The Heavenly Twins by Madame Sarah Grand

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It was about this time that he became aware of the fact that Evadne had
gradually formed a party of her own, and was making his house a centre of
attraction to all the best people in the place. He knew that such support
was an evidence of her strength, and would only confirm her in her
"views," especially when even those who had opposed her most bitterly at
first were caught intriguing to get into the Colquhoun house clique; but
naturally he was gratified by a position which reflected credit upon
himself; his respect for Evadne increased, and consequently they became,
if possible, better friends than ever.

CHAPTER XIII.

On the day following her children's party, Evadne went to see Edith. She
always went there when she felt brain-fagged and world-weary, and came
away refreshed. Edith's ignorance of life amazed and perplexed her. She
thought it foolish, and she thought it unsafe for a mature young woman to
know no more of the world than a child does, but still she shrank from
sharing the pain of her own knowledge with her, and had never had the
heart to say a word that might disturb her beautiful serenity. She showed
some selfishness in that. She could be a child in mind again with Edith,
and only with Edith, and it was really for her own pleasure that she
avoided all serious discussion with the latter, although she firmly
persuaded herself that it was entirely out of deference to Mrs. Beale's
wishes and prejudices.

She owed a great deal, as has already been said, to Mrs. Beale. When her
attitude began to attract attention and provoked criticism, the old lady
declined emphatically to hear a word against her from anybody, and so
supported her in public; while in private the influence of her sweet
old-fashioned womanliness was restraining in the way that Mrs. Orton Beg
had foreseen; it was a check upon Evadne, and prevented her from going too
far and fast at a time. Argument would not have hindered her; but when
Mrs. Beale was present, she often suppressed a fire-brand of a phrase,
because it would have wounded her.

As she went out that afternoon she met old Lord Groome on the doorstep,
just coming to call on her, and hesitated a moment between asking him in
or allowing him to accompany her as far as Mrs. Beale's, but decided on
the latter because she would get rid of him so much the sooner. Her
attitude toward him, however, was kindly and tolerant as a rule, and she
was even amused by his curious conceit. He was always ready to express
what he called an opinion on any subject, but more especially when it bore
reference to legislation and the government of peoples generally, for he
was comfortably confident that he had inherited the brain power necessary
for a legislator as well as a seat in the House of Lords and the position
of one--a pardonable error, surely, since it is so very common. Socially
he lived in a comfortable conception of the fitness of things that were
agreeable to him, morally he did not exist at all, religiously he
supported the Established Church, and politically he believed in every
antiquated error still extant, in which respect most of his friends
resembled him.

"Ah, and so you are going to see Miss Beale? That's right," he observed
patronisingly. "I like to see one young lady with her work in her hand
tripping in to sit and chat with another, and while away the long hours
till the gentlemen return. One can imagine all their little jests and
confidences. Young ladyhood is charming to contemplate."

The implication that a young lady has no great interest in life but in
"the return of the gentlemen," and that, while awaiting them, her pursuits
must of necessity be petty and trivial, both amused and provoked Evadne,
and she answered with a dry enigmatical, "Yes-s-s."

A few steps further on, they overtook that soft-voiced person of "singular
views," Mrs. Malcomson, from whom Lord Groome would have fled had he seen
her in time, for they detested each other cordially, and she never spared
him. She was strolling along alone with her eyes cast down, humming a
little tune to herself, and thinking. There was a tinge of colour in her
cheeks, for the air was fresh for Malta; her eyes were bright, her hair as
usual had broken from bondage into little brown curls, all crisp and
shining, on her forehead and neck, and her lips were parted as if they
only waited for an excuse to break into a smile. A healthier, pleasanter,
happier, handsomer young woman Lord Groome could not have wished to
encounter, and consequently his disapproval of those "absurd new-fangled
notions of hers" which were "an effectual bar, sir," as he said himself,
"the kind of thing that destroys a woman's charm, and makes it impossible
to get on with her," mounted to his forehead in a frown of perplexity.

"What are you so busy about?" Evadne asked her.

"My profession," she answered laconically.

"And what is that?" Lord Groome inquired, with that ponderous affectation
of playfulness which he believed to be acceptable to women.

"The Higher Education of Man," she rejoined, then darted down a side
street, laughing.

"I am afraid you are too intimate with that lady," Lord Groome observed
severely, "You must not allow yourself to be bitten by her revolutionary
ideas. She is a dangerous person."

