The Three Clerks by Anthony Trollope

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Their meeting was very touching, and characteristic of the two
persons. Mrs. Woodward was sad enough, but her sadness was
accompanied by a strength of affection that carried before it
every obstacle. Norman was also sad; but he was at first stern
and cold, and would have remained so to the last, had not his
manly anger been overpowered by her feminine tenderness.

It was singular, but not the less true, that at this period
Norman appeared to have forgotten altogether that he had ever
proposed to Gertrude, and been rejected by her. All that he said
and all that he thought was exactly what he might have said and
thought had Alaric taken from him his affianced bride. No suitor
had ever felt his suit to be more hopeless than he had done; and
yet he now regarded himself as one whose high hopes of happy love
had all been destroyed by the treachery of a friend and the
fickleness of a woman.

This made the task of appeasing him very difficult to Mrs.
Woodward. She could not in plain language remind him that he had
been plainly rejected; nor could she, on the other hand, permit
her daughter to be branded with a fault of which she had never
been guilty.

Mrs. Woodward had wished, though she had hardly hoped, so to
mollify Norman as to induce him to promise to be at the wedding;
but she soon found that this was out of the question. There was
no mitigating his anger against Alaric.

'Mrs. Woodward,' said he, standing very upright, and looking very
stiff, 'I will never again willingly put myself in any position
where I must meet him.'

'Oh! Harry, don't say so--think of your close friendship, think
of your long friendship.'

'Why did he not think of it?'

'But, Harry--if not for his sake, if not for your own, at any
rate do so for ours; for my sake, for Katie's and Linda's, for
Gertrude's sake.'

'I had rather not speak of Gertrude, Mrs. Woodward.'

'Ah! Harry, Gertrude has done you no injury; why should you thus
turn your heart against her? You should not blame her; if you
have anyone to blame, it is me.'

'No; you have been true to me.'

'And has she been false? Oh! Harry, think how we have loved you!
You should be more just to us.'

'Tush!' he said. 'I do not believe in justice; there is no
justice left. I would have given everything I had for him. I
would have made any sacrifice. His happiness was as much my
thought as my own. And now--and yet you talk to me of justice.'

'And if he had injured you, Harry, would you not forgive him? Do
you repeat your prayers without thinking of them? Do you not wish
to forgive them that trespass against you?' Norman groaned
inwardly in the spirit. 'Do you not think of this when you kneel
every night before your God?'

'There are injuries which a man cannot forgive, is not expected
to forgive.'

'Are there, Harry? Oh! that is a dangerous doctrine. In that way
every man might nurse his own wrath till anger would make devils
of us all. Our Saviour has made no exceptions.'

'In one sense, I do forgive him, Mrs. Woodward. I wish him no
evil. But it is impossible that I should call a man who has so
injured me my friend. I look upon him as disgraced for ever.'

She then endeavoured to persuade him to see Gertrude, or at any
rate to send his love to her. But in this also he was obdurate.
'It could,' he said, 'do no good.' He could not answer for
himself that his feelings would not betray him. A message would
be of no use; if true, it would not be gracious; if false, it had
better be avoided. He was quite sure Gertrude would be indifferent
as to any message from him. The best thing for them both would
be that they should forget each other.

He promised, however, that he would go down to Hampton
immediately after the marriage, and he sent his kindest love to
Linda and Katie. 'And, dear Mrs. Woodward,' said he, 'I know you
think me very harsh, I know you think me vindictive--but pray,
pray believe that I understand all your love, and acknowledge all
your goodness. The time will, perhaps, come when we shall be as
happy together as we once were.'

Mrs. Woodward, trying to smile through her tears, could only say
that she would pray that that time might soon come; and so,
bidding God bless him, as a mother might bless her child, she
left him and returned to Hampton, not with a light heart.

CHAPTER XVI

THE FIRST WEDDING

In spite, however, of Norman and his anger, on a cold snowy
morning in the month of February, Gertrude stood at the altar in
Hampton Church, a happy trusting bride, and Linda stood smiling
behind her, the lovely leader of the nuptial train. Nor were
Linda's smiles false or forced, much less treacherous. She had
taught herself to look on Alaric as her sister's husband, and
though in doing so she had suffered, and did still suffer, she
now thought of her own lost lover in no other guise.

A housemaid, not long since, who was known in the family in which
she lived to be affianced to a neighbouring gardener, came
weeping to her mistress.

