GEORGE SHAW - The Complete Works

Lydia leaned back in her chair and looked at Mrs. Skene with a curious expression which soon brightened into an irrepressible smile. Mrs. Skene smiled very slightly in complaisance, but conveyed by her serious brow that what she had said was no laughing matter.

“I must take some time to consider all that you have so eloquently urged,” said Lydia. “I am in earnest, Mrs. Skene; you have produced a great effect upon me. Now let us talk of something else for the present. Your daughter is quite well, I hope.”

“Thank you kindly, ma’am, she enjoys her health.”

“And you also?”

“I am as well as can be expected,” said Mrs. Skene, too fond of commiseration to admit that she was perfectly well.

“You must have a rare sense of security,” said Lydia, watching her, “being happily married to so celebrated a — a professor of boxing as Mr. Skene. Is it not pleasant to have a powerful protector?”

“Ah, miss, you little know,” exclaimed Mrs. Skene, falling into the trap baited by her own grievances, and losing sight of Cashel’s interests. “The fear of his getting into trouble is never off my mind. Ned is quietness itself until he has a drop of drink in him; and then he is like the rest — ready to fight the first that provokes him. And if the police get hold of him he has no chance. There’s no justice for a fighting man. Just let it be said that he’s a professional, and that’s enough for the magistrate; away with him to prison, and good-by to his pupils and his respectability at once. That’s what I live in terror of. And as to being protected, I’d let myself be robbed fifty times over sooner than say a word to him that might bring on a quarrel. Many a time when we were driving home of a night have I overpaid the cabman on the sly, afraid he would grumble and provoke Ned. It’s the drink that does it all. Gentlemen are proud to be seen speaking with him in public; and they come up one after another asking what he’ll have, until the next thing he knows is that he’s in bed with his boots on, his wrist sprained, and maybe his eye black, trying to remember what he was doing the night before. What I suffered the first three years of our marriage none can tell. Then he took the pledge, and ever since that he’s been very good — I haven’t seen him what you could fairly call drunk, not more than three times a year. It was the blessing of God, and a beating he got from a milkman in Westminster, that made him ashamed of himself. I kept him to it and made him emigrate out of the way of his old friends. Since that, there has been a blessing on him; and we’ve prospered.”

“Is Cashel quarrelsome?”

At the tone of this question Mrs. Skene suddenly realized the untimeliness of her complaints. “No, no,” she protested. “He never drinks; and as to fighting, if you can believe such a thing, miss, I don’t think he has had a casual turnup three times in his life — not oftener, at any rate. All he wants is to be married; and then he’ll be steady to his grave. But if he’s left adrift now, Lord knows what will become of him. He’ll mope first — he’s moping at present — then he’ll drink; then he’ll lose his pupils, get out of condition, be beaten, and — One word from you, miss, would save him. If I might just tell him—”

“Nothing,” said Lydia. “Absolutely nothing. The only assurance I can give you is that you have softened the hard opinion that I had formed of some of his actions. But that I should marry Mr. Cashel Byron is simply the most improbable thing in the world. All questions of personal inclination apart, the mere improbability is enough in itself to appal an ordinary woman.”

Mrs. Skene did not quite understand this; but she understood sufficiently for her purpose. She rose to go, shaking her head despondently, and saying, “I see how it is, ma’am. You think him beneath you. Your relations wouldn’t like it.”

“There is no doubt that my relatives would be greatly shocked; and I am bound to take that into account for — what it is worth.”

“We should never trouble you,” said Mrs. Skene, lingering. “England will see the last of us in a month of two.”

“That will make no difference to me, except that I shall regret not being able to have a pleasant chat with you occasionally.” This was not true; but Lydia fancied she was beginning to take a hardened delight in lying.

Mrs. Skene was not to be consoled by compliments. She again shook her head. “It is very kind of you to give me good words, miss,” she said; “but if I might have one for the boy you could say what you liked to me.”

Lydia considered far before she replied. At last she said, “I am sorry I spoke harshly to him, since, driven as he was by circumstances, I cannot see how he could have acted otherwise than he did. And I overlooked the economic conditions of his profession. In short, I am not used to fisticuffs; and what I saw shocked me so much that I was unreasonable. But,” continued Lydia, checking Mrs. Skene’s rising hope with a warning finger, “how, if you tell him this, will you make him understand that I say so as an act of justice, and not in the least as a proffer of affection?”

“A crumb of comfort will satisfy him, miss. I’ll just tell him that I’ve seen you, and that you meant nothing by what you said the other day; and—”

“Mrs. Skene,” said Lydia, interrupting her softly; “tell him nothing at all as yet. I have made up my mind at last. If he does not hear from me within a fortnight you may tell him what you please. Can you wait so long?”

“Of course. Whatever you wish, ma’am. But Mellish’s benefit is to be tomorrow night; and—”

“What have I to do with Mellish or his benefit?”

Mrs. Skene, abashed, murmured apologetically that she was only wishful that the boy should do himself credit.

“If he is to benefit Mellish by beating somebody, he will not be behindhand. Remember you are not to mention me for a fortnight. Is that a bargain?”

“Whatever you wish, ma’am,” repeated Mrs. Skene, hardly satisfied. But Lydia gave her no further comfort; so she begged to take her leave, expressing a hope that things would turn out to the advantage of all parties. Then Lydia insisted on her partaking of some solid refreshment, and afterwards drove her to the railway station in the pony-carriage. Just before they parted Lydia, suddenly recurring to their former subject, said,

“Does Mr. Byron ever THINK?”

“Think!” said Mrs. Skene emphatically. “Never. There isn’t a more cheerful lad in existence, miss.”

Then Mrs. Skene was carried away to London, wondering whether it could be quite right for a young lady to live in a gorgeous castle without any elder of her own sex, and to speak freely and civilly to her inferiors. When she got home she said nothing of her excursion to Mr. Skene, in whose disposition valor so entirely took the place of discretion that he had never been known to keep a secret except as to the whereabouts of a projected fight. But she sat up late with her daughter Fanny, tantalizing her by accounts of the splendor of the castle, and consoling her by describing Miss Carew as a slight creature with red hair and no figure (Fanny having jet black hair, fine arms, and being one of Cashel’s most proficient pupils).

“All the same, Fan,” added Mrs. Skene, as she took her candlestick at two in the morning, “if it comes off, Cashel will never be master in his own house.”

“I can see that very plain,” said Fanny; “but if respectable professional people are not good enough for him, he will have only himself to thank if he gets himself looked down upon by empty-headed swells.”

Meanwhile, Lydia, on her return to the castle after a long drive round the country, had attempted to overcome an attack of restlessness by setting to work on the biography of her father. With a view to preparing a chapter on his taste in literature she had lately been examining his favorite books for marked passages. She now resumed this search, not setting methodically to work, but standing perched on the library ladder, taking down volume after volume, and occasionally dipping into the contents for a few pages or so. At this desultory work the time passed as imperceptibly as the shadows lengthened. The last book she examined was a volume of poems. There were no marks in it; but it opened at a page which had evidently lain open often before. The first words Lydia saw were these: