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HomeMy WebLinkAboutThe Brussels Post, 1887-9-9, Page 7SEPT. J, ItSb7 insawareaetsestseeen THE ,3RUSSELS POST PtJT ASUNDER I ea, Lady Castlemaino's Divorce 1 By BBERTHIA M. CLAY, wTaou oI• " line ted Life "A a , " The Hart's Aloup tonal;" " A Ntrnggic for n Iri"g,'" , etc., etc„ ate. opThey were both gr cued to part with , her ; they had begged hor to stay longer with them, but she had answered, laugh- ing! : ""lymust go some time; I cannot stay always. I cannot live with you, but I would if I could." "The only comfort is that we shall see you in town. We aro going early. Perhaps Lady Cresson will let you come to lie for a few weeks then." "That would be delightful!" said Isabel Hyde, with a smile that was 80 muoh Greek to Lady Oastlemaine. The carriage was at the door ; the white snow lay frozen on the ground; the robin -redbreasts flitted about on the bare boughs ; the sky was bine and cloudless, and the wind soughed around the grand old walls—a bright, beauti. ful winter's day. Lord Castlemaine was going to drive Mies Hyde to Redmoss station. Other guests had been driven by the coach- man, but she had looked in her host's face when the manner and time of her going was mentioned. "You will drive me ?" she said. "How many happy rides and drives I have had with you 1 and this will be the last 1" "The last for a time," he replied. "I hope we shall often ride together in London." "Do you really hope that ?" she nak- ed. "Assuredly I do," was the reply, in a tone of wonder. They all three stood on the drive ; the horses were impatiently pawing the ground. Lord Caatlemaine went to the car- riage to see if the rugs were all right, and the two beautiful women stood alone for a few minutes. Lady Castle. Maine had thrown a fur cloak over her shoulders, yet she shuddered as the Wind blew. "I am afraid," she said, "that you will have a dull journey; it is so very cold." "I am quite sure of that," said Isabel. *'I should be dull at leaving you if it were the brightest day in summer. I wonder what kind of season it will be; a brilliant one, I hope." "lt is sure to be," said Lady Castle- maine•" "Wo shall not bo rival roses thisyear," said Isabel. "You can never again be a rival; you are victorious." "We shall not be rivals ; we never were, in that sense of the word. Isabel; you will not forget one thing—that you have oallod me friend?" "I shall not forget it," she replied, with a peculiar smile. "The greatest pleasure to me of the coming season, is that I shall see you again," said Lady Castlemaine, as she kiseed the face of the girl that was to bring such unutterable woe to hor. And CO with a kiss, false as the kiss of Judas, they parted. That evening, over her dressing roam fire, Gertrude, with her husband, dis- cussed Isabel Yyde. "She seams so very much attached to us," said. Lady Castlemaine. "I think myself quite fortunate in having found such a friend. You have known her some time, Rudolph ; how is it yon did not fall in love with her ?" "I1" he replied, easily. "Ali, my Getter le, she is beautiful and clever, but she is not the style of girl I should have loved. You are my style, and no other. W e have been married nearly a year, and I am even more your lover than I was on my wedding -clay. You are and always must be the only wo- man in the world for me." As Gertrude kissed the lips that uttered such loving words, she thought herself the most fortunate as well as the happiest woman in the world. 1f the stars that shine above us and hear so many vows, could but tell how often they aro made, and how often they are broken! If the tall trees, that stand with their great branches erect and bare, could tell the vows made ander their shade—so fervent, so earn- est, ono would think they must be im-. mortal—and they last about a year 1 I-Iow the stars and the trees must laugh at such lovers' perjuries; how often this love is changed or dead before the leaves have fallen and the green comes round again ! While husband and wife so discussed her, Isabel Hyde was in her own room at Holme Seaton; whore she was staying with her aunt, Lady Cresson, and she was face to face with a failure, a corn - pieta and perfeot failure. Tho last thing she had seen at Neath Abbey was how .fiord Castlemaine, after he had arranged her rugs and had made her quite comfortable, hastened from the carriage to where his wife stood, wrapped in her fur cloak. How handsome be looked standing therein the winter sunshine, his dark faoe all aglow with love 1 Little heeding any lookers-on, he took Gertrude in his arms and kiesod her. "Good -by, my darling 1" he said. "I shall nob bo gone long." As they drove away, to the last his oyes lingered on her, and when they could see her no longer, he began to talk about her, and every word that ho uttered was in loving praiee of hor. Isabel Hyde had to beton and respond. Most people would have been quite daunted. She was going away) it was uncertain_, to (!at+ the least_ of it, when they would meet again, and he bad no thought of ber; hie heart and mind were full of his wife. Even at the railroad station, when ho had arranged her travelling rugs, seen that she had the most comfortable spat in a first-class oar, when he brought papers and periodicals to ammo her during the journey, when Lobed shaken hands with her and had bidden her good -by, she could tell that his thoughts were still with Gertrude; for he game baok to her, just as the train was start- ing—not, as She fondly imagined, to speak a few kind words to her, a last farewell, but to say : "Do you think Gertrude is looking as, well as she illi in town 2" Her patience gave way as she answer- ed nswered : "Yoe, I think she looks as well aa it ie possible for ber to look." But if sho intended her answer to be sarcastic, hor sarcasm was all lost, en- tirely lost on Lord Castlemaino, in whose eyes his wife always looked beautiful. Then the train went on its way, and she soon left Neath Abbey far behind. Isabel went with a sense of failure; and now, as she sat in her room alone, she was face to face with the knowledge u hadbrought all be that although she o t t power of her mind to bear on her pur- pose—that of making miechief between husband and wife, and of ultimately parting thein, she had ignominiously failed. She at for some time in silence ; then she clenched her white hands. "I will do it 1" she said to herself. "Where there is a strong will, there most be a way." The words died on her lips as Lady Cresson entered the room. "You are not looking as well as when you left, Isabel," she said, with a keen glance at the beautiful face, which had lost some of its brilliancy. "I am tired with the journey," she replied. "That is not all, my dear," said Lady Cresson. "I see signs of mental wear and tear. If you are not careful you will have wrinkles soon. I advised you not to go to Neath, but you would have your own way, Isabel." There was something kindly and wistful in Lady Cresson's manner. She was evidently under the impression that hor niece had been suffering. Isabel rose impatiently against the uttered sympathy. Neath has done me no harm," she said, coldly. "I have bad a very pleas- ant visit. If I do not look quite so well, it must be because we have had late hours, and little rest." "Did you leave Lord and Lady Castle- maine quite well?" asked Lady Cresson. "Yes, they were well and in good spirits," she answered. Lady Cresson looked curiously at her. "I seldom ask any questions about my neighbors," she said, "and I am not given to curiosity, but I should like to know how they get on together. Are they happy? Do they suit each other ?" "Yes, perfectly," she answered; "they seem as -happy as it is possible to be." "I am glad of that," said Lady Cres- son. "I had my doubts." "Had you ?" asked Isabel, eagerly. "Why 2" "Only from studying just a little the characters of both," said Lady Cresson. Tho are both proud and obstinate. People with thsame faults seldom agree well." "I have the same faults, aunt, yet I should have agreed with Lord Castle- maine." "You really like him, Isabel 2" said Lady Cresson. "So does Gertrude," responded Isabel. "She loves him with all her heart." She turned away as she uttered the words. Lady Cresson did not fool quite satis- fied, and long afterward she remember- ed the expression on the dark, beautiful face. All night long Lady Cresson was haunted, she could not tellwhy,by these words "Though the mills of God grind slowly, Yet they grind exceeding small Though with patience Ho etande waiting, With exactness grinds He all." CHAPTER XVIII. "x DECLINE." A bright April day, and all fashion- able Loudon is astir. Lovely spring smiles over the land, the buds areform- ing on the trees, the tender grass is springing, the sweet-smelling violets hide themselves, though they spread their fragrance through the air. There is something in the air keen and bracing, yet sweet. In the park one seems to in- hale the perfume of the springing buds. The world of fashion is all astir; the season is one of the gayest ever known. Fashionable London ie thronged, and and the tide of gayety flows on unceas• ingly. A great number of the best families in England are in town, but there is no circle more exclusive, no house more select than that of Lord and Lady Caatlemaine. They give the best balls, the beet dinners, the most recherche little suppers after the opera, the best and most amusing "at homes" in town. Neath House was considered that season the best in the metropolis. Per. haps its greatest attraction lay in the marvelous beauty of the two ladies— Lady Castlemaine, the hostess, and hex friendIsabel Hyde, who was staying with her. The two loveliest women in London, and it seemed strange that they should be under one root, but Lady Crosson had another niece to bring out this season) and Isabel Hyde would have been compelled to remain in the country but for the earnest and peen - in invitation of Lady Castlemaine. Both rivals wore even more lovely than last year. Happy love had given more brit btnesdto the fair face of Lady Castlemaino ; the face of Teabel Hyde took deeper beauty from ber passionate love, There comes a time in the lives of all men and women when they cease to wear a mask, even to themselves --when they look at their own orimes, sins and temptations straight in the faoe, and oall them by their right names, That time had come to Isabel Hyde, She made no more moral pretenses even to herself. She looked her sin boldly in the face, and went on with it. Lord Castlemaine hadmarriodanothoi instead of marrying her, and she in. tended to have her revenge on him and ton that other. " Copstaut dropping wears away a stone," and she, by her constant intri. gues, her innuendoes, had impaired in some measure the happy love that had existed between husband and wife. She was the wisest of all traitors, for she never said one word that, if repeated could compromise her, could be proved untrue, or which, if brought home tc her, oould do her the least harm. She could plant