"I am very wicked," she said, "I am utterly unworthy of all you have done for me. It would have been better for you never to have seen my face."

"Wicked! no, Clary. Your only sin has been to have disappointed a foolish fancy. What right had I to suppose you loved me? Better never to have seen your face?--yes, perhaps that might have been better. But, once having seen you, I would rather be wretched with you than happy with any other woman in the world. That is what love means, Clary."

He stooped down to kiss her.

"Say no more, dear," he said, "I never meant to speak as I have spoken to-night. I love you for ever."

The day came when she remembered those words, "I love you for ever."

If she could have thrown herself upon his breast and acknowledged all her weakness, beseeching him to shield her from herself in obedience to the impulse of that moment, what a world of anguish might have been spared to these two! But she let the impulse pa.s.s, and kept silence.

CHAPTER XL.

LYING IN WAIT.

Mr. Granger went back to Yorkshire; and Clarissa's days were at her own disposal. They were to leave Paris at the beginning of March. She knew it was only for a very short time that she would be able to see her brother.

It was scarcely natural, therefore, that she should neglect such an opportunity as this. There was so much in Austin's life that caused her uneasiness; he seemed in such sore need of wiser counsel than his poor empty-headed little wife could give him; and Clarissa believed that she had some influence with him: that if he would be governed by the advice of any creature upon earth, that counsellor was herself.

So she spent her mornings in baby-worship, and went every afternoon to the Rue du Chevalier Bayard, where it happened curiously that Mr. Fairfax came even oftener than usual just at this time. In the evening she stayed at home--not caring to keep her engagements in society without her husband's escort--and resigned herself to the edifying companionship of Miss Granger, who was eloquent upon the benighted condition of the Parisian poor as compared with her model villagers. She described them sententiously as a people who put garlic in everything they ate, and never read their Bibles.

"One woman showed me a book with little pictures of saints printed upon paper with lace edges," said Sophia, "as if there were any edification to be derived from lace edges; and such a heathen book too--Latin on one side and French on the other. And there the poor forsaken creatures sit in their churches, looking at stray pictures and hearing a service in an unknown tongue."

Daniel Granger had been away nearly a week; and as yet there was no announcement of his return; only brief business-like letters, telling Clarissa that the drainage question was a complicated one, and he should remain upon the spot till he and Forley could see their way out of the difficulty. He had been away nearly a week, when George Fairfax went to the Rue du Chevalier Bayard at the usual hour, expecting to find Austin Lovel standing before his easel with a cigar in his mouth, and Clarissa sitting in the low chair by the fire, in the att.i.tude he knew so well, with the red glow of the embers lighting up gleams of colour in her dark velvet dress, and shining on the soft brown hair crowned with a coquettish little seal-skin hat--a _toque_, as they called it on that side of the Channel.

What was his astonishment to find a pile of trunks and portmanteaus on the landing, Austin's easel roughly packed for removal, and a heap of that miscellaneous lumber without which even poverty cannot shift its dwelling!

The door was open; and Mr. Fairfax walked straight into the sitting-room, where the two boys were eating some extemporised meal at a side-table under their mother's supervision; while Austin lounged with his back against the chimney-piece, smoking. He was a man who would have smoked during the culminating convulsions of an earthquake.

"Why, Austin, what the--I beg your pardon, Mrs. Austin--what _does_ this mean?"

"It means Brussels by the three-fifteen train, my dear Fairfax, that's all."

"Brussels? With those children and that luggage? What, in Heaven's name, induces you to carry your family off like this, at an hour's notice?"

"It is not an hour's notice; they've had an hour and three-quarters. As to my reasons for this abrupt hegira--well, that involves rather a long story; and I haven't time to tell it to-day. One thing is pretty clear--I can't live in Paris. Perhaps I may be able to live in Brussels. I can't very well do worse than I've done here--that's _one_ comfort."

At this Bessie Lovel began to cry--in a suppressed kind of way, like a woman who is accustomed to cry and not to be taken much notice of. George Fairfax flung himself into a chair with an impatient gesture. He was at once sorry for this man and angry with him; vexed to see any man go to ruin with such an utter recklessness, with such a deliberate casting away of every chance that might have redeemed him.

"You have got into some sc.r.a.pe, I suppose," he said presently.

