While I was puzzling myself what to answer, she said,--

"Come now, Cherubino, what you really meant to say was, I don't think papa likes _you!_"

Though I never could have made so rude a speech, its truth and force struck me so palpably that I could not answer.

"Well," cried she, with a little laugh, "he is very fond of Monsieur Cleremont, and that ought always to be enough for Madame Cleremont. Do you know, Cherubino, it's the rarest thing in life for a husband and wife to be liked by the same people? There is in conjugal life some beautiful little ingredient of discord that sets the two partners to the compact at opposite poles, and gives them separate followings. I must n't distract you with the theory, I only want you to see why liking my husband is sufficient reason for not caring for me."

Now, as I liked her exceedingly, and felt something very near to hatred for Monsieur Cleremont, I accepted all she said as incontestable truth.

Still I grieved over the fact that papa was not of my own mind, and did not see her and all her fascinations as I did.

There is something indescribably touching in the gentle sadness of certain buoyant bright natures. Like the low notes in a treble voice, there is that that seems to vibrate in our hearts at a most susceptible moment, and with the force of an unforeseen contrast; and it was thus that, in her graver times, she won over me an ascendancy, and inspired an interest which, had I been other than a mere boy, had certainly been love.

Perhaps I should not have been even conscious, as I was of this sentiment, if it were not for the indignation I felt at Cleremont's treatment of her. Over and over again my temper was pushed to its last limit by his brutality and coa.r.s.eness. His tone was a perpetual sneer, and his wife seldom spoke before him without his directing towards her a sarcasm or an impertinence. This was especially remarkable if she uttered any sentiment at all elevated, when his banter would be ushered in with a burst of derisive laughter.

Nothing could be more perfect than the way she bore these trials. There was no a.s.sumed martyrdom, no covert appeal for sympathy, no air of suffering asking for protection. No! whether it came as ridicule or rebuke, she accepted it gently and good-humoredly; trying, when she could, to turn it off with a laugh, or when too grave for that, bearing it with quiet forbearance.

I often wondered why my father did not check these persecutions, for they were such, and very cruel ones too; but he scarcely seemed to notice them, or if he did, it would be by a smile, far more like enjoyment of Cleremont's coa.r.s.e wit than reprehending or reproving it.

"I wonder how that woman stands it?" I once overheard Hotham say to Eccles; and the other replied,--

"I don't think she _does_ stand it. I mistake her much if she is as forgiving as she looks."

Why do I recall these things? Why do I dwell on incidents and pa.s.sages which had no actual bearing on my own destiny? Only because they serve to show the terrible school in which I was brought up; the mingled dissipation, splendor, indolence, and pa.s.sion in which my boyhood was pa.s.sed. Surrounded by men of reckless habits, and women but a mere shade better, life presented itself to me as one series of costly pleasures, dashed only with such disappointments as loss at play inflicted, or some project of intrigue baffled or averted.

"If that boy of Norcott's isn't a scamp, he must be a most unteachable young rascal," said an old colonel once to Eccles on the croquet ground.

"He has had great opportunities," said Eccles, as he sent off his ball, "and, so far as I see, neglected none of them."

"You were his tutor, I think?" said the other, with a laugh.

"Yes, till Madame Cleremont took my place."

"I 'll not say it was the worst thing could have happened him. I wish it had been a woman had spoiled _me_. Eh, Eccles, possibly you may have some such misgivings yourself?"

"I was never corrupted," said the other, with a sententious gravity whose hypocrisy was palpable.

I meditated many and many a time over these few words, and they suggested to me the first attempt I ever made to know something about myself and my own nature.

Those stories of Balzac's, those wonderful pictures of pa.s.sionate life, acquired an immense hold upon me, from the very character of my own existence. That terrific game of temper against temper, mind against mind, and heart against heart, of which I read in these novels, I was daily witnessing in what went on around me, and I amused myself by giving the names of the characters in these fictions to the various persons of our society.

"It is a very naughty little world we live in at this house, Digby,"

said Madame to me one day; "but you'd be surprised to find what a very vulgar thing is the life of people in general, and that if you want the sensational, or even the pictorial in existence, you 'll have to pay for it in some compromise of principle."

"I know mamma wouldn't like to live here," said I, half sullenly.

"Oh, mamma!" cried she, with a laugh, and then suddenly checking herself: "No, Digby, you are quite right. Mamma would be shocked at our doings; not that they are so very wicked in themselves as that, to one of her quiet ways, they would seem so."

"Mamma is very good. I never knew any one like her," stammered I out.

"That's quite true, my dear boy. She is all that you say, but one may be too good, just as he may be too generous or too confiding; and it is well to remember that there are a number of excellent things one would like to be if they could afford them; but the truth is, Digby, the most costly of all things are virtues."

"Oh, do not say that!" cried I, eagerly.

