CHAPTER XXXV

It was not yet six o’clock and the sun was not due to set for more than another hour. The evening was a lovely one. From the shrubberies around the house came the liquid notes of countless blackbirds and thrushes, and above the trees of the park the cawing of the rooks as they wheeled above their nests and settled upon the branches.

“We shall sit on the terrace for half an hour, if you have a mind to,” said Mrs. Thrale, taking Fanny through the drawing-room into a smaller room that opened upon a long terrace above the beds of the flower-garden. Here were several seats and a small table bearing writing materials.

“Here I do most of my correspondence in the summer,” said Mrs. Thrale. “Sitting at that table in the open air, I have few distractions, unless I choose to accept the birds as such; and here I hope you will begin a new novel, or better still, a comedy that Mr. Sheridan will produce, with Mrs. Abington in her most charming gowns—you must give your namesake a chance of wearing a whole trunkful of gowns.” They seated themselves, and Mrs. Thrale continued:

“Now I have confided in you how I do my simple work, and I wish to hear from you by what means you found time to write your novel. That is the greatest secret of all associated with ‘Evelina’—so your father thinks. Mrs. Burney I always knew as a model housekeeper—a model manager of a family, and how you could contrive to write a single page without her knowledge is what baffles me as well as your father.”

“To tell you all would, I fear, be to confess to a lifetime of duplicity,” said Fanny. “I am sometimes shocked now when I reflect upon my double-dealing.”

“Tell me how you first came to stray from the paths of virtue—such a story is invariably interesting,” said Mrs. Thrale.

“My story is like all the others,” replied Fanny. “I only meant to turn aside a little way, but soon I lost myself and I knew that there was no retracing my steps.”

“Alas, alas, the old story!” said Mrs. Thrale, with a long-drawn sigh. “Well, happily, you were not able to retrace your steps.”

“I had no idea that the story would grow upon me as it did,” said Fanny. “I really only meant it to be a diversion for our dear friend, Mr. Crisp, and an exercise for myself. I wrote a scrap now and again at odd moments—when I was supposed to be writing to Mr. Crisp, or copying out my father’s notes for his History, at home as well as at Chessington, and when I was staying at Lynn; and so the thing grew and grew until I was afraid to look at what I had perpetrated.”

“You are paraphrasing Macbeth, my dear: ‘I am afeared to think what I have done: Look on’t again I dare not,’” said the elder lady. “But with all you were able to prepare your father’s great work for the press—he told me as much; so that what your double-dealing comes to is that you did his writing as well as your own, and at the same time neglected none of your ordinary household duties—if you had done so Mrs. Burney would have informed you of it, I have no doubt. An excellent housewife, Mrs. Burney! And now you shall tell me how you contrived to bring together so marvellous a group of characters—you who have lived so short a time in the world, and had so small an amount of experience.”

“I should like someone to answer that question for me,” said Fanny. “It was not until I read the book in print that I began to be surprised at it, and to wonder how it came to be written and how those characters had found their way into it.”

But this question was too interesting a one not to be pursued by Mrs. Thrale; and for half an hour she put inquiry after inquiry to Fanny respecting the characters, the incidents and the language of “Evelina.” Mrs. Thrale was certainly determined to place herself in a position to prove to her friends that Miss Burney had made a confidante of her in all matters, down to the smallest detail of the book.

In ordinary circumstances Fanny would have been delighted to give her her confidence in regard to these particulars—she had always a childlike pleasure in talking about her books—but at this time she only did so with a great effort. For while Mrs. Thrale was plying her with questions about “Evelina,” there was ever before Fanny the unanswered question as to what Rauzzini meant by his coldness and formality both before dinner and during that meal. What did he mean by looking at her with that reproachful frown upon his face? What did he mean by averting his eyes from her when he had a chance of exchanging confidences with her, as he had often done before? What did he mean by sitting at the table without addressing a single word to her?

These were the questions which she was struggling in vain to answer to her own satisfaction all the time that Mrs. Thrale was putting inquiry after inquiry to her upon a matter that Fanny now regarded as insignificant compared with the one that she was trying to answer for herself.

