Ralph had listened with great attention, as if everything she said merited deep consideration; but in truth he was only half thinking of the things she said, he was for the rest simply accommodating himself to the weight of his total impressionthe impression of her ardent good faith. She was wrong, but she believed; she was deluded, but she was dismally consistent. It was wonderfully characteristic of her that, having invented a fine theory, about Gilbert Osmond, she loved him not for what he really possessed, but for his very poverties dressed out as honours. Ralph remembered what he had said to his father about wishing to put it into her power to meet the requirements of her imagination. He had done so, and the girl had taken full advantage of the luxury. Poor Ralph felt sick; he felt ashamed. Isabel had uttered her last words with a low solemnity of conviction which virtually terminated the discussion, and she closed it formally by turning away and walking back to the house. Ralph walked beside her, and they passed into the court together and reached the big staircase. Here he stopped and Isabel paused, turning on him a face of elationabsolutely and perversely of gratitude. His opposition had made her own conception of her conduct clearer to her. Shall you not come up to breakfast? she asked.
No; I want no breakfast; Im not hungry.
You ought to eat, said the girl; you live on air.
I do, very much, and I shall go back into the garden and take another mouthful. I came thus far simply to say this. I told you last year that if you were to get into trouble I should feel terribly sold. Thats how I feel to-day.
Do you think Im in trouble?
Ones in trouble when ones in error.
Very well, said Isabel; I shall never complain of my trouble to you! And she moved up the staircase.
Ralph, standing there with his hands in his pockets, followed her with his eyes; then the lurking chill of the high-walled court struck him and made him shiver, so that he returned to the garden to breakfast on the Florentine sunshine.
CHAPTER XXXV
Isabel, when she strolled in the Cascine with her lover, felt no impulse to tell him how little he was approved at Palazzo Crescentini. The discreet opposition offered to her marriage by her aunt and her cousin made on the whole no great impression upon her; the moral of it was simply that they disliked Gilbert Osmond. This dislike was not alarming to Isabel; she scarcely even regretted it; for it served mainly to throw into higher relief the fact, in every way so honourable, that she married to please herself. One did other things to please other people; one did this for a more personal satisfaction; and Isabels satisfaction was confirmed by her lovers admirable good conduct. Gilbert Osmond was in love, and he had never deserved less than during these still, bright days, each of them numbered, which preceded the fulfilment of his hopes, the harsh criticism passed upon him by Ralph Touchett. The chief impression produced on Isabels spirit by this criticism was that the passion of love separated its victim terribly from every one but the loved object. She felt herself disjoined from every one she had ever known beforefrom her two sisters, who wrote to express a dutiful hope that she would be happy, and a surprise, somewhat more vague, at her not having chosen a consort who was the hero of a richer accumulation of anecdote; from Henrietta, who, she was sure, would come out, too late, on purpose to remonstrate; from Lord Warburton, who would certainly console himself, and from Caspar Goodwood, who perhaps would not; from her aunt, who had cold, shallow ideas about marriage, for which she was not sorry to display her contempt; and from Ralph, whose talk about having great views for her was surely but a whimsical cover for a personal disappointment. Ralph apparently wished her not to marry at allthat was what it really meantbecause he was amused with the spectacle of her adventures as a single woman. His disappointment made him say angry things about the man she had preferred even to him: Isabel flattered herself that she believed Ralph had been angry. It was the more easy for her to believe this because, as I say, she had now little free or unemployed emotion for minor needs, and accepted as an incident, in fact quite as an ornament, of her lot the idea that to prefer Gilbert Osmond as she preferred him was perforce to break all other ties. She tasted of the sweets of this preference, and they made her conscious, almost with awe, of the invidious and remorseless tide of the charmed and possessed condition, great as was the traditional honour and imputed virtue of being in love. It was the tragic part of happiness; ones right was always made of the wrong of some one else.
The elation of success, which surely now flamed high in Osmond, emitted meanwhile very little smoke for so brilliant a blaze. Contentment, on his part, took no vulgar form; excitement, in the most self-conscious of men, was a kind of ecstasy of self-control. This disposition, however, made him an admirable lover; it gave him a constant view of the smitten and dedicated state. He never forgot himself, as I say; and so he never forgot to be graceful and tender, to wear the appearancewhich presented indeed no difficultyof stirred senses and deep intentions. He was immensely pleased with his young lady; Madame Merle had made him a present of incalculable value. What could be a finer thing to live with than a high spirit attuned to softness? For would not the softness be all for ones self, and the strenuousness for society, which admired the air of superiority? What could be a happier gift in a companion than a quick, fanciful mind which saved one repetitions and reflected ones thought on a polished, elegant surface? Osmond hated to see his thought reproduced literallythat made it look stale and stupid; he preferred it to be freshened in the reproduction even as words by music. His egotism had never taken the crude form of desiring a dull wife; this ladys intelligence was to be a silver plate, not an earthen onea plate that he might heap up with ripe fruits, to which it would give a decorative value, so that talk might become for him a sort of served dessert. He found the silver quality in this perfection in Isabel; he could tap her imagination with his knuckle and make it ring. He knew perfectly, though he had not been told, that their union enjoyed little favour with the girls relations; but he had always treated her so completely as an independent person that it hardly seemed necessary to express regret for the attitude of her family. Nevertheless, one morning, he made an abrupt allusion to it. Its the difference in our fortune they dont like, he said. They think Im in love with your money.
Are you speaking of my auntof my cousin? Isabel asked. How do you know what they think?
Youve not told me theyre pleased, and when I wrote to Mrs. Touchett the other day she never answered my note. If they had been delighted I should have had some sign of it, and the fact of my being poor and you rich is the most obvious explanation of their reserve. But of course when a poor man marries a rich girl he must be prepared for imputations. I dont mind them; I only care for one thingfor your not having the shadow of a doubt. I dont care what people of whom I ask nothing thinkIm not even capable perhaps of wanting to know. Ive never so concerned myself, God forgive me, and why should I begin to-day, when I have taken to myself a compensation for everything? I wont pretend Im sorry youre rich; Im delighted. I delight in everything thats yourswhether it be money or virtue. Moneys a horrid thing to follow, but a charming thing to meet. It seems to me, however, that Ive sufficiently proved the limits of my itch for it: I never in my life tried to earn a penny, and I ought to be less subject to suspicion than most of the people one sees grubbing and grabbing. I suppose its their business to suspectthat of your family; its proper on the whole they should. Theyll like me better some day; so will you, for that matter. Meanwhile my business is not to make myself bad blood, but simply to be thankful for life and love. It has made me better, loving you, he said on another occasion; it has made me wiser and easier andI wont pretend to denybrighter and nicer and even stronger. I used to want a great many things before and to be angry I didnt have them. Theoretically I was satisfied, as I once told you. I flattered myself I had limited my wants. But I was subject to irritation; I used to have morbid, sterile, hateful fits of hunger, of desire. Now Im really satisfied, because I cant think of anything better. Its just as when one has been trying to spell out a book in the twilight and suddenly the lamp comes in. I had been putting out my eyes over the book of life and finding nothing to reward me for my pains; but now that I can read it properly I see its a delightful story. My dear girl, I cant tell you how life seems to stretch there before uswhat a long summer afternoon awaits us. Its the latter half of an Italian daywith a golden haze, and the shadows just lengthening, and that divine delicacy in the light, the air, the landscape, which I have loved all my life and which you love to-day. Upon my honour, I dont see why we shouldnt get on. Weve got what we liketo say nothing of having each other. Weve the faculty of admiration and several capital convictions. Were not stupid, were not mean, were not under bonds to any kind of ignorance or dreariness. Youre remarkably fresh, and Im remarkably well-seasoned. Weve my poor child to amuse us; well try and make up some little life for her. Its all soft and mellowit has the Italian colouring.
Are you speaking of my auntof my cousin? Isabel asked. How do you know what they think?
Youve not told me theyre pleased, and when I wrote to Mrs. Touchett the other day she never answered my note. If they had been delighted I should have had some sign of it, and the fact of my being poor and you rich is the most obvious explanation of their reserve. But of course when a poor man marries a rich girl he must be prepared for imputations. I dont mind them; I only care for one thingfor your not having the shadow of a doubt. I dont care what people of whom I ask nothing thinkIm not even capable perhaps of wanting to know. Ive never so concerned myself, God forgive me, and why should I begin to-day, when I have taken to myself a compensation for everything? I wont pretend Im sorry youre rich; Im delighted. I delight in everything thats yourswhether it be money or virtue. Moneys a horrid thing to follow, but a charming thing to meet. It seems to me, however, that Ive sufficiently proved the limits of my itch for it: I never in my life tried to earn a penny, and I ought to be less subject to suspicion than most of the people one sees grubbing and grabbing. I suppose its their business to suspectthat of your family; its proper on the whole they should. Theyll like me better some day; so will you, for that matter. Meanwhile my business is not to make myself bad blood, but simply to be thankful for life and love. It has made me better, loving you, he said on another occasion; it has made me wiser and easier andI wont pretend to denybrighter and nicer and even stronger. I used to want a great many things before and to be angry I didnt have them. Theoretically I was satisfied, as I once told you. I flattered myself I had limited my wants. But I was subject to irritation; I used to have morbid, sterile, hateful fits of hunger, of desire. Now Im really satisfied, because I cant think of anything better. Its just as when one has been trying to spell out a book in the twilight and suddenly the lamp comes in. I had been putting out my eyes over the book of life and finding nothing to reward me for my pains; but now that I can read it properly I see its a delightful story. My dear girl, I cant tell you how life seems to stretch there before uswhat a long summer afternoon awaits us. Its the latter half of an Italian daywith a golden haze, and the shadows just lengthening, and that divine delicacy in the light, the air, the landscape, which I have loved all my life and which you love to-day. Upon my honour, I dont see why we shouldnt get on. Weve got what we liketo say nothing of having each other. Weve the faculty of admiration and several capital convictions. Were not stupid, were not mean, were not under bonds to any kind of ignorance or dreariness. Youre remarkably fresh, and Im remarkably well-seasoned. Weve my poor child to amuse us; well try and make up some little life for her. Its all soft and mellowit has the Italian colouring.
