CHAPTER XXXII

It was on the evening of the next day that Tom Linley entered the house at Pierrepont Street, and ran upstairs and flung himself into the music-room, where his father was giving Polly and Maria a lesson on a part song. They had gone over the lines:

“Sigh no more, ladies:
Men were deceivers ever,
One foot on sea and one on land,
To one thing constant never.”

“‘Deceivers ever—deceivers ever,’” came Maria’s pretty treble.

“‘Sigh no more—sigh no more,’” whispered Polly in simple harmony, and then their voices joined with Betsy’s in the half-mocking bourdon—

“With a hey nonny, nonny—”

when Tom entered and threw himself on the sofa. The singers ceased their song and stared at him. He held his violin laid across his knees, and then a sudden horror came over the girls, paralysing them where they stood, for they saw that the violin was broken. Its long neck was severed close to the body of the instrument, and hung down, suspended by the strings, from his knees. It was as if they were looking at a strangled infant—the droop of the severed neck had about it all the limpness of death. It was ludicrously ghastly, and Tom was gazing at the wreck with unspeculative eyes.

“Heavens above us! What has happened?” cried Mr. Linley.

“I broke it—God forgive me—I broke it in my anger!” sobbed Tom. “What does it matter?” he cried, recovering himself. “’Tis not alone the fiddle that is broken; my heart is broken, and I shall never touch the instrument again!”

He flung it away from him, but Betsy saw that he took good care that it should alight on the cushion of the sofa. The moan that came from the headless trunk striking the soft place was distractingly human. Maria had lately been reading of a decapitated prince whose head, after the operation, had rolled off the sawdust, so that all could see the disdainful expression on the face; and here was the decapitated violin moaning.

She shuddered.

“It can be mended,” said Mr. Linley, examining the wreck.

“I shall never play again,” moaned Tom. “My heart is broken.”

“Thank Heaven!” murmured his father.

Betsy went to her brother’s side, and put an arm about his neck.

“You have come back to us, dear Tom,” she said; “and you will never go away from us again. We all here love you, Tom. Ah, you know that nothing can change our love for you.”

"Curse Dick Sheridan!"

“Curse Dick Sheridan! he has done it all!”

[page 313 .

“Delilah—Delilah—traitress!” murmured Tom. “O Betsy, there has been no deception like mine since the days of Delilah! She told me plainly that she was tired of me—that she had never thought of me except as a nice boy—she actually called me a pretty boy! And my playing—she said that it was dreary—it gave her the vapours; she asked me to play a jig—an Irish jig, too—Irish! I told her that sooner than see my instrument desecrated I would break it across my knee. ‘Virginius, the Roman father!’ she cried, pointing a finger at me. I always thought her fingers shapely; but I saw then that they were not fingers, but talons—talons!... and I broke my violin before her, and yet she laughed.... O Delilah—Delilah!... But I shall set the scene to music that shall wring her heart, if she have one. I see clearly how it can be dealt with by a small orchestra. Handel fell lamentably short of the truth when he wrote the music to Delilah. I have the prelude in my mind. This is how it will go.”

He mechanically stretched across the sofa for the violin. Crash went the pegs, drooping with the neck by the catgut strings, against the hollow body of the instrument. He started up as if he had become aware of the disaster for the first time. For some moments he stood handling the wreck, and then he laid it down very gently on the sofa. He went with the bowed head of a father in the death-chamber of his child, to the door; but when he had opened it, and was in the act of departing, he turned and stood up straight like a man; his hands were clenched, his eyes were blazing, while he cried:

“Curse Dick Sheridan! he has done it all. Curse him! Curse him!”

He banged the door behind him, leaving the girls white and awed. They had never before witnessed a really tragic scene ending up with a curse, and they felt that it was very awful.

“Yes,” said Mr. Linley quietly, “we can all join in his prayer and say, ‘Bless Dick Sheridan! Bless Dick Sheridan!’—that will be poor Tom’s prayer in another month—perhaps another week.”

“Oh, no, no! not another week,” said Betsy. “I should be sorry to think that Tom could be himself within a week. Tom has too deep feeling for that.”

“Let us return to our lesson,” said her father. “Dwell lightly on ‘deceivers ever,’ Maria; and I think, Betsy, you might give full value to the minim rest before ‘Sigh no more,’ after the ‘hey nonny!’ I think I see the delicate humour of the composer’s treatment of the song better now than I did ten minutes ago.”

But the girls were too unnerved to be able to return to their lesson just then. They remonstrated with their father.

“Well, perhaps one lesson in the day is enough,” said he, “and Tom has just had his.”