'Oh, ma'am!'

'Why, Susan, what ails you?'

'Oh, ma'am!'

'Well, Susan--what is it?--why are you crying?'

'Oh, ma'am--John!'

'Well--what of John? I hope he is not misbehaving.'

'Indeed, ma'am, he is then; the worst of misbehaviour; for he's
gone and got hisself married.' And poor Susan gave vent to a
flood of tears.

Her mistress tried to comfort her, and not in vain. She told her
that probably she might be better as she was; that John, seeing
what he had done, must be a false creature, who would undoubtedly
have used her ill; and she ended her good counsel by trying to
make Susan understand that there were still as good fish in the
sea as had ever yet been caught out of it.

'And that's true too, ma'am,' said Susan, with her apron to her
eyes.

'Then you should not be downhearted, you know.'

'Nor I han't down'arted, ma'am, for thank God I could love any
man, but it's the looks on it, ma'am; it's that I mind.'

How many of us are there, women and men too, who think most of
the 'looks of it' under such circumstances; and who, were we as
honest as poor Susan, ought to thank God, as she did, that we can
love anyone; anyone, that is, of the other sex. We are not all of
us susceptible of being torn to tatters by an unhappy passion;
not even all those of us who may be susceptible of a true and
honest love. And it is well that it is so. It is one of God's
mercies; and if we were as wise as Susan, we should thank God for
it.

Linda was, perhaps, one of those. She was good, affectionate,
tender, and true. But she was made of that stuff which can bend
to the north wind. The world was not all over with her because a
man had been untrue to her. She had had her grief, and had been
told to meet it like a Christian; she had been obedient to the
telling, and now felt the good result. So when Gertrude was
married she stood smiling behind her; and when her new brother-
in-law kissed her in the vestry-room she smiled again, and
honestly wished them happiness.

And Katie was there, very pretty and bonny, still childish, with
her short dress and long trousers, but looking as though she,
too, would soon feel the strength of her own wings, and be able
to fly away from her mother's nest. Dear Katie! Her story has yet
to be told. To her belongs neither the soft easiness of her
sister Linda nor the sterner dignity of Gertrude. But she has a
character of her own, which contains, perhaps, higher qualities
than those given to either of her sisters.

And there were other bridesmaids there; how many it boots not now
to say. We must have the spaces round our altars greatly widened
if this passion for bevies of attendant nymphs be allowed to go
on increasing--and if crinolines increase also. If every bride is
to have twelve maidens, and each maiden to stand on no less than
a twelve-yard circle, what modest temple will ever suffice for a
sacrifice to Hymen?

And Mrs. Woodward was there, of course; as pretty to my thinking
as either of her daughters, or any of the bridesmaids. She was
very pretty and smiling and quiet. But when Gertrude said 'I
will,' she was thinking of Harry Norman, and grieving that he was
not there.

And Captain Cuttwater was there, radiant in a new blue coat, made
specially for the occasion, and elastic with true joy. He had
been very generous. He had given L1,000 to Alaric, and settled
L150 a year on Gertrude, payable, of course, after his death.
This, indeed, was the bulk of what he had to give, and Mrs.
Woodward had seen with regret his exuberant munificence to one of
her children. But Gertrude was her child, and of course she could
not complain.

And Charley was there, acting as best man. It was just the place
and just the work for Charley. He forgot all his difficulties,
all his duns, and also all his town delights. Without a sigh he
left his lady in Norfolk Street to mix gin-sling for other
admirers, and felt no regret though four brother navvies were
going to make a stunning night of it at the 'Salon de Seville
dansant,' at the bottom of Holborn Hill. However, he had his
hopes that he might be back in time for some of that fun.

And Undy Scott was there. He and Alaric had fraternized so
greatly of late that the latter had, as a matter of course, asked
him to his wedding, and Mrs. Woodward had of course expressed
her delight at receiving Alaric's friend. Undy also was a pleasant
fellow for a wedding party; he was full of talk, fond of ladies,
being no whit abashed in his attendance on them by the remembrance
of his bosom's mistress, whom he had left, let us hope, happy in
her far domestic retirement. Undy Scott was a good man at a
wedding, and made himself specially agreeable on this occasion.

But the great glory of the day was the presence of Sir Gregory
Hardlines. It was a high honour, considering all that rested on
Sir Gregory's shoulders, for so great a man to come all the way
down to Hampton to see a clerk in the Weights and Measures
married.