They made a good many plans, but they left themselves also a good deal of latitude; it was a matter of course, however, that they should live for the present in Italy. It was in Italy that they had met, Italy had been a party to their first impressions of each other, and Italy should be a party to their happiness. Osmond had the attachment of old acquaintance and Isabel the stimulus of new, which seemed to assure her a future at a high level of consciousness of the beautiful. The desire for unlimited expansion had been succeeded in her soul by the sense that life was vacant without some private duty that might gather ones energies to a point. She had told Ralph she had seen life in a year or two and that she was already tired, not of the act of living, but of that of observing. What had become of all her ardours, her aspirations, her theories, her high estimate of her independence and her incipient conviction that she should never marry? These things had been absorbed in a more primitive needa need the answer to which brushed away numberless questions, yet gratified infinite desires. It simplified the situation at a stroke, it came down from above like the light of the stars, and it needed no explanation. There was explanation enough in the fact that he was her lover, her own, and that she should be able to be of use to him. She could surrender to him with a kind of humility, she could marry him with a kind of pride; she was not only taking, she was giving.
He brought Pansy with him two or three times to the CascinePansy who was very little taller than a year before, and not much older. That she would always be a child was the conviction expressed by her father, who held her by the hand when she was in her sixteenth year and told her to go and play while he sat down a little with the pretty lady. Pansy wore a short dress and a long coat; her hat always seemed too big for her. She found pleasure in walking off, with quick, short steps, to the end of the alley, and then in walking back with a smile that seemed an appeal for approbation. Isabel approved in abundance, and the abundance had the personal touch that the childs affectionate nature craved. She watched her indications as if for herself also much depended on themPansy already so represented part of the service she could render, part of the responsibility she could face. Her father took so the childish view of her that he had not yet explained to her the new relation in which he stood to the elegant Miss Archer. She doesnt know, he said to Isabel; she doesnt guess; she thinks it perfectly natural that you and I should come and walk here together simply as good friends. There seems to me something enchantingly innocent in that; its the way I like her to be. No, Im not a failure, as I used to think; Ive succeeded in two things. Im to marry the woman I adore, and Ive brought up my child, as I wished, in the old way.
He was very fond, in all things, of the old way; that had struck Isabel as one of his fine, quiet, sincere notes. It occurs to me that youll not know whether youve succeeded until youve told her, she said. You must see how she takes your news, She may be horrifiedshe may be jealous.
Im not afraid of that; shes too fond of you on her own account. I should like to leave her in the dark a little longerto see if it will come into her head that if were not engaged we ought to be.
Isabel was impressed by Osmonds artistic, the plastic view, as it somehow appeared, of Pansys innocenceher own appreciation of it being more anxiously moral. She was perhaps not the less pleased when he told her a few days later that he had communicated the fact to his daughter, who had made such a pretty little speechOh, then I shall have a beautiful sister! She was neither surprised nor alarmed; she had not cried, as he expected.
Perhaps she had guessed it, said Isabel.
Dont say that; I should be disgusted if I believed that. I thought it would be just a little shock; but the way she took it proves that her good manners are paramount. Thats also what I wished. You shall see for yourself; to-morrow she shall make you her congratulations in person.
The meeting, on the morrow, took place at the Countess Geminis, whither Pansy had been conducted by her father, who knew that Isabel was to come in the afternoon to return a visit made her by the Countess on learning that they were to become sisters-in-law. Calling at Casa Touchett the visitor had not found Isabel at home; but after our young woman had been ushered into the Countesss drawing-room Pansy arrived to say that her aunt would presently appear. Pansy was spending the day with that lady, who thought her of an age to begin to learn how to carry herself in company. It was Isabels view that the little girl might have given lessons in deportment to her relative, and nothing could have justified this conviction more than the manner in which Pansy acquitted herself while they waited together for the Countess. Her fathers decision, the year before, had finally been to send her back to the convent to receive the last graces, and Madame Catherine had evidently carried out her theory that Pansy was to be fitted for the great world.