for a final week with Madame de St Ange.”
“That is delightful!” cried Soeur Marie-Blanche. “We shall be a lively family party — for you are quite one of ourselves. What pleasant days and evenings shall we have! I must discover complications in my mission that will take time to overcome. What kindly fate led to our meeting in this way? I was to have come yesterday, but an intense headache prevented my travelling! I murmured at the time, and lo, it has proved my good friend.”
The rattling streets made conversation difficult. Jean le cocher — who, to give him his due, had not once during the journey descended from his box for absinthe — awoke the echoes with his whip; a small pandemonium. People of course rushed out to see the cavalcade pass.
“I do not like Dieppe,” said Soeur Marie-Blanche. “It is unwholesome and monotonous.”
“But the Plage is fine and the sea magnificent,” observed Mrs. Wood; “without any monotony.”
“Ah no! There you are in another world, and those who are fortunate enough to put up at any of the hotels on the Plage have nothing to complain of. But I, attached to the convent, am not so well placed. Those gloomy walls are depressing, and the stereotyped life would soon kill me if I could not get away from it. I always depart with joy; but on this occasion, if I leave you and Marguerite de Marseine behind me, I shall become a Niobe!”
Mrs. Wood laughed. “Do not think of that last day,” she observed. “Rather dwell upon the days we shall spend together. We must both write to Madame de Marseine, and try to hasten her coming. Yet no; for we must think of poor Madame de St. Ange!”
“Poor Adelaide!” sighed Sceur Marie-Blanche. “I have not been happy out of the world — she has not been happy within it. I suppose happiness does not exist. The fate I missed my imagination has always clothed in couleur de rose; I have pictured my life one long summer’s day, a calm flowing stream, all sparkling sunshine and clear reflections: but I daresay I should have had many rapids and shallows, many a thorn-wound.”
“When the end comes, depend upon it you will see that all has been for the best,” said Mrs. Wood earnestly.
“I am quite certain of it,” returned Soeur Marie-Blanche. “Yet it is hard to think so sometimes. The human heart is deceitful; what we have missed, what might have been, we see for ever in rainbow colours, whilst the skies of our actual life are always gray. But there is a happy fortnight before me,” she cried more joyously. “Events are not always so kindly disposed. I will make the most of it.”
And so the friends — already friends — parted; to meet again on many succeeding days. And when Madame de Marseine arrived, with all her train, Soeur Marie-Blanche seemed to have obtained a special dispensation or indulgence, for she spent almost all her hours with them. Dieppe was at that time the most fashionable of French watering-places, where the beau-monde from Paris and elsewhere met for many weeks of a delightful and unceremonious life. Picnics, walks upon the heights, parties of pleasure to the Chateau d’Arques, ambassadors’ balls, hours spent amidst friendly groups watching from the raised terrace of the Casino the deep blue, ever-changing sea — all contributed to the gilding of the hours as Time took his flight. In few places is the sea more beautiful than at Dieppe, more blue and expansive. Every hour of the day possessed its own phases and changes; the sun passing grandly and gorgeously on its way touched the sparkling waters into life; the sunsets, night after night, were celestial visions; and many a vessel steering westward seemed to be making straight for the land from which there is no return. To Mrs. Henry Wood it was a time of great happiness: renewing her intimacy with old friends; reviving old associations; the air full of the sound of the French tongue; the streets all life and movement, evidences of the happy French temperament which persists in seeing a silver lining to every cloud.
The episode has been specially dwelt on, as affording another insight into much of Mrs. Henry Wood’s life: the scenes she passed through, and day by day grew familiar with, until France became as another home to her, and its inhabitants, in whom, we would repeat, she ever saw much that was good, a greatly-loved people.
PART II
CHAPTER XVII
“But there is more than I can see,
And what I see I leave unsaid,
Nor speak it, knowing Death has made
His darkness beautiful with thee.”
IF the Abbeville episode be excepted, we have hitherto dwelt chiefly upon the scenes of Mrs. Henry Wood’s childhood, youth, and early married life.
The narrative is again taken up after a lapse of many years. The scene changes to England; the order of the old life had altered in every possible way; romance had given place to realities. The interval was a period of many trials and troubles, which proved Mrs. Wood’s true nature and heroic endurance.
We have now to touch upon her literary career. We feel how delicate is the task, and with regard to her success we would, as far as possible, record the words and praises of others and nothing of our own.
For the rest, praise at this hour could neither add to nor take from her fame. To one whose works, in the words of Mr. Bentley, have sold only less, if less, than those of Scott and Dickens, mere praise or the contrary can avail little.
