Эдвард Бульвер-Литтон - Night and Morning, Complete

“And now,” she said, colouring as she spoke, “I must see your wife, brother: there is so much to say about a child that only a woman will recollect. Is she very good-tempered and kind, your wife? You know I never saw her; you married after—after I left.”

“She is a very worthy woman,” said Mr. Morton, clearing his throat, “and brought me some money; she has a will of her own, as most women have; but that’s neither here nor there—she is a good wife as wives go; and prudent and painstaking—I don’t know what I should do without her.”

“Brother, I have one favour to request—a great favour.”

“Anything I can do in the way of money?”

“It has nothing to do with money. I can’t live long—don’t shake your head—I can’t live long. I have no fear for Philip, he has so much spirit—such strength of character—but that child! I cannot bear to leave him altogether; let me stay in this town—I can lodge anywhere; but to see him sometimes—to know I shall be in reach if he is ill—let me stay here—let me die here!”

“You must not talk so sadly—you are young yet—younger than I am—I don’t think of dying.”

“Heaven forbid! but—”

“Well—well,” interrupted Mr. Morton, who began to fear his feelings would hurry him into some promise which his wife would not suffer him to keep; “you shall talk to Margaret,—that is Mrs. Morton—I will get her to see you—yes, I think I can contrive that; and if you can arrange with her to stay,—but you see, as she brought the money, and is a very particular woman—”

“I will see her; thank you—thank you; she cannot refuse me.”

“And, brother,” resumed Mrs. Morton, after a short pause, and speaking in a firm voice—“and is it possible that you disbelieve my story?—that you, like all the rest, consider my children the sons of shame?”

There was an honest earnestness in Catherine’s voice, as she spoke, that might have convinced many. But Mr. Morton was a man of facts, a practical man—a man who believed that law was always right, and that the improbable was never true.

He looked down as he answered, “I think you have been a very ill-used woman, Catherine, and that is all I can say on the matter; let us drop the subject.”

“No! I was not ill-used; my husband—yes, my husband—was noble and generous from first to last. It was for the sake of his children’s prospects—for the expectations they, through him, might derive from his proud uncle—that he concealed our marriage. Do not blame Philip—do not condemn the dead.”

“I don’t want to blame any one,” said Mr. Morton, rather angrily; “I am a plain man—a tradesman, and can only go by what in my class seems fair and honest, which I can’t think Mr. Beaufort’s conduct was, put it how you will; if he marries you as you think, he gets rid of a witness, he destroys a certificate, and he dies without a will. How ever, all that’s neither here nor there. You do quite right not to take the name of Beaufort, since it is an uncommon name, and would always make the story public. Least said, soonest mended. You must always consider that your children will be called natural children, and have their own way to make. No harm in that! Warm day for your journey.” Catherine sighed, and wiped her eyes; she no longer reproached the world, since the son of her own mother disbelieved her.

The relations talked together for some minutes on the past—the present; but there was embarrassment and constraint on both sides—it was so difficult to avoid one subject; and after sixteen years of absence, there is little left in common, even between those who once played together round their parent’s knees. Mr. Morton was glad at last to find an excuse in Catherine’s fatigue to leave her. “Cheer up, and take a glass of something warm before you go to bed. Good night!” these were his parting words.

Long was the conference, and sleepless the couch, of Mr. and Mrs. Morton. At first that estimable lady positively declared she would not and could not visit Catherine (as to receiving her, that was out of the question). But she secretly resolved to give up that point in order to insist with greater strength upon another—viz., the impossibility of Catherine remaining in the town; such concession for the purpose of resistance being a very common and sagacious policy with married ladies. Accordingly, when suddenly, and with a good grace, Mrs. Morton appeared affected by her husband’s eloquence, and said, “Well, poor thing! if she is so ill, and you wish it so much, I will call to-morrow,” Mr. Morton felt his heart softened towards the many excellent reasons which his wife urged against allowing Catherine to reside in the town. He was a political character—he had many enemies; the story of his seduced sister, now forgotten, would certainly be raked up; it would affect his comfort, perhaps his trade, certainly his eldest daughter, who was now thirteen; it would be impossible then to adopt the plan hitherto resolved upon—of passing off Sidney as the legitimate orphan of a distant relation; it would be made a great handle for gossip by Miss Pryinall. Added to all these reasons, one not less strong occurred to Mr. Morton himself—the uncommon and merciless rigidity of his wife would render all the other women in the town very glad of any topic that would humble her own sense of immaculate propriety. Moreover, he saw that if Catherine did remain, it would be a perpetual source of irritation in his own home; he was a man who liked an easy life, and avoided, as far as possible, all food for domestic worry. And thus, when at length the wedded pair turned back to back, and composed themselves to sleep, the conditions of peace were settled, and the weaker party, as usual in diplomacy, sacrificed to the interests of the united powers. After breakfast the next morning, Mrs. Morton sallied out on her husband’s arm. Mr. Morton was rather a handsome man, with an air and look grave, composed, severe, that had tended much to raise his character in the town.

Mrs. Morton was short, wiry, and bony. She had won her husband by making desperate love to him, to say nothing of a dower that enabled him to extend his business, new-front, as well as new-stock his shop, and rise into the very first rank of tradesmen in his native town. He still believed that she was excessively fond of him—a common delusion of husbands, especially when henpecked. Mrs. Morton was, perhaps, fond of him in her own way; for though her heart was not warm, there may be a great deal of fondness with very little feeling. The worthy lady was now clothed in her best. She had a proper pride in showing the rewards that belong to female virtue. Flowers adorned her Leghorn bonnet, and her green silk gown boasted four flounces,—such, then, was, I am told, the fashion. She wore, also, a very handsome black shawl, extremely heavy, though the day was oppressively hot, and with a deep border; a smart sevigni brooch of yellow topazes glittered in her breast; a huge gilt serpent glared from her waistband; her hair, or more properly speaking her front, was tortured into very tight curls, and her feet into very tight half-laced boots, from which the fragrance of new leather had not yet departed. It was this last infliction, for il faut souffrir pour etre belle , which somewhat yet more acerbated the ordinary acid of Mrs. Morton’s temper. The sweetest disposition is ruffled when the shoe pinches; and it so happened that Mrs. Roger Morton was one of those ladies who always have chilblains in the winter and corns in the summer. “So you say your sister is a beauty?”

“Was a beauty, Mrs. M.,—was a beauty. People alter.”

“A bad conscience, Mr. Morton, is—”

“My dear, can’t you walk faster?”

“If you had my corns, Mr. Morton, you would not talk in that way!”