"Not 'revo'--but evolutionary," Evadne answered, smiling. "Yes. Mrs.
Malcomson has taught me a great deal. She is a very remarkable person. The
world will hear more of her, I am sure, and be all the better for her
passage through it. But here we are. Thank you for accompanying me. What a
hot afternoon! Good-bye!"

She shook hands with him, then opened the door and walked in, leaving him
outside.

He felt the dismissal somewhat summary, but shrugged his shoulders
philosophically and walked on, reflecting, _a propos_ of Mrs.
Malcomson: "That's just the way with women! When they begin to have ideas
they spread them everywhere, and all the other women in the neighbourhood
catch them, and are spoiled by them."

Evadne's spirits had risen in the open air, but the moment she found
herself alone a reaction set in.

The hall was dark and cool, and she stopped there, thinking--Oh, the
dissatisfaction of it all!

There were no servants about, and the house seemed curiously still. She
heard the ripple of running water from an unseen fountain somewhere, and
the intermittent murmur of voices in a room close by, but there is a
silence that broods above such sounds, and this it was that Evadne felt.

Close to where she stood was a divan with some tall foliage plants behind
it, and she sat down there, and, leaning forward with her arms resting on
her knees, began listlessly to trace out the pattern of the pavement with
the point of her parasol. She had no notion why she was lingering there
alone, when she had come out for the sole purpose of not being alone; but
the will to do anything else had suddenly forsaken her. Her mind, however,
had become curiously active all at once, in a jerky, disconnected sort of
way.

"Lord Groome--thank Heaven for having got rid of him so easily! I was
afraid it would be more difficult. Poor foolish old man! Yes. It is
ridiculous that the destinies of nations should hang on the size of one
man's liver. Where did I hear that now? It seems as old--old--as the
iniquity itself. Subjects get into the air--I heard someone say that too,
by-the-way--here--soon after I came out. Who was it? Oh--the dance on the
_Abomination_. Mrs. Malcomson and Mr. Price. _He_ said subjects
were diseases which got into the air; _she_ said they were more like
perfumes. Now, _I_ should not have compared them with either--"

The door of the room where the voices had been murmuring intermittently
opened at that moment, and Edith came out, followed by Menteith.

It was a vision which Evadne never forgot.

Edith was dressed in ivory white, and wore a brooch of turquoise and
diamonds at her throat, a buckle of the same at her waist, and a very
handsome ring, also of turquoise and diamonds, on the third finger of her
left hand. Evadne took the ornaments in at a glance. She had seen all that
Edith had hitherto possessed, and these were new; but she did not for a
moment attach any significance to the fact. It was Edith's radiant face
that riveted her attention. A bright flush flickered on her delicate
cheek, deepening or fading at every breath; her large eyes floated in
light; even the bright strands of her yellow hair shone with unusual
lustre; her step was so buoyant she scarcely seemed to touch the ground at
all; she was all shy smiles; and as she came, with her slender white right
hand she played with the new ring she wore on her left, fingering it
nervously. But anyone more ecstatically happy than she seemed it is
impossible to imagine. Menteith could not take his eyes off her. He seemed
to gloat over every item of her appearance.

"Oh, here is Evadne!" she exclaimed in a voice of welcome, running up to
the latter and kissing her with peculiar tenderness. Then she turned and
looked up at Menteith, then back again at Evadne, wanting to say
something, but not liking to.

With a start of surprise, Evadne awoke to the significance of all this,
and she knew, too, what was expected of her; but she could not say, "I
congratulate you!" try as she would. "I will wait for you in the drawing
room," was all she was able to gasp, and she hastened off in that
direction as she spoke.

"How can you care so much for that cold, unsympathetic woman?" Menteith
exclaimed.

"She is not cold and unsympathetic," Edith rejoined emphatically. "I am
afraid there is something wrong. I must go and see what it is. O Mosley! I
feel all chilled! It is a bad omen!"

"This is a bad damp hall," he answered, laughing at her, "you are too
sensitive to changes of temperature."

It seemed so really, for her colour had faded, and she had not recovered
it when she appeared in the drawing room.

Evadne was standing in the middle of the room alone, waiting for her.

"Edith! You are not going to marry that dreadful man?" she exclaimed.

Edith stopped short, astonished.

"_Dreadful man_!" she gasped. "Yon must be mad, Evadne!"

