Chapter VI: Cecil's Weakness

O God! O God! that it were possible
To undo things done,--to call back yesterday!
That Time could turn his swift and sandy glass
To untell days, or to redeem these hours!
HEYWOOD.--_A Woman Killed with Kindness._

When Blanche returned to her senses, she found herself in the arms of her landlady, who was bathing her forehead with vinegar and water.

"My husband!" she murmured; "where is my husband?"

"Oh, he's not come back yet. There, you are better now, aren't you?"

"Thank you; yes, I can walk now."

"Don't attempt it just yet."

"I must. I must go out."

"Go out such a day as this! Why, see how it snows."

"I must. You see I can stand. Oh, pray God, I may not be too late."

"But where do you wish to go, my dear? Can't I send my girl for you?"

"Where? Where? Ay, indeed. He did not tell me where. But then Cecil will not know where to find .... Thank God! Thank God!"

She sank down again upon the chair, relieved of her terrible anxiety; for she doubted not that if Cecil were unable to meet with Captain Heath, he would soon grow calmer, and look at things more rationally.

She waited for his return, however, with extreme uneasiness, fearful lest he should not have missed the captain; and dreading lest he should still continue his jealous suspicions. Free from all sentiment of jealousy herself, she could not understand Cecil's excessive susceptibility; and knowing Captain Heath so well as she did, she was perfectly convinced that her husband's jealousy was quite motiveless. This made her feel secure on this subject. Her deep sense of her own innocence, and of Heath's high-mindedness, made her convinced that Cecil must see the matter in its true light, so soon as he should calmly consider it.

It was nearly seven o'clock before her anxiety was relieved by hearing his knock at the door; but she screamed with terror as he entered the room. Although his coat and hat were covered with snow, he had left his chest exposed to the cold, and his shirt-collar and front were dripping with wet. He had evidently been altogether heedless of his person, and had given no thought of protecting it from the weather.

His face was pale and haggard, his eyes dull and blood-shot, his lips compressed--his whole aspect that of one who has just committed some fearful crime. She interrogated his face with watchful terror. He avoided her eye.

He seated himself in silence, and began brushing the snow off his hat. That completed, he placed his wet feet on the fender, and looked stedfastly at the fire.

Unable to bear this suspense, she went up to him, and laying her hand upon his shoulder, said timidly,--

"Have you seen him?"

"No."

She felt greatly relieved. He continued to look at the fire, but gave no signs of wishing to prolong the conversation. She drew a stool by his side, and sat down upon it; and in silence they both contemplated the evanescent shapes in the burning coals.

Having sat thus for some time, Blanche rose and went into the next room, and presently returned with her baby in her arms, asleep, which she gently laid upon Cecil's lap.

He turned a dull, sad eye upon her, inquiringly, and then looked down upon the sleeping infant on his knee.

"Unhappy child!" he said, and the tears rolled down his cheeks, as he gazed upon the sleeping babe, unconscious of the sorrow it awakened in its father's heart, and the remorse for infatuated villany, the consequences of which must eventually fall upon its head.

"Take her away," he said, "take her away. Why do you bring her to me?"

"To make you happy."

"To make me more miserable than I was before--to reproach me--me, her father, that she has not a better home, warmer clothing! Take her away."

Blanche, sobbing, took the child and laid it again in its cradle.

"Blanche you must write a note for me," he said, after a pause.

"To whom, dearest?"

No reply.

"To whom am I to write?"

"To--Captain Heath!" he said, with an effort.

She started at the name, alarmed and wondering.

"What am I to say?"

"Whatever you please--you are sure to succeed."

"But tell me what the object is?"

"Money."

"Money?"

"For my picture--I am to paint him one, am I not? he has ordered it. Well! I want money in advance."

Blanche would have been highly delighted at such a speech, had it been uttered in a different tone, and had not Captain Heath, already, that very day, given a cheque in advance.

She made no reply.

"Well!" he said, "are you ready? Write it at once."

"But the fifty pounds...."

"Gone! I met a man to whom I owed it--he demanded payment--I was forced to let him have the cheque. You can explain it all to Heath, and tell him I must have ten pounds more to buy materials with. Tell him what you please, but get the money."

He resumed his contemplation of the fire after this speech, and scarcely opened his lips again for the evening. Blanche wrote the letter, but it was with loathing, and she hated herself while she was doing it, and was sure Captain Heath would also hate her.

Glad as she would have been to see her husband relinquish his absurd jealousy of the captain, it came with quite a different aspect when that relinquishment was not a matter of conviction, but of degraded calculation. She guessed at once the truth of the whole history; she saw that Cecil had gambled away the fifty pounds, and that he had not only reconciled himself to it, but had made up his mind to extort from the generosity of the captain certain sums which would enable him to indulge his unhappy passion.

What a situation for a loving wife! Never before, not even in his worst exhibitions of selfishness and weakness, had Blanche despised her husband; but she could not master the feeling now; a lurking sense of contempt would intrude itself upon her thoughts.

The letter was sent under cover to her father.

All the next day Cecil sat over the fire, sometimes whistling, but mostly quite silent. He was playing over again the games which he had lost on the previous day: and _now_, as he played them, he calculated rightly, and always won.

Blanche observed that he exhibited singular impatience for the arrival of the postman; and when the day entirely passed over without bringing a letter, he constantly muttered to himself, "Very extraordinary!"

The next morning his impatience was greater, and when the two o'clock postman brought a letter for her from Rose, and nothing from Captain Heath, he began to swear and mutter to himself, till she was quite terrified.

He took up his hat and lounged out, without saying a word as to where he was going.