"Yes, dear, I must say it. Monsieur Cleremont and I have always been very poor, and we never permitted ourselves these luxuries, any more than we kept a great house and a fine equipage, and so we economize in our morals, as in our means, doing what rich folk might call little shabbinesses; but, on the whole, managing to live, and not unhappily either."

"And papa?"

"Papa has a fine estate, wants for nothing, and can give himself every good quality he has a fancy for."

"By this theory, then, it is only rich people are good?"

"Not exactly. I would rather state it thus,--the rich are as good as they like to be; the poor are as good as they 're able."

"What do you say, then, to Mr. Eccles: he 's not rich, And I 'm sure he's good?"

"Poor Mr. Eccles!" said she, with a merry laughter, in which a something scornful mingled, and she hurried away.

CHAPTER X. PLANNING PLEASURE.

It was my father's pleasure to celebrate my sixteenth birthday with great splendor. The whole house was to be thrown open; and not only the house, but the conservatory and the grounds were to be illuminated. The festivities were to comprise a grand dinner and a reception afterwards, which was to become a ball, as if by an impromptu.

As the society of the Villa habitually was made up of a certain number of intimates, relieved, from time to time, by such strangers as were presented, and as my father never dined out, or went into the fashionable world of the place, it was somewhat of a bold step at once to invite a number of persons with whom we had no more than bowing acquaintance, and to ask to his table ministers, envoys, court officials, and grand chamberlains for the first time. It was said, I know not how truthfully, that Cleremont did his utmost to dissuade him from the project at first, by disparaging the people for whom he was putting himself to such cost, and, finding this line of no avail, by openly saying that what between the refusals of some, the excuses of others, and the actual absence of many whose presence he was led to expect, my father was storing up for himself an amount of disappointment and outrage that would drive him half desperate. It was not, of course, very easy to convey this to my father. It could only be done by a dropping word or a half-expressed doubt. And when the time came to make out the lists and issue the invitations, no real step had been taken to turn him from his plan.

The same rumor which ascribed to Cleremont the repute of attempting to dissuade my father from his project, attributed to Madame Cleremont a most eager and warm advocacy of the intended _fete_. From the marked coldness and reserve, however, which subsisted between my father and her, it was too difficult to imagine in what way her influence could be exercised.

And for my own part, though I heard the list of the company canva.s.sed every day at luncheon, and discussed at dinner, I don't remember an occasion where Madame ever uttered a word of remark, or even a suggestion in the matter. Hotham, who had come back on a short leave, was full of the scheme. With all a sailor's love of movement and bustle, he mixed himself up with every detail of it. He wrote to Paris and London for all the delicacies of the "comestible" shops. He established "estafettes" on every side to bring in fresh flowers and fruit; with his own hands he rigged out tents and marquees for the regimental bands, which were to be stationed in different parts of the grounds; and all the devices of Bengal lights and fireworks he took into his especial charge.

Indeed, Nixon told me that his functions did not stop here, but that he had charged himself with the care of Madame Cleremont's toilette, for whom he had ordered the most splendid ball-dress Paris could produce.

"Naturally, Master Digby, it is Sir Roger pays," added he; "and perhaps one of these days he'll be surprised to find that diamond loops and diamond bouquets should figure in a milliner's bill. But as she is to receive the company, of course it's all right."

"And why does Mr. Cleremont seem to dislike it all so much?" asked I.

"Chiefly, I believe, because _she_ likes it." And then, as though he had said more than he intended, he added: "Oh, it's easy to see he likes to keep this house as much his own as he can. He does n't want Sir Roger to have other people about him. He's almost the master here now; but if your father begins to mix with the world, and have strangers here, Cleremont's reign would soon be over."

Though there was much in this speech to suggest thought and speculation, nothing in it struck me so forcibly as the impertinence of calling Mr.

Cleremont Cleremont, and it was all I could do to suppress the rebuke that was on my lips.

"If your father comes through for a thousand pounds, sir," continued he, "I 'll say he's lucky. If Sir Roger would leave it to one person to give the orders,--I don't mean myself,--though by right it is my business; instead of that, there's the Captain sending for this, and Cleremont for the other, and you 'll see there will be enough for three entertainments when it's all over. Could you just say a word to him, sir?"

"Not for the world, Nixon. Papa is very kind to me and good-natured, but I 'll not risk any liberty with him; and what's more, I 'd be right sorry to call Mr. Cleremont Cleremont before him, as you have done twice within the last five minutes."

"Lord bless you, Master Digby! I 've known him these fifteen years. I knew him when he came out, just a boy like, to Lord Colthorpe's emba.s.sy.

He and I is like pals."

"You have known _me_ also as a boy, Nixon," said I, haughtily; "and yet, I promise you, I 'll not permit you to speak of me as Norcott, when I am a man."