Mrs. Beale came into the room just as Edith uttered these words, and
overheard them. She had been on the point of happy smiles and tears,
expecting kind congratulations, but at the tone of Edith's voice almost
more than at what she had said, and at the sight of the two girls standing
a little apart looking into each other's faces in alarm and horror, her
own countenance changed, and an expression of blank inquiry succeeded the
smiles, and dried the tears.

"Oh, Mrs. Beale!" Evadne entreated; "you are not going to let Edith marry
that dreadful man!"

"Mother! she will keep saying that!" Edith exclaimed.

"My dear child, what _do_ you mean?" Mrs. Beale said gently to
Evadne, taking her hand.

"I mean that he is bad--thoroughly bad," said Evadne.

"Why! Now tell me, what do you know about him?" the old lady asked,
leading Evadne to a sofa, and making her sit down beside her upon it. Her
manner was always excessively soothing, and the first heat of Evadne's
indignation began to subside as she came under the influence of it.

"I don't know anything about him," she answered confusedly; "but I don't
like the way he looks at me!"

"Oh, come, now! that is childish!" Mrs. Beale said, smiling.

"No, it is not! I am sure it is not!" Evadne rejoined, knitting her brows
in a fruitless endeavour to grasp some idea that evaded her, some item of
information that had slipped from her mind. "I feel--I have a
consciousness which informs me of things my intellect cannot grasp. And I
_do_ know!" she exclaimed, her mental vision clearing as she
proceeded. "I have heard Colonel Colquhoun drop hints."

"And you would condemn him upon hints?" Edith interjected contemptuously.

"I know that if Colonel Colquhoun hints that there is something
objectionable about a man it must be something very objectionable indeed,"
Evadne answered, cooling suddenly.

Edith turned crimson.

"Evadne--_dear_," Mrs. Beale remonstrated, patting her hand
emphatically to restrain her. "Edith has accepted him because she loves
him, and that is enough."

"If it were love it would be," Evadne answered. "But it is not love she
feels. Prove to her that this man is not a fit companion for her, and she
will droop for a while, and then recover. The same thing would happen if
you separated them for years without breaking off the engagement. Love
which lasts is a condition of the mature mind; it is a fine compound of
inclination and knowledge, controlled by reason, which makes the object of
it, not a thing of haphazard, but a matter of choice. Mrs. Beale," she
reiterated, "you will not let Edith marry that dreadful man!"

"My dear child," Mrs. Beale replied, speaking with angelic mildness, "your
mind is quite perverted on this subject, and how it comes to be so I
cannot imagine, for your mother is one of the sweetest, truest, most long
suffering _womanly_ women I ever knew. And so is Lady Adeline
Hamilton-Wells--and Mrs. Orton Beg. You have been brought up among womanly
women, none of whom ever even _thought_ such things as you do not
hesitate to utter, I am sure."

"I once heard a discussion between Lady Adeline and Aunt Olive," Evadne
rejoined. "It was about a lady who had a very bad husband, and had
patiently endured a great deal. 'It is beautiful--pathetic--pitiful to see
a woman making the best of a bad bargain in that way,' Aunt Olive said.
'It may be all that,' Lady Adeline answered; '_but is it right?_ If
this generation would object to bad bargains, the next would have fewer to
make the best of.'"

"Ah, that is so like dear Adeline!" Mrs. Beale observed. "But what a
memory you have, my dear, to be able to give the exact words!"

Evadne's countenance fell. She was disheartened, but still she persisted.

"It is you good women," she said, clasping Mrs. Beale's hand in both of
hers, and holding it to her breast: "It is you good women who make
marriage a lottery for us. You, for instance. Because you drew a prize
yourself, you see no reason why every other woman should not be equally
fortunate."

"I think, when people make _quite_ sure beforehand that they love
each other, they are safe--even when the man has _not_ been all that
he ought to have been. Love is a great purifier, and love for a good woman
has saved many a man," Mrs. Beale declared with the fervour of full
conviction.

