第34章 THE MARCHIONESS OF STONEHENGE(4)

It was a curious psychological fact that,having once made the avowal,Milly seemed possessed with a spirit of ecstasy at her position.With the liberal sum of money supplied to her by Lady Caroline she now purchased the garb of a widow,and duly appeared at church in her weeds,her simple face looking so sweet against its margin of crape that she was almost envied her state by the other village-girls of her age.And when a woman's sorrow for her beloved can maim her young life so obviously as it had done Milly's there was,in truth,little subterfuge in the case.Her explanation tallied so well with the details of her lover's latter movements--those strange absences and sudden returnings,which had occasionally puzzled his friends--that nobody supposed for a moment that the second actor in these secret nuptials was other than she.The actual and whole truth would indeed have seemed a preposterous assertion beside this plausible one,by reason of the lofty demeanour of the Lady Caroline and the unassuming habits of the late villager.There being no inheritance in question,not a soul took the trouble to go to the city church,forty miles off,and search the registers for marriage signatures bearing out so humble a romance.

In a short time Milly caused a decent tombstone to be erected over her nominal husband's grave,whereon appeared the statement that it was placed there by his heartbroken widow,which,considering that the payment for it came from Lady Caroline and the grief from Milly,was as truthful as such inscriptions usually are,and only required pluralizing to render it yet more nearly so.

The impressionable and complaisant Milly,in her character of widow,took delight in going to his grave every day,and indulging in sorrow which was a positive luxury to her.She placed fresh flowers on his grave,and so keen was her emotional imaginativeness that she almost believed herself to have been his wife indeed as she walked to and fro in her garb of woe.One afternoon,Milly being busily engaged in this labour of love at the grave,Lady Caroline passed outside the churchyard wall with some of her visiting friends,who,seeing Milly there,watched her actions with interest,remarked upon the pathos of the scene,and upon the intense affection the young man must have felt for such a tender creature as Milly.A strange light,as of pain,shot from the Lady Caroline's eye,as if for the first time she begrudged to the young girl the position she had been at such pains to transfer to her;it showed that a slumbering affection for her husband still had life in Lady Caroline,obscured and stifled as it was by social considerations.

An end was put to this smooth arrangement by the sudden appearance in the churchyard one day of the Lady Caroline,when Milly had come there on her usual errand of laying flowers.Lady Caroline had been anxiously awaiting her behind the chancel,and her countenance was pale and agitated.

'Milly!'she said,'come here!I don't know how to say to you what I am going to say.I am half dead!'

'I am sorry for your ladyship,'says Milly,wondering.

'Give me that ring!'says the lady,snatching at the girl's left hand.

Milly drew it quickly away.

'I tell you give it to me!'repeated Caroline,almost fiercely.

'Oh--but you don't know why?I am in a grief and a trouble I did not expect!'And Lady Caroline whispered a few words to the girl.

'O my lady!'said the thunderstruck Milly.'What WILL you do?'

'You must say that your statement was a wicked lie,an invention,a scandal,a deadly sin--that I told you to make it to screen me!

That it was I whom he married at Bath.In short,we must tell the truth,or I am ruined--body,mind,and reputation--for ever!'

But there is a limit to the flexibility of gentle-souled women.

Milly by this time had so grown to the idea of being one flesh with this young man,of having the right to bear his name as she bore it;had so thoroughly come to regard him as her husband,to dream of him as her husband,to speak of him as her husband,that she could not relinquish him at a moment's peremptory notice.

'No,no,'she said desperately,'I cannot,I will not give him up!

Your ladyship took him away from me alive,and gave him back to me only when he was dead.Now I will keep him!I am truly his widow.

More truly than you,my lady!for I love him and mourn for him,and call myself by his dear name,and your ladyship does neither!'

'I DO love him!'cries Lady Caroline with flashing eyes,'and Icling to him,and won't let him go to such as you!How can I,when he is the father of this poor babe that's coming to me?I must have him back again!Milly,Milly,can't you pity and understand me,perverse girl that you are,and the miserable plight that I am in?

Oh,this precipitancy--it is the ruin of women!Why did I not consider,and wait!Come,give me back all that I have given you,and assure me you will support me in confessing the truth!'

'Never,never!'persisted Milly,with woe-begone passionateness.

'Look at this headstone!Look at my gown and bonnet of crape--this ring:listen to the name they call me by!My character is worth as much to me as yours is to you!After declaring my Love mine,myself his,taking his name,making his death my own particular sorrow,how can I say it was not so?No such dishonour for me!I will outswear you,my lady;and I shall be believed.My story is so much the more likely that yours will be thought false.But,O please,my lady,do not drive me to this!In pity let me keep him!'

The poor nominal widow exhibited such anguish at a proposal which would have been truly a bitter humiliation to her,that Lady Caroline was warmed to pity in spite of her own condition.

'Yes,I see your position,'she answered.'But think of mine!What can I do?Without your support it would seem an invention to save me from disgrace;even if I produced the register,the love of scandal in the world is such that the multitude would slur over the fact,say it was a fabrication,and believe your story.I do not know who were the witnesses,or anything!'