knew that before. Now I want you to say whether you will be my wife.”
“How can I answer that myself? Papa settles everything.”
“May I go to papa?”
“You may if you like,” she replied in a very low whisper. It was thus that the greatest heiress of the day, the greatest heiress of any day if people spoke truly, gave herself away to a man without a penny.
Chapter XII
Sir Felix in His Mother’s House
When all her friends were gone Lady Carbury looked about for her son, — not expecting to find him, for she knew how punctual was his nightly attendance at the Beargarden, but still with some faint hope that he might have remained on this special occasion to tell her of his fortune. She had watched the whispering, had noticed the cool effrontery with which Felix had spoken, — for without hearing the words she had almost known the very moment in which he was asking, — and had seen the girl’s timid face, and eyes turned to the ground, and the nervous twitching of her hands as she replied. As a woman, understanding such things, who had herself been wooed, who had at least dreamed of love, she had greatly disapproved her son’s manner. But yet, if it might be successful, if the girl would put up with lovemaking so slight as that, and if the great Melmotte would accept in return for his money a title so modest as that of her son, how glorious should her son be to her in spite of his indifference!
“I heard him leave the house before the Melmottes went,” said Henrietta, when the mother spoke of going up to her son’s bedroom.
“He might have stayed tonight. Do you think he asked her?”
“How can I say, mamma?”
“I should have thought you would have been anxious about your brother. I feel sure he did, — and that she accepted him.”
“If so I hope he will be good to her. I hope he loves her.”
“Why shouldn’t he love her as well as any one else? A girl need not be odious because she has money. There is nothing disagreeable about her.”
“No, — nothing disagreeable. I do not know that she is especially attractive.”
“Who is? I don’t see anybody specially attractive. It seems to me you are quite indifferent about Felix.”
“Do not say that, mamma.”
“Yes you are. You don’t understand all that he might be with this girl’s fortune, and what he must be unless he gets money by marriage. He is eating us both up.”
“I wouldn’t let him do that, mamma.”
“It’s all very well to say that, but I have some heart. I love him. I could not see him starve. Think what he might be with £20,000 a-year!”
“If he is to marry for that only, I cannot think that they will be happy.”
“You had better go to bed, Henrietta. You never say a word to comfort me in all my troubles.”
Then Henrietta went to bed, and Lady Carbury absolutely sat up the whole night waiting for her son, in order that she might hear his tidings. She went up to her room, disembarrassed herself of her finery, and wrapped herself in a white dressing-gown. As she sat opposite to her glass, relieving her head from its garniture of false hair, she acknowledged to herself that age was coming on her. She could hide the unwelcome approach by art, — hide it more completely than can most women of her age; but, there it was, stealing on her with short grey hairs over her ears and around her temples, with little wrinkles round her eyes easily concealed by objectionable cosmetics, and a look of weariness round the mouth which could only be removed by that self-assertion of herself which practice had made always possible to her in company, though it now so frequently deserted her when she was alone.
But she was not a woman to be unhappy because she was growing old. Her happiness, like that of most of us, was ever in the future, — never reached but always coming. She, however, had not looked for happiness to love and loveliness, and need not therefore be disappointed on that score. She had never really determined what it was that might make her happy, — having some hazy aspiration after social distinction and literary fame, in which was ever commingled solicitude respecting money. But at the present moment her great fears and her great hopes were centred on her son. She would not care how grey might be her hair, or how savage might be Mr Alf, if her Felix were to marry this heiress. On the other hand, nothing that pearl-powder or the “Morning Breakfast Table” could do would avail anything, unless he could be extricated from the ruin that now surrounded him. So she went down into the dining-room, that she might be sure to hear the key in the door, even should she sleep, and waited for him with a volume of French memoirs in her hand.
Unfortunate woman! she might have gone to bed and have been duly called about her usual time, for it was past eight and the full staring daylight shone into her room when Felix’s cab brought him to the door. The night had been very wretched to her. She had slept, and the fire had sunk nearly to nothing and had refused to become again comfortable. She could not keep her mind to her book, and while she was awake the time seemed to be everlasting. And then it was so terrible to her that he should be gambling at such hours as these! Why should he desire to gamble if this girl’s fortune was ready to fall into his hands? Fool, to risk his health, his character, his beauty, the little money which at this moment of time might be so indispensable to his great project, for the chance of winning something which in comparison with Marie Melmotte’s money must be despicable! But at last he came! She waited patiently till he had thrown aside his hat and coat, and then she appeared at the dining-room door. She had studied her part for the occasion. She would not say a harsh word, and now she endeavoured to meet him with a smile. “Mother,” he said, “you up at this hour!” His face was flushed, and she thought that there was some unsteadiness in his gait. She had never seen him tipsy, and it would be doubly terrible to her if such should be his condition.
“I could not go to bed till I had seen you.”
“Why not? why should you want to see me? I’ll go to bed now. There’ll be plenty of time by-and-by.”
“Is anything the matter, Felix?”
“Matter, — what should be the matter? There’s been a gentle row among the fellows at the club; — that’s all. I had to tell Grasslough a bit of my mind, and he didn’t like it. I didn’t mean that he should.”
“There is not going to be any fighting, Felix?”
“What, duelling; oh no, — nothing so exciting as that. Whether somebody may not have to kick somebody is more than I can say at present. You must let me go to bed now, for I am about used up.”
“What did Marie Melmotte say to you?”
“Nothing particular.” And he stood with his hand on the door as he answered her.
“And what did you say to her?”
“Nothing particular. Good heavens, mother, do you think that a man is in a condition to talk about such stuff as that at eight o’clock in the morning, when he has been up all night?”
“If you knew all that I suffer on your behalf you would speak a word to me,” she said, imploring him, holding him by the arm, and looking into his purple face and bloodshot eyes. She was sure that he had been drinking. She could smell it in his breath.
“I must go to the old fellow, of course.”
“She told you to go to her father?”
“As far as I remember, that was about it. Of course, he means to settle it as he likes. I should say that it’s ten to one against me.” Pulling himself away with some little roughness from his mother’s hold, he made his way up to his own bedroom, occasionally stumbling against the stairs.
Then