Cum tot sustineas, et tanta negotia solus,

--for we may call it 'solus,' Sir Warwick and Mr. Jobbles being
sources of more plague than profit in carrying out your noble
schemes--while so many things are on your shoulders, Sir Gregory;
while you are defending the Civil Service by your pen[?],
adorning it by your conduct, perfecting it by new rules, how
could any man have had the face to ask you to a wedding?

Nevertheless Sir Gregory was there, and did not lose the
excellent opportunity which a speech at the breakfast-table
afforded him for expressing his opinion on the Civil Service of
his country.

And so Gertrude Woodward became Gertrude Tudor, and she and
Alaric were whirled away by a post-chaise and post-boy, done out
with white bows, to the Hampton Court station; from thence they
whisked up to London, and then down to Dover; and there we will
leave them.

They were whisked away, having first duly gone through the amount
of badgering which the bride and bridegroom have to suffer at the
wedding breakfast-table. They drank their own health in
champagne. Alaric made a speech, in which he said he was quite
unworthy of his present happiness, and Gertrude picked up all the
bijoux, gold pencil-cases, and silver cream-jugs, which were
thrown at her from all sides. All the men made speeches, and all
the women laughed, but the speech of the day was that celebrated
one made by Sir Gregory, in which he gave a sketch of Alaric
Tudor as the beau ideal of a clerk in the Civil Service. 'His
heart,' said he, energetically, 'is at the Weights and Measures;'
but Gertrude looked at him as though she did not believe a word
of it.

And so Alaric and Gertrude were whisked away, and the wedding
guests were left to look sheepish at each other, and take
themselves off as best they might. Sir Gregory, of course, had
important public business which precluded him from having the
gratification of prolonging his stay at Hampton. Charley got away
in perfect time to enjoy whatever there might be to be enjoyed at
the dancing saloon of Seville, and Undy Scott returned to his
club.

Then all was again quiet at Surbiton Cottage. Captain Cuttwater,
who had perhaps drunk the bride's health once too often, went to
sleep; Katie, having taken off her fine clothes, roamed about the
house disconsolate, and Mrs. Woodward and Linda betook themselves
to their needles.

The Tudors went to Brussels, and were made welcome by the Belgian
banker, whose counters he had deserted so much to his own
benefit, and from thence to Paris, and, having been there long
enough to buy a French bonnet and wonder at the enormity of
French prices, they returned to a small but comfortable house
they had prepared for themselves in the neighbourhood of
Westbourne Terrace.

Previous to this Norman had been once, and but once, at Hampton,
and, when there, he had failed in being comfortable himself, or
in making the Woodwards so; he could not revert to his old
habits, or sit, or move, or walk, as though nothing special had
happened since he had been last there. He could not talk about
Gertrude, and he could not help talking of her. By some closer
packing among the ladies a room had now been prepared for him in
the house; even this upset him, and brought to his mind all those
unpleasant thoughts which he should have endeavoured to avoid.

He did not repeat his visit before the Tudors returned; and then
for some time he was prevented from doing so by the movements of
the Woodwards themselves. Mrs. Woodward paid a visit to her
married daughter, and, when she returned, Linda did the same. And
so for a while Norman was, as it were, divided from his old
friends, whereas Tudor, as a matter of course, was one of
themselves.

It was only natural that Mrs. Woodward should forgive Alaric and
receive him to her bosom, now that he was her son-in-law. After
all, such ties as these avail more than any predilections, more
than any effort of judgement in the choice of the objects of our
affections. We associate with those with whom the tenor of life
has thrown us, and from habit we learn to love those with whom we
are brought to associate.

CHAPTER XVII

THE HONOURABLE MRS. VAL AND MISS GOLIGHTLY

The first eighteen months of Gertrude's married life were not
unhappy, though, like all persons entering on the realities of
the world, she found much to disappoint her. At first her
husband's society was sufficient for her; and to give him his
due, he was not at first an inattentive husband. Then came the
baby, bringing with him, as first babies always should do, a sort
of second honeymoon of love, and a renewal of those services
which women so delight to receive from their bosoms' lord.