Mrs. Thrale was just beginning a series of questions on the subject of the comedy which she meant Miss Burney to write, when a servant appeared with a message for the former.

“Tiresome!” exclaimed Fanny’s hostess, rising. “Here is some insignificant household matter that can only be dealt with by the mistress—summer frocks for two girls: the carrier has brought some boxes—the summer has come upon us before spring has prepared us for its arrival, and there has been a despairing cry heard in the nursery. I need not excuse myself to you, Miss Burney. You will spare me for ten minutes.”

Miss Burney hoped that the feeling of relief of which she was conscious did not show itself on her face, when she expressed the hope that Mrs. Thrale would not think of her; she would be quite happy with the birds.

“And the comedy—do not forget the comedy.”

Miss Burney laughed, but before her hostess had reached the door leading off the terrace, she was once more immersed in that question:

“What does he mean by his change of attitude in regard to me?”

It was serious—so much she knew. He had heard something that had caused him to change. But what could he have heard? What manner of man was he that would allow himself to be so influenced by anything that he might hear against her, without first coming to her for an explanation?

Her mind went back to the evening when they had first met. It was in St. Martin’s Street. He was there on the invitation of Dr. Burney: but it seemed that he had become conscious of a sympathy existing between her and himself, for he had remained by her side for a full hour while the others in the room were singing and playing on the piano, and he had held her hand at parting, expressing the hope, which his eyes confirmed, that they would soon meet again.

And they had met again and again until one evening they found themselves alone in an ante-room to the apartment where a musical programme was being performed at a great house. Then he had told her that his happiness depended on her returning the love which he bore her; and startled though she had been, yet when he took her hand all her shyness seemed to vanish and she confessed....

A sound behind her only served to make her memory seem more vivid, for it was his voice that reached her ear and it was singing the same aria that he had come from singing on that evening—the passionate “Lascia ch’io pianga” of Handel. Once more she was listening to the strains—they came from one of the rooms that opened upon the terrace—and now the chords of the accompaniment were struck with a vehemence that had been absent from her father’s playing to Rauzzini’s singing upon that occasion.

She listened as if in a dream while the noble, despairing strain went on to its close, and the melody sobbed itself into silence—a silence that the birds among the roses seemed unwilling to break, for only an occasional note of a thrush was in the air....

She heard the sound of the door opening a little way down the terrace—of a foot upon the flagged path. She did not raise her head, but she knew that he was there—only a few yards away from her.

Through the silence there came the cawing of rooks far away among the trees of the park.

Then all at once she heard his sudden exclamation of surprise. He had not seen her at first; he saw her now.

“Dio mio! ella è qui!”

Still she did not turn her head toward him. More than a minute had passed before she heard his slow steps as he approached her. He was beside her for quite as long before he spoke.

“I did not know that you were here,” he said in a low voice. “But I am glad. It is but right that I should say good-bye to you alone.”

Then she looked up.

“Why—why—why?” she cried almost piteously. “Why should you say good-bye? What has made the change in you?”

“It is not I who have changed: it is you,” said he. “I loved the sweet, modest, untarnished jewel of a girl—a pearl hidden away from the sight of men in dim sea-cave—a violet—ah, I told you how I loved the violet that hides itself from every eye—that was what you were when I loved you, and I hoped to return to your side and find you the same. Well, I return and—ah, where is the exquisite shrinking one that I looked for? Gone—gone—gone for ever, and in her place I find one whose name is in every mouth—not a soft, gentle girl, but a woman who has put her heart into a book—Dio mio! A woman who puts her heart into a book is like a woman who disrobes in a public place—worse—worse—she exposes a heart that should be sacred—feelings that it would be a gross indelicacy to exhibit to the eyes of man!”

“And that is how you think of me on account of what I have done?” said she.