"That is presuming that a man 'who has not been all that he ought to have
been' is still able to love," said Evadne, "which is not the case. We are
all endowed with the power to begin with; but love is a delicate essence,
as volatile as it is delicious; and when a man's moral fibre is loosened,
his share of love escapes. But this is not the point," she broke off,
dropping Mrs. Beale's hand, and gathering herself together. "The trouble
now is that you are going to let Edith throw herself away on a man you
know nothing about--"

"Ah, my dear, _there_ you are mistaken," Mrs. Beale interrupted,
comfortably triumphant. "They have known each other all their lives. They
used to play together as children; and when I wrote to ask her father's
consent to the engagement, he replied that the one thing which could
reconcile him to parting with Edith was her choice of a man who had grown
up under our own eyes. I can assure you that we know his faults quite as
well as his good qualities."

"I thought you would like to have me in the regiment, Evadne," Edith
ventured with timid reproach.

"I would not like to have you anywhere as that man's wife," Evadne
answered.

"Well, if he is," said Edith, with a flash of enthusiasm, "if he is
_bad_, I will make him good; if he is lost, I will save him!"

"Spoken like a true woman, dearest!" her mother said, rising to kiss her,
and then standing back to look up at her with yearning love and
admiration.

Evadne rose also with a heavy sigh. "I know how you feel," she said to
Edith drearily. "You glow and are glad from morning till night. You have a
great yearning here," she clasped her hands to her breast. "You find a new
delight in music, a new beauty in flowers; unaccountable joy in the warmth
and brightness of the sun, and rapture not to be contained in the quiet
moonlight. You despise yourself, and think your lover worthy of adoration.
The consciousness of him never leaves you even in your sleep. He is your
last thought at night, your first in the morning. Even when he is away
from you, you do not feel separated from him as you do from other people,
for a sense of his presence remains with you, and you flatter yourself
that your spirits mingle when your bodies are apart. You think, too, that
the source of all this ecstasy is holy because it is pleasurable; you
imagine it will last forever!"

Edith stared at her. That Evadne should know the entrancement of love
herself so exactly, and not reverence it as holy, amazed her.

"And you call it love," Evadne added, as if she had read her thought; "but
it is not love. The threshold of love and hate adjoin, and it--this
feeling--stands midway between them, an introduction to either. It is
always a question, as marriages are now made, whether, when passion has
had time to cool, husband and wife will love or detest each other. But
what is the use of talking?" she exclaimed. "You will not heed me. It is
too late now." She turned and walked toward the door; but Edith caught her
by the arm and stopped her.

"Evadne! Do not go like this!" she entreated, with a sob in her voice.
"Wish me well at least!"

"I _do_ wish you well," said Evadne. "With what other motive could I
have said so much? But I ask again, what is the use? Your parents are
content to let you marry a man of whose private life they have no
knowledge whatever--"

Mrs. Beale interrupted her: "This is not quite the case," she confessed.
"We _do_ know that there have been errors; but all that is over now,
and it would be wicked of us not to believe the best, and hope for the
best. A young man in his position has great temptations--"

"And if he succumbs, he is pardoned because of his position!"

"Oh, come, now, Evadne!" Mrs. Beale remonstrated, "You cannot think that
such a consideration affects our decision. His position and property are
very nice in themselves, and indeed all that we care about in that way for
Edith, but we were not thinking about either when we gave our consent. It
is the dear fellow himself that we want--"

"I can make him all that he ought to be! I know I can!" Edith exclaimed
fervently, clasping her hands, and looking up, with bright eyes full of
confidence and passion.

Evadne said not another word, but kissed them both, and left the house.

"Mother! how strange Evadne is!" Edith ejaculated.

Mrs. Beale shook her head several times. "I heard that she had some
trouble at the outset of her own married life," she said. "I don't know
what it was; but doubtless it accounts for her manner to-day. Don't think
about it, however. She will recover her right-mindedness as she grows
older. A little shock upsets a girl's judgment very often; but she is so
clever and conscientious, she will certainly get over it. But you are
quite agitated yourself, dear. Come! think no more about what she said!
Her own marriage quite disproves all her arguments, for Colonel Colquhoun
was notoriously just the kind of man she would have us believe Mosley is,
and see what she has done for him, and how well they get on together!
Think no more about it, dear child, but come out with me. The air will
tranquillize us both."

On her way home, Evadne overtook Mr. St. John. He was walking slowly with
his chin on his chest, looking down, and his whole demeanour was
expressive of deep dejection.

He looked up with a start when Evadne overtook him, and their eyes met.

"You have heard?" she said.

He made an affirmative gesture.

"I never--never dreamt of such a thing," she went on. "I thought--I hoped--
pardon me, but I hoped it would be you. She liked you so much. I know she
did."