She had of course made acquaintances since she had settled
herself in London, and had, in her modest way, done her little
part in adding to the gaiety of the great metropolis. In this
respect indeed Alaric's commencement of life had somewhat
frightened Mrs. Woodward, and the more prudent of his friends.
Grand as his official promotion had been, his official income at
the time of his marriage did not exceed L600 a year, and though
this was to be augmented occasionally till it reached L800, yet
even with this advantage it could hardly suffice for a man and
his wife and a coming family to live in an expensive part of
London, and enable him to 'see his friends' occasionally, as the
act of feeding one's acquaintance is now generally called.

Gertrude, like most English girls of her age, was at first so
ignorant about money that she hardly knew whether L600 was or was
not a sufficient income to justify their present mode of living;
but she soon found reason to suspect that her husband at any rate
endeavoured to increase it by other means. We say to suspect,
because he never spoke to her on the subject; he never told her
of Mary Janes and New Friendships; or hinted that he had
extensive money dealings in connexion with Undy Scott.

But it can be taken for granted that no husband can carry on such
dealings long without some sort of cognizance on his wife's part
as to what he is doing; a woman who is not trusted by her lord
may choose to remain in apparent darkness, may abstain from
questions, and may consider it either her duty or her interest to
assume an ignorance as to her husband's affairs; but the partner
of one's bed and board, the minister who soothes one's headaches,
and makes one's tea, and looks after one's linen, can't but have
the means of guessing the thoughts which occupy her companion's
mind and occasionally darken his brow.

Much of Gertrude's society had consisted of that into which
Alaric was thrown by his friendship with Undy Scott. There was a
brother of Undy's living in town, one Valentine Scott--a captain
in a cavalry regiment, and whose wife was by no means of that
delightfully retiring disposition evinced by Undy's better half.
The Hon. Mrs. Valentine, or Mrs. Val Scott as she was commonly
called, was a very pushing woman, and pushed herself into a
prominent place among Gertrude's friends. She had been the widow
of Jonathan Golightly, Esq., umquhile sheriff of the city of
London, and stockbroker, and when she gave herself and her
jointure up to Captain Val, she also brought with her, to enliven
the house, a daughter Clementina, the only remaining pledge of
her love for the stockbroker.

When Val Scott entered the world, his father's precepts as to the
purposes of matrimony were deeply graven on his heart. He was the
best looking of the family, and, except Undy, the youngest. He
had not Undy's sharpness, his talent for public matters, or his
aptitude for the higher branches of the Civil Service; but he had
wit to wear his sash and epaulets with an easy grace, and to
captivate the heart, person, and some portion of the purse, of
the Widow Golightly. The lady was ten years older than the
gentleman; but then she had a thousand a year, and, to make
matters more pleasant, the beauteous Clementina had a fortune of
her own.

Under these circumstances the marriage had been contracted
without any deceit, or attempt at deceit, by either party. Val
wanted an income, and the sheriff's widow wanted the utmost
amount of social consideration which her not very extensive means
would purchase for her. On the whole, the two parties to the
transaction were contented with their bargain. Mrs. Val, it is
true, kept her income very much in her own hands; but still she
consented to pay Val's tailors' bills, and it is something for a
man to have bed and board found him for nothing. It is true,
again, the lady did not find that the noble blood of her husband
gave her an immediate right of entry into the best houses in
London; but it did bring her into some sort of contact with some
few people of rank and fame; and being a sensible woman, she had
not been unreasonable in her expectations.

When she had got what she could from her husband in this
particular, she did not trouble him much further. He delighted in
the Rag, and there spent the most of his time; happily, she
delighted in what she called the charms of society, and as
society expanded itself before her, she was also, we must
suppose, happy. She soon perceived that more in her immediate
line was to be obtained from Undy than from her own member of the
Gaberlunzie family, and hence had sprung up her intimacy with
Mrs. Tudor.

It cannot be said that Gertrude was very fond of the Honourable
Mrs. Val, nor even of her daughter, Clementina Golightly, who was
more of her own age. These people had become her friends from the
force of circumstances, and not from predilection. To tell the
truth, Mrs. Val, who had in her day encountered, with much
patience, a good deal of snubbing, and who had had to be thankful
when she was patronized, now felt that her day for being a great
lady had come, and that it behoved her to patronize others. She
tried her hand upon Gertrude, and found the practice so congenial
to her spirits, so pleasantly stimulating, so well adapted to
afford a gratifying compensation for her former humility, that
she continued to give up a good deal of her time to No. 5, Albany
Row, Westbourne Terrace, at which house the Tudors resided.