“How can I think anything else?” he cried. “I told you that I loved you because you were so unlike others—because you were like a child for timidity and innocence of the world. I told you on that last evening we were together how greatly I admired the act of Miss Linley in turning her back upon the platform where she had sung and vowing never to return to it—that was what I told you I loved—I who have seen how the nature—the womanly charm of every woman suffers by reason of her appealing to the public for money—for applause. That beautiful creature forsook the platform before it was too late—before the evil influence could work her ruin. But you—what do I hear the day I return to England?—you have put your heart—your soul, into a book that causes your name to be tossed about from mouth to mouth—Fanny Burney—Fanny Burney—Fanny Burney—I hear that name, which I regarded as sacred, spoken as freely as men speak the name of their Kitty Fisher—their Polly Kennedy—their Fanny Abington! These are public characters—so are you—oh, my God! so are you. You should have heard how you were discussed in that room behind us before you arrived to-day—that gross man Johnson—he called you by a dozen pet names as if he had a right—‘Fan’—‘Fannikin’—I know not what—‘a shy rogue’—that was another! They laughed! They did not see the degradation of it. You were a toy of the public—the vulgar crowd! Ah, you saw how that gross man, who fed himself as a wolf, tucked you under his arm and the others only smiled! Oh, I was shocked—shocked!”

“And I felt proud—prouder than I have felt in my life,” said she. “But now I see what I have lost—forfeited. Listen to me and I will tell you what my dream was. I had written that book, but I had no hope of printing it until I met you and heard from your lips—all that I heard.”

“It was the truth—then: I loved you—then.”

“I knew that it was the truth. But who was I that I should be beloved by you? I felt that it would be unendurable to me to hear people refer to us—as I knew they would—the great singer who had stooped to a nonentity.”

“Ah! that was the charm!”

“Who except you would have said so? I knew what they would say, and I made up my mind that I would not go to you except as an equal. I wanted you to marry someone of whom you would feel proud, and I thought that I had a little gift which I would lay at your feet. I did my best to perfect it for your sake; but even when the book was printed I would not give you my promise until I had assured myself that the gift would be pronounced worthy of your acceptance. That was why I put you off for so many months.”

“Ah, that was your mystery—you called it a mystery.”

“That was my secret—my mystery. Never mind; I thought that my hope was realized when everyone about me was talking of the book and when people whose opinion was valuable had said it was good—my one thought, God knows, was that I could go to you—that I could make you happy, since I should be thought by the world to be in some measure at least, worthy of you.”

“My poor child! you have not made me happy, but miserable. No one can make me happy now. I do not love you now—you are a different person now, and you can never return to be what you were. That is the worst of all: you can never return to your former innocence.”

“I can bear to hear you say even that; for now I perceive the mistake I made. I should not have, thought of the difference between us: I should only have had one thought—that you had offered me your love and that I was ready to offer you my love. That should have been enough for me. You were right, I was wrong. Good-bye.”

He looked at her for a few moments—tears were in his eyes and on his cheeks—then he turned away with a passionate gesture, crying in his native tongue:

“Mother—mother in heaven! I loved her because she was of a nature the same as yours—saint-like as a lily—shrinking from the world—in the world but having nothing in common with the world. I loved her because I thought that she was as you were. I will not be a traitor to your ideal—to your memory.”

He returned to her.

“I am alone in the world; but I know that the spirit of that saint, my mother, looks down upon me from her heaven, and will comfort me. My heart is broken. Addio! Addio! I do not mean to be cruel—tell me that you do not accuse me of being cruel!”

“I do not accuse you. I think I understand you—that is all.”

“Addio—addio—addio!”

The sound of his voice grew less with every word.

She was alone in the silence of the twilight.

Not for long, however. She heard the voice of Mrs. Thrale in the room behind her, followed by the protests of Dr. Johnson.

“Miss Burney and I want to have an undisturbed talk together about writing books,” Mrs. Thrale was saying as she came out upon the terrace.

“Books, madam; any fool can talk of books, and a good many fools avail themselves of the licence,” cried Johnson. “Miss Burney and I are going to talk about life. Books are not life, Miss Burney.”

“No, sir,” said Miss Burney slowly; “books are not life—books are not life.”

THE END