"But not enough, for she refused me," he answered gently. "But doubtless
it is all for the best. _His_ ways are not our ways, you know, and we
suffer because we are too proud to resign ourselves to manifestations of
His wisdom, which are beyond our comprehension. When you came up, I was
feeling as if I could never say 'Thy will be done' with my whole heart,
fervently, in this matter, but since you spoke to me, I think I can."

Evadne took his arm, and the gentle pressure of her hand upon it expressed
her heartfelt sympathy eloquently.

"If it had been anyone else, I thought at first--but, doubtless,
doubtless, it is all for the best!" he added; and then he raised his head,
and changed the subject bravely.

But Evadne did not hear what he was saying, for suddenly she found herself
on the cliffs at home, and it was a scented summer morning; the air was
balmy, the sun was shining, the little waves rippled up over the sand, the
birds were singing, and the dew-drops hung on the yellow gorse; but that
joy in her own being which lent a charm to these was wanting, and the
songs seemed tuneless, the scent oppressive, the sea all sameness, the
land a waste, and the sun itself a glaring garish baldness of light, that
accentuated her own disconsolation, the length of a life that is not worth
living, and the size of a world which contains no corner of comfort in all
its pitiless expanse. And it was the same story too. She was witnessing
the same mystery of love rejected--the same worthiness for the same
unworthiness; the same fine discipline of resignation, which made the pain
of it endurable; listening to the same old pulpit platitudes even, which
have such force of soothing when reverently expressed. She and Edith were
very different types of girlhood, and it seemed a strange coincidence that
their opportunities should have been identical nevertheless; but not
singular that their action should have been the same, because the force of
nature which controlled them is a matter of constitution more than of
character, and subject only to a training which neither of them had
received, and without which, instead of ruling, they are ruled
erratically.

Evadne had quite forgotten by this time all her first fine feelings on the
subject of a celibate priesthood. She now held that the laws of nature are
the laws of God, and marriage is a law of nature which there is no
evidence that God has ever rescinded.

Evadne had not heard what Mr. St. John was saying, and she did not care to
hear; she knew that it was not relevant to anything which either of them
had in their minds; but still held his arm, and looked up at him
sympathetically when he paused for a reply, and at that moment Colonel
Colquhoun, accompanied by Sir Mosley Menteith, turned out of a side street
just behind them, and followed on in the same direction. When Menteith saw
the two walking so familiarly arm in arm, he glanced at Colonel Colquhoun
out of the comers of his eyes to see how he took it. But Colonel
Colquhoun's face remained serenely impassive.

"Easy!" he said. "We won't overtake them till we arrive at the house. I
expect he is seeing her home, and as Mrs. Colquhoun is only at her best
_tete-a-tete_, it would be a shame to deprive him of the small
recompense he will get for his trouble." He twisted his moustache and
continued to look at the pair thoughtfully when he had spoken, and
Menteith glanced at him again to see if he might not perchance be
concealing some secret annoyance under an affectation of easy
indifference, but there was not a trace of anything of the kind apparent.

"There is no doubt that women _do_ cling to the clergy," was the
outcome of Colonel Colquhoun's reflections--"I mean metaphorically
speaking, of course," he hastened to add with a laugh, perceiving the
double construction that might be put on the remark in view of the
situation. "Now, there is only one fellow on the island that Evadne cares
for as much as she does for her friend there, I think she likes the other
better though."

"You mean yourself, of course," said Menteith.

"No, I don't mean myself, of course," Colonel Colquhoun answered, "Putting
myself out of the question. It is Price, I mean."

"That dried-up old chap?" Menteith exclaimed. "Well, he's pretty safe, I
should say! And I should never be jealous of a parson myself. Women always
treat them _de haut en bas_."

"I believe, sir, that Mrs. Colquhoun is perfectly 'safe' with anyone whom
she may choose for a friend," Colonel Colquhoun said with an emphasis
which made Menteith apologize immediately.

Colonel Colquhoun asked Evadne that evening what she thought of the
projected marriage.

"I think it detestable," she answered.

"Well, I think it a pity myself," he said. "She's such a nice looking girl
too."

Evadne turned to him with a flash of hope. "Can't you do something?" she
exclaimed. "Can't you prevent it?"

"Absolutely impossible," he answered. "And I beg as a favour to myself
that you won't try."