The young bride was not exactly the woman to submit quietly to
patronage from any Mrs. Val, however honourable she might be; but
for a while Gertrude hardly knew what it meant; and at her first
outset the natural modesty of youth, and her inexperience in her
new position, made her unwilling to take offence and unequal to
rebellion. By degrees, however, this feeling of humility wore
off; she began to be aware of the assumed superiority of Mrs.
Val's friendship, and by the time that their mutual affection was
of a year's standing, Gertrude had determined, in a quiet way,
without saying anything to anybody, to put herself on a footing
of more perfect equality with the Honourable Mrs. Val.

Clementina Golightly was, in the common parlance of a large
portion of mankind, a 'doosed fine gal.' She stood five feet six,
and stood very well, on very good legs, but with rather large
feet. She was as straight as a grenadier, and had it been her
fate to carry a milk-pail, she would have carried it to
perfection. Instead of this, however, she was permitted to expend
an equal amount of energy in every variation of waltz and polka
that the ingenuity of the dancing professors of the age has been
able to produce. Waltzes and polkas suited her admirably; for she
was gifted with excellent lungs and perfect powers of breathing,
and she had not much delight in prolonged conversation. Her
fault, if she had one, was a predilection for flirting; but she
did her flirtations in a silent sort of way, much as we may
suppose the fishes do theirs, whose amours we may presume to
consist in swimming through their cool element in close
contiguity with each other. 'A feast of reason and a flow of
soul' were not the charms by which Clementina Golightly essayed
to keep her admirers spell-bound at her feet. To whirl rapidly
round a room at the rate of ten miles an hour, with her right
hand outstretched in the grasp of her partner's, and to know that
she was tightly buoyed up, like a horse by a bearing-rein, by his
other hand behind her back, was for her sufficient. To do this,
as she did do it, without ever crying for mercy, with no
slackness of breath, and apparently without distress, must have
taken as much training as a horse gets for a race. But the
training had in nowise injured her; and now, having gone through
her gallops and run all her heats for three successive seasons,
she was still sound of wind and limb, and fit to run at any
moment when called upon.

We have said nothing about the face of the beauteous Clementina,
and indeed nothing can be said about it. There was no feature in
it with which a man could have any right to find fault; that she
was a 'doosed fine girl' was a fact generally admitted; but
nevertheless you might look at her for four hours consecutively
on a Monday evening, and yet on Tuesday you would not know her.
She had hair which was brownish and sufficiently silky--and which
she wore, as all other such girls do, propped out on each side of
her face by thick round velvet pads, which, when the waltzing
pace became exhilarating, occasionally showed themselves, looking
greasy. She had a pair of eyes set straight in her head,
faultless in form, and perfectly inexpressive. She had a nose
equally straight, but perhaps a little too coarse in dimensions.
She had a mouth not over large, with two thin lips and small
whitish teeth; and she had a chin equal in contour to the rest of
her face, but on which Venus had not deigned to set a dimple.
Nature might have defied a French passport officer to give a
description of her, by which even her own mother or a detective
policeman might have recognized her.

When to the above list of attractions it is added that Clementina
Golightly had L20,000 of her own, and a reversionary interest in
her mother's jointure, it may be imagined that she did not want
for good-winded cavaliers to bear her up behind, and whirl around
with her with outstretched hands.

'I am not going to stay a moment, my dear,' said Mrs. Val,
seating herself on Gertrude's sofa, having rushed up almost
unannounced into the drawing-room, followed by Clementina;
'indeed, Lady Howlaway is waiting for me this moment; but I must
settle with you about the June flower-show.'

'Oh! thank you, Mrs. Scott, don't trouble yourself about me,'
said Gertrude; 'I don't think I shall go.'

'Oh! nonsense, my dear; of course you'll go; it's the show of the
year, and the Grand duke is to be there--baby is all right now,
you know; I must not hear of your not going.'

'All the same--I fear I must decline,' said Gertrude; 'I think I
shall be at Hampton.'

'Oh! nonsense, my dear; of course you must show yourself. People
will say all manner of things else. Clementina has promised to
meet Victoire Jaquetanapes there and a party of French people,
people of the very highest ton. You'll be delighted, my dear.'

'M. Jaquetanapes is the most delicious polkist you ever met,'
said Clementina. 'He has got a new back step that will quite
amaze you.' As Gertrude in her present condition was not much
given to polkas, this temptation did not have great effect.