About three, Captain Heath called. Blanche was frightened lest Cecil should return and find him there; and was also alarmed at the probable storm which would burst upon her in consequence of this visit.

Heath saw her embarrassment, and attributed it to a sense of shame at her husband's conduct; for the note was so incoherently written, that he divined pretty nearly the whole truth of the matter.

"I have brought a cheque for your husband," he said, "because I did not wish to trust it to the post--also, because I wished to say a word to you. Blanche, I take the privilege of an old, a very old friend, to speak frankly to you; therefore, you must not be offended with me when I ask you to receive another ten pounds in advance for the picture, besides the cheque which your husband has requested. I mean the second sum to be received by you, for household expenses--to be kept a secret by you--you can keep a secret from your husband, can you not?"

"Why do you wish it?"

"Because, Blanche, affairs are not in a flourishing condition with you at present; and as your husband owes a good deal of money, perhaps, if he knew you had this sum, instead of allowing it to be devoted to your immediate necessities, he might also play that away."

She blushed deeply, as she perceived that he had guessed the truth.

"I wish, therefore, that you would give him this cheque from me, which he has asked, but that you would say nothing, if you can help it, about the other sum. I am asking, perhaps, that which I ought not to ask. I am overstepping, perhaps, the bounds of friendship, and interfering in domestic concerns where I have no sort of right to interfere. But it is my friendship which dictates the wish, and which must be my excuse. I do not bind you to any condition; I do not even wish you to keep the matter a secret, if it is at all repugnant to your feelings: but I would strenuously _advise_ you to do so. Act just as you think fitting and proper; do not imagine that I wish in any way to dictate to you; but, as a brother might counsel you, I would venture to suggest, that on many accounts it would be well if you did not speak of this."

"Kindest, best of men!" she exclaimed, pressing his hand. She could say no more.

He quietly laid the cheque upon the mantelpiece, and slipped ten sovereigns into the pocket of her apron. He then, to change the subject, asked after Rose Blanche, who was brought to him immediately.

Blanche, after a long struggle with herself, at last said,--

"Captain Heath, you know me well enough to believe that I am neither insensible to your friendship, nor ungrateful for it--do you not?"

"Assuredly, dear Blanche."

"And if I were to say anything to you that might look ungrateful, you would not believe that it sprang from ingratitude? you would at once see that I was forced by circumstances, not by my own will?"

He shook slightly, as he answered,--

"I could not doubt you."

"You do not believe me to be capricious?"

"I do not."

"And if I were to beg you .... to .... if I were to say.... do not come here any more....?"

Her voice faltered, and died away in a whisper. He started as the words fell on his ear, and turned first red, then pale again.

There was a moment of embarrassed silence.

"Oh! do not believe," she passionately exclaimed, "that it comes from me; do not fancy that I should ever.... But I cannot do what my heart dictates: I owe obedience to another."

He saw at once what was in her mind; he saw that Cecil's absurd jealousy was at the bottom of her agitation: and in a low but firm tone, he said,--

"Blanche, do not continue. I understand you. I never was a favourite of his, and he naturally enough does not desire my acquaintance; in which case, of course, I must relinquish the pleasure of seeing you. Do not sob, Blanche--you cannot help this. Such cases are frequent. I shall not regard you less--shall not be less your friend, because I am not permitted to see you. Perhaps, if he knew me better, he might think otherwise of me; but sympathy is not to be commanded, and too many people dislike me, for me to be either surprised or hurt at his opinion. Besides, I have already interfered too much between you. He thinks my conduct unwarrantable--perhaps it was--and he dislikes me. There, you see I look at the matter in its true light. I do not blame you--I do not blame him. A husband is not forced to accept the friends of his wife."

At this moment Cecil returned.

Heath coloured as he saw him enter the room; Blanche turned aside her head to conceal her tears, but not before Cecil's glance had detected them; a fierce pain shot across Cecil's heart, as if a burning iron had entered it, but with a hypocritical smile he extended his hand to the captain, and expressed himself delighted to see him.

The situation was excessively uncomfortable for all three. The captain could not depart, it would have looked so pointed, yet to remain was torture. Blanche was terrified, and silent. Cecil, who in an instant saw that Heath's presence betokened a fresh assistance from him, stifled the horrible jealousy which his presence awakened, and resolved not to lose the benefit. He began a common-place conversation, and soon led it to the subject of the commissioned picture, for which he declared he had been inspired with a magnificent idea.

Heath's replies were brief and cold; but Cecil was not to be daunted. So completely had his vice corrupted him, that he had lost all sense of dignity, and only looked upon the captain as a victim from whom to draw sums of money. That Heath loved his wife he knew; and doubted not but that from such an affection he should draw golden results. That Blanche did not return the captain's love, he was firmly convinced--and yet that conviction could not allay his jealousy. Awful moral perplexity and corruption! Despicable weakness and meanness! Here was a man base enough to barter his honour, yet not strong enough to resist the petty irritation of the pettiest jealousy!

As the captain took his leave, Cecil said:--

"We are generally at home,--if you should be in this neighbourhood, pray don't forget to give us a look in. It is but a miserable place to come to--but old friends, you know."

Blanche's eye met the captain's, and most significantly expressed,--"Don't accept the invitation."

Heath merely bowed his acceptance, and departed, marvelling much whether it was corruption or irony which dictated Cecil's speech.

Cecil made no observation to Blanche respecting the captain's presence; but took up the cheque with delight, and forthwith proceeded to get it cashed, and to carry the money to Leicester-square, whence, after spending the afternoon and night at play, with various alternations of fortune, he came away a winner of thirteen pounds.

He was in excellent spirits on his return home. Blanche said nothing respecting the ten sovereigns in her possession.