It was altogether very amusing and quite infamous, Bath said. Heavens! the way in which that woman pursued her course, being on with a new love quite two days before she was off with the old, was absolutely shameless.

“A female comet with an ardent train—no fixed star in the firmament,” said Mr. Walpole, when it was found that Mrs. Abington had discarded Tom Linley and had taken on Dick Sheridan. It was found that she had done so within an hour of Tom’s dismissal.

“The comet has in all ages been looked on as a portent of disaster,” said George Selwyn. “I wonder what does this particular heavenly body portend?”

“I am no astrologer, but I dare swear that Mr. Cumberland’s new comedy will be damned,” said Walpole.

“My dear Horry, the obvious needs no portent! ’Twould be a ridiculous waste of fuel to send a comet flaring through the sky merely to let the world know that Sir Joshua’s macaw will lose his tail-feathers in the moulting season,” said Selwyn. “Mrs. Abington has not come to Bath for a whole month solely to give Nan Cattley a chance of making the damning of Cumberland’s play a certainty.”

“Nay, but her acting might save it if she were to return to town,” said Walpole.

“Then it must be our duty to keep her here,” said Selwyn.

“’Tis two days since she found young Sheridan attractive,” said Walpole; “so that she is not the fickle creature some people have called her.”

“With economy she may be faithful to Dick Sheridan till the end of the week,” said Selwyn. “Can Bath furnish another swain with ruddy cheeks and a glib tongue to follow him?”

The cynical pleasantries of the Walpole circle, dealing with the case of Mrs. Abington and young Sheridan, were echoed by the inferior wits of the Pump Room—for the flare of a comet affects other systems besides the solar. Dick Sheridan was in as active attendance upon the lady as Tom Linley had been even in the early days of his attachment to her. He did not play the violin to her, and this fact, some people declared, should not be lost sight of by those who were venturing to assign a duration of just one week to this new caprice on the part of the actress. There was no predicting the length of time that she might remain faithful to a good-looking youth, provided that he refrained from playing the violin to her—her constancy might even last out the fortnight.

But these were the optimists.

Dick Sheridan knew perfectly well what the people were saying when they shrugged their shoulders and smiled significantly as he went by with Mrs. Abington; but he too shrugged his shoulders, and his smile also had a significance of its own. He went everywhere with the lady, even to her own house; but this was when she entertained some of her friends to supper.

Once when by the side of Mrs. Abington in Spring Gardens he caught sight of Betsy Linley in the distance. She was looking toward him across the green lawn, and their eyes met. He fancied that there was something of gratitude in the smile which she sent to him—he knew that there was something of sadness in it; and then—he could not doubt that the expression on her face was one of reproach—reproach and indignation.

For a moment he omitted to reply to a casual question put to him by his gay companion, and she quickly followed the direction of his eyes. She saw Betsy and gave a laugh. She accepted the reproachful look in the girl’s eyes as a tribute to her own powers. She was not astute enough to keep her satisfaction to herself.

“Lud!” she cried, “that young woman has strange notions of the duty of a censorship. She is e’en reproving you, Dick, for being in my company. That is like enough a woman to serve you for a lesson, my dear. A woman has no sense of gratitude for a favour done to her by a man whom she loves and whom she has discarded.”

“Madam,” said Dick, “it is not for such as we are to judge Miss Linley by our standards: we are only men and women.”

“That is all, praise Heaven!” cried the actress. “I claim to be nothing more than a woman, and I don’t know that one can be much better—ay, or worse, Dick. God made me a woman, and I don’t believe that He will be hard on a woman for being womanly. If He had meant me to be an angel, He would have given me wings, and then I should be angelic—and to be angelic is to be insipid. But take my word for it, Miss Linley, though she judge us from the standpoint of an angel, is just as much a woman as the best of us—ay, or the worst of us. She is just as jealous of me, thank God, as I am of her at this moment; and that’s the last word that you and I will have about Miss Linley.”

Dick resolved that, so far as he was concerned, there should be no need for another word on the subject of Miss Linley to pass between them; and when he came to think over the matter, he was glad that so much had already passed between them regarding Betsy. He had been warned, from what Mrs. Abington had said, that she was under no delusion respecting Betsy and himself. That same astuteness which she had shown in reading the secret of his love for Betsy, had enabled her to perceive that the fact of his having entered into an agreement with herself did not in a moment cause him to forget Betsy Linley.

And thus, day by day, he was in attendance upon Mrs. Abington, appearing by her side in all public places, and at many private suppers and card-tables, so that a good many people looked on him as an extremely fortunate young man.

