Blanche: A Story for Girls

So he sat in silence, patiently enough, to all appearance, while Lady Marth unbosomed herself of what she considered her mission, prefacing her advice with the usual excuses for interference, on the ground that, sooner or later, both of the principals concerned would thank her for having acted as a true friend in the matter.

Archie bent his head in acknowledgment of her kind intentions, but beyond this, neither by word nor look did he help her out with what she had to say.

This attitude of his made her task by no means easier. For some little time she floundered about in unusual embarrassment; but once fairly under weigh, her words flowed fluently. She dilated on Archie’s lonely position – the advisability of his making up his mind to marry, instead of remaining a target for the aims of designing mammas or rich husband-hunting daughters, and possibly some day finding himself pinned by their well-directed arrows. She hinted at the satisfaction and security of being cared for, “for himself,” and by one who had known him long and thoroughly, to all of which Archie listened unmoved, with the utmost deference and attention, till her ladyship at last pulled up short, partly through breathlessness, partly because, without the encouragement of a responsive word or gesture, she had really nothing more to say.

Then he looked up, but nothing in his face helped her to any conclusion as to the effect of her exordium.

“I must thank you,” he said, “for your great interest in my welfare. Believe me, I shall always remember it.” Which statement was certainly well founded, though the glimmer of a smile danced in his eyes as he made his little speech.

The smile, however, Lady Marth was too engrossed to perceive.

“But” – and at this word, for the first time, her heart misgave her as to what was to follow – “but it is best for me at once to make you understand my position. I am not likely to marry. It seems to me at present almost certain that I never shall.”

“Archie!” exclaimed Lady Marth, startled and surprised, “why not?”

“Simply for this reason. There is only one woman in the world whom I can imagine myself caring for in that way, and she” – here, even Archies calm somewhat deserted him – “she,” he went on, with a touch of bitterness quite new to him, “won’t have anything to say to me.”

“I can scarcely believe it,” exclaimed his hearer.

“There must be some mistake!”

“Thank you for the inferred compliment,” he replied. “But no – it is quite true; there is no mistake.”

Then a wild idea struck Lady Marth, suggested by her irrepressible belief in her own powers of discernment.

“You don’t mean to say,” she began. “Is it possible that we are both thinking of the same person! It can’t be that Rosy has refused you.”

Archie laughed, quite unconstrainedly.

“As things are,” he said, “I suppose I may be quite frank. Rosy! – oh dear, no; we are the best of friends, as you are aware, but thoroughly and completely like brother and sister. And it is by no means improbable that she suspects the real state of the case, as Hebe is in my confidence.”

“Then who in all the world can it be?” said Lady Marth, completely nonplussed, “for somehow you seem to infer that it’s some one I know.”

“I don’t mind telling you,” said Archie. “You do know her – it is Blanche Derwent.”

For a moment or two Lady Marth did not speak. Then she said, half timidly:

“It must have been very sudden. You have seen very little of her? Oh yes, there was that Christmas week at Alderwood.”

“It all happened long before then,” said Archie.

“It is true, I had not seen much of her, but it doesn’t seem to me now that time is required in such a case. It was soon after they left Pinnerton, and took up that millinery business.”

“Before Sir Adam came home?”

“Of course,” said Archie drily.

“And she refused you —then?”

“Naturally, as she didn’t care for me.”

Lady Marth again relapsed into silence. The confusion of ideas in her mind was too great to find expression in words. She had read of such things; in novels, perhaps, they seemed credible and rather fine. But in real life – no, she couldn’t take it in.

Archie showed no inclination to say more. He rose, and held out his hand.

“Good-bye,” he said. “Thank you for your interest in me.”

“Good-bye,” she replied, “and – no, perhaps I had better say nothing. Except, yes – honestly, Archie, I should like to see you happy.”

“Thank you,” he repeated.

When Archie found himself in the street again, he looked about him vaguely, and sauntered on, scarcely knowing why or whither, thinking over the interview which had just taken place, and recalling, not without a certain grim humour, Josephine Marth’s blank amazement.

Suddenly the sound of his own name not far from him made him start, and looking up, on the opposite pavement he caught sight of three familiar figures, Sir Adam and his two “grand-daughters.”

“Where are you off to?” said the old man. “You don’t look as if you were bound on anything very important. Come with us – we’re going to see some of the pictures.”

Mr Dunstan hesitated.

“Yes, do come,” said Stasy, with whom he was on the friendliest of terms. “Three is no company, you know, and I’m always getting left behind by myself.”

He glanced up, still irresolute, but at that moment he caught Blanche’s eyes, and something – an impalpable something in their blue depths – brought him to a sudden determination.

“If I won’t be in the way,” he said, “I should like nothing better.”

And the four walked on together.

“Norman,” said Lady Hebe that same evening, when they met for a few moments before dinner in her guardian’s house – it was within a week or two of the date fixed for their marriage – “Norman, I’ve something wonderful to tell you. Archie Dunstan rushed in late this afternoon to see me for a moment – ”

“Well?” said Norman, as she paused. “Do you want me to guess?”

“No,” said Hebe, “I want to tell you straight off. Archie knew how I should enjoy doing so. Its all right, Norman – between him and Blanche, I mean. Just fancy! Aren’t you pleased?”

And never had Hebe’s face looked happier than as she said the words.

End of “Blanche.”

Chapter Twenty Five

One Sunday Morning

The Rector of a large West-end church was ill. His illness was not very serious, nor did it threaten to be protracted, but it fell at a bad moment. It was the middle of the season, the time at which his church was more crowded than at any other of the year. He was an earnest and thoughtful man, and one who, despite much discouragement, laboured energetically to do his best; but on the Friday evening, preceding the second Sunday in June, he was obliged to acknowledge that for some days he would be unfit to officiate in his usual place.

“What shall I do?” he said in distress. “What shall I do about the sermon on Sunday morning? The curates can manage the rest, but it will be as much as they can do. I cannot ask either of them to prepare another sermon so hurriedly. And the one I had ready has cost me much time and thought – I had even built some hopes upon it. One never knows – ”

“Your sermon will keep till another Sunday. That is not the question,” said his wife.

“No, truly,” he agreed, with some bitterness; “my sermon, as you say, will keep. Nor can I flatter myself that any one will be the loser if it never be preached at all. Do sermons ever do good, I sometimes ask myself? Yet many of us – I could almost say most of us – do our best. We spare neither time nor trouble nor prayer; but all falls on stony ground, it seems to me. And we are but human – liable to error and mistake, and but few among us have great gift of eloquence. It is easy, I know, to pick holes and criticise; but is the fault all on the side of the sermons, I wonder?”