"Got into a sc.r.a.pe!" cried Austin with a laugh, tossing away the end of one cigar and preparing to light another. "My normal condition is that of being in a sc.r.a.pe. Egad! I fancy I must have been born so.--For G.o.d's sake don't whimper, Bessie, if you want to catch the three-fifteen train! _I_ go by that, remember, whoever stays behind.--There's no occasion to enter into explanations, Fairfax. If you could help me I'd ask you to do it, in spite of former obligations; but you can't. I have got into a difficulty--pecuniary, of course; and as the law of liability in this city happens to be a trifle more stringent than our amiable British code, I have no alternative but to bid good-bye to the towers of Notre Dame. I love the dear, disreputable city, with her lights and laughter, and music and mirth; but she loves not me.--When those boys have done gorging themselves, Bessie, you had better put on your bonnet."

"His wife cast an appealing glance at George Fairfax, as if she felt she had a friend in him who would sustain her in any argument with her husband.

Her face was very sad, and bore the traces of many tears.

"If you would only tell me why we are going, Austin," she pleaded, "I could bear it so much better."

"Nonsense, child! Would anything I could tell you alter the fact that we are going? Pshaw, Bessie! why make a fuss about trifles? The packing is over: that was the grand difficulty, I thought. I told you we could manage that."

"It seems so hard--running away like criminals."

Austin Lovel's countenance darkened a little.

"I can go alone," he said.

"No, no," cried the wife piteously: "I'll go with you. I don't want to vex you, Austin. Haven't I shared everything with you--everything? I would go with you if it was to prison--if it was to death. You know that."

"I know that we shall lose the three-fifteen train if you don't put on your bonnet."

"Very well, Austin; I'm going. And Clarissa--what will she think of us? I'm so sorry to leave her."

"O, by the way, George," said Austin, "you might manage that business for me. My sister was to be here at five o'clock this afternoon. I've written her a letter telling her of the change in my plans. She was in some measure prepared for my leaving Paris; but not quite so suddenly as this. I was going to send the letter by a commissionnaire; but if you don't mind taking it to the Rue de Morny, I'd rather trust it to you. I don't want Clary to come here and find empty rooms."

He took a sealed letter from the mantelpiece and handed it to George Fairfax, who received it with somewhat of a dreamy air, as of a man who does not quite understand the mission that is intrusted to him. It was a simple business enough, too--only the delivery of a letter.

Mrs. Lovel came out of the adjoining room dressed for the journey, and carrying a collection of wraps for the children. It was wonderful to behold what comforters, and scarves, and gaiters, and m.u.f.fetees those juvenile individuals required for their equipment.

"Such a long cold journey!" the anxious mother exclaimed, and went on winding up the two children in woollen stuffs, as if they had been royal mummies. She pushed little papers of sandwiches into their pockets--sandwiches that would hardly be improved by the squeezing and sitting upon they must need undergo in the transit.

When this was done, and the children ready, she looked into the painting-room with a melancholy air.

"Think of all the furniture, Austin," she exclaimed; "the cabinets and things!"

"Yes; there's a considerable amount of money wasted there, Bess; for I don't suppose we shall ever see the things again, but there's a good many of them not paid for. There's comfort in that reflection."

"You take everything go lightly," she said with a hopeless sigh.

"There's nothing between that and the Morgue, my dear. You'd scarcely like to see me framed and glazed _there_, I think."

"O, Austin!"

"Precisely. So let me take things lightly, while I can. Now, Bess, the time is up. Good-bye, George."

"I'll come downstairs with you," said Mr. Fairfax, still in a somewhat dreamy state. He had put Austin's letter into his pocket, and was standing at a window looking down into the street, which had about as much life or traffic for a man to stare at as some of the lateral streets in the Bloomsbury district--Caroline-place, for instance, or Keppel-street.

There was a great struggling and b.u.mping of porters and coachman on the stairs, with a good deal more exclamation than would have proceeded from stalwart Englishmen under the same circ.u.mstances; and then Austin went down to the coach with his wife and children, followed by George Fairfax. The painter happened not to be in debt to his landlord--a gentleman who gave his tenants small grace at any time; so there was no difficulty about the departure.

"I'll write to Monsieur Meriste about my furniture," he said to the guardian of the big dreary mansion. "You may as well come to the station with us, George," he added, looking at Mr. Fairfax, who stood irresolute on the pavement, while Bessie and the boys were being packed into the vehicle, the roof of which was laden with portmanteaus and the painter's "plant."

"Well--no; I think not. There's this letter to be delivered, you see. I had better do that at once."

"True; Clarissa might come. She said five o'clock, though; but it doesn't matter. Good-bye, old fellow. I hope some of these days I may be able to make things square with you. Good-bye. Tell Clary I shall write to her from Brussels, under cover to the maid as usual."

He called out to the coachman to go on; and the carriage drove off, staggering under its load. George Fairfax stood watching it till it was out of sight, and then turned to the porter.