As for Dick himself, he began to feel that he was indeed fortunate. Had he not been able to do a great service to the only one whom he loved, at a sacrifice of himself? He was proving his love to Betsy Linley by marrying Mrs. Abington. Yes, he felt that he was fortunate.

But all these days he failed to call upon Mr. Long. The truth was that it now and again occurred to him that Mr. Long might not understand without more explanation than he was inclined to offer, the position which he had taken up. He shrank from the duty—if he might call it a duty—of making it plain to Mr. Long that he was marrying Mrs. Abington in order that Betsy Linley might get back her brother. But there came a day when he learned that Mr. Long was waiting on him, and he found himself in the presence of that gentleman in the room in which he had received Mrs. Abington a short time before.

Mr. Long greeted him cordially.

“You will pardon my obtruding upon you at this time, Mr. Sheridan,” said he; “but I must confess that I thought it strange that we should separate good friends a fortnight ago and then remain apart. Surely our friendship promised better things than this, sir!”

Dick made up his mind to be bold. He smiled, examined the tips of his fingers, and then said:

“I assure you, sir, that I retain all the liveliest sentiments of regard for you. Dear sir, you have been kindness itself to me, and I should be most ungrateful if I were to fail in my duty to you. But the fact is, Mr. Long, that—that—— Ah well, sir, you will understand my seeming neglect when I inform you that I have been successful in engaging the affections of a lady to whom I have been devoted for—for—some time. When I tell you the lady’s name, sir, I know I shall be the more easily excused.”

“Do not tell me that the lady’s name is Mrs. Abington,” said Mr. Long gravely.

“I am sorry—I mean I am glad—yes, I am glad, sir, that it is not in my power to obey you in this matter,” said Dick, still smiling, but with more than a little self-consciousness. He was beginning to feel uneasy beneath the grave, searching look of his visitor. “Yes, dear sir, we are to be married very shortly, so that you will understand, I am sure, that, just now, I do not count my time my own.”

“You are to marry Mrs. Abington, the actress—the actress?” said Mr. Long.

“Ah, sir, there is only one Mrs. Abington in the world, and—my father is an actor,” said Dick.

“And you expect to be happy with her as your wife?” said Mr. Long.

“If I am not, sir, it will be because I am not easily made happy; ’twill not be the lady’s fault.”

“Then I wish you every happiness, Mr. Sheridan.”

Mr. Long rose from his chair and took up his hat.

“There is a forlorn hopefulness in your tone, sir, that has a chilling effect upon me,” said Dick. “May I ask why it should appear ridiculous to expect that I should be happy—at least as happy as most wedded folks are?”

“You have disappointed me, Dick, that is all I can say to you—you have grievously disappointed me. That one who had ever loved Elizabeth Linley could bring himself to marry—— I ask your pardon, sir; I exceed my privileges as a friend. I have no right to express myself in such terms. I have the honour to wish you a very good day, sir.”

“Mr. Long,” said Dick, “I seek for your good opinion more than that of any man living. I pray of you to think the best of me—not the worst.”

“And what is the best that you would have me think?” cried Mr. Long. “Just state with some show of reason what you wish me to think of you, and I promise that I will be influenced by what you say. You talked to me of loving Elizabeth Linley.”

“Nay, sir, ’twas you who talked to me of it. ’Twas you strange to say—you, to whom Miss Linley has given her promise—’twas you who talked to me of my love for her.”

“I allow it. Alas! I believed—in my ignorance of men and of their motives—in my ignorance of how men regard love—I prayed of you to allow your love for her—her love for you—to urge you to achieve something noble in life. I flattered myself that I had impressed upon you the true nature of love—the sentiment that exalts, that ennobles, that leads a man into deeds of self-sacrifice and devotion to duty; and yet—you are ready to marry Mrs. Abington.”

For a moment Dick was stung with a sense of the injustice that was being done to him.

“I am ready to marry Mrs. Abington,” he cried, “and you, sir, are ready to marry Elizabeth Linley.”

“You fool!” said Mr. Long, “I have no hope of marrying her. I knew too well that she loved you, and—as I fancied—that you loved her, ever to think of marrying her. My only hope was to see her happy—to look at her happiness through another man’s eyes—through your eyes, Dick—your eyes. But now—alas! alas!”

He spoke rapidly, almost passionately, facing Dick. His breaking off was abrupt; it seemed as if he had a great deal more to say, but that words failed him unexpectedly. His lips were parted, his hand was upraised, but he stopped short, saying:

“Alas! Alas!”

Then he turned quickly and walked out of the room.

Dick dropped into a chair.