the sharpest dagger in the heart of Lord Castlemaine, yet. if be were asked afterward, he could not tell even what words she had used She could make Lady Castlemaine wince again and again, yet hor word* never left behind her the faintest im• pression of unkindness. She was beginning to make progress she could see her way more clearly, and she worked with the patient assiduit3 of a demon tempting a human soul. Already she had made Gertrud< believe that her husband looked dowr on her family, that he considered i 1* infinitelyu ri l hon awn superior o, that although g1 he never expressed it in words, still ir his own heart and mind, this want o1 antiquity in her familywas the on* thing that lived in his mind against her She had most firmly impressed that ex Lady Castlemaine, yet, if any one had asked that lady how those ideas had come to her, why she believed them she could not have told, so gently, sc imperceptibly had she been led up tc them. Isabel had impressed on Lord Castle. mains that his wife rebelled against hit pride, and did all in her power to defeat it to show him that she cared little fo* the "divine right," whether it was it the case of king or peer. She hal managed to draw a clearly defined lin* between them, and neither could hay, told how it was done. She had managed also, without ix the Ieast degree alarming him, to im• press upon Lord Castlemaine's mins the fact of her own great devotion to him, of her care for his interests, of th* high value she placed on his friendship There was nothing of love, nothing a flirtation, but Lord Castlemaine 11< honestly believe that no man in the world had a more true or more devoted friend than he had found in Isabe Hyde. Her Battery was of that subth kind, so sweet, so intoxicating, yet a* delicate it could hardly be perceived. She smiled to herself, as she said : "I have the ear of the house, now can manage both." She had succeeded so far on her evi mission, that husband and wife boti indulged in small quarrels before her, 1f they had been alone, those quarrel: would have been over at once, and t kiss would have followed them. As slit was present, and her interest seemed e* equally divided, neither cared to give in Tnen, when she was alone with either a few subtle but perfectly safe word, would anger one still more greats' against the other. One morning, during luncheon, bus hand and wife had some few words they did not pass the bounds of ggood breeding, but they were vexed and irri meal against each other. Isabel was secretly careful to increase that veas- lion. When night came on, and Lord Castle- maine, feeling annoyed with himself, went to make peace with his wife, he found her for the first time, with a sul- len frown on her beautiful face. "Gertrude," ho said, "I am sorry I spoke so sharply. Kiss me and let us be friends." Bnt the beautiful lips were not, as usual, raised to his; she did not turn to him, or smile or answer him by kiss or loving words; she sat quite still without moving, and small as this incident was, it was the beginning of the end. "Gertrude, my darling," he said, "do you hear me ? I want to kiss you and be friends." "It is no use," she replied : "If I am friends with you as you call it, one hour, we shall quarrel the next." "But," he answered, "if we never make friends, we shall always be quer- roling,t.•' and we should neither of us like quer- lin "I ani not so sure," said Lady Castle- maine,- "It seems to me that you enjoy quarreling; you loved me so much once upon a time that you could not have one word with me." "I love you just as muoh now, but perhaps a little bit more sensihy," he replied. "Then I prefer the foolish love," re. torted Lady Castlemaine.' "I do not," sold her husband. "The fact ie," continued Lady Castle- maine, "you ought to have married some one with 'all the blood of the Howards' in her veins. My father— God bless him 1—was but a oily knight. The truth is, I was not good enough for you." "Oh, Gertrude," he Dried, "how cruel you are! how can you say such things to me? -•I, who worship you so." "You worship ancient ancestry a groat deal more," she geld. '"I do not, I could not. What makes you say auoh unkind things to me, Gertrude ?" Sho could not tell him, aha hardly knew horself, She was not even eon- ecious that it was the slowly distilled and carefully uttered words of Isable flyae that bad impressed this belief upon her. "Gertrude," he said, slowly, '1 see a change in you." "IE your eyes wore a little clearer and a little keener, you would see a far greater change in yourself," she retorted. "My dear, you have no need to be Bar. castle with nee," he said, gravely. "Duce more, will you tries . tee and make friends." "Never while you speak to me in that 'Lord of Burleigh' fashion," she replied. "You should have married the daughter of a duchess." "My dear," he said, quietly, "I mar. rigid the only woman in the world whom I loved, and that was yourself." "Yon remind me of an anecdote Iread the other day of a nobleman," she con- tinued. "I forgot even the name; but ho was proud even to implacability, and, one day, in order to draw bis attention, bis wife placed her hand on his shoul- der. "'Madam,' he said, haughtily, 'my first wife was a peeress, and elle never took snoh a liberty 00 that.' You are just like that man, Rudolph, whose name I forget." "I do not think I am in the least de- gree like him. How can you say such cruel things to me ?" "They are not cruel; they are only true," retorted Lady Castlemaine. "Why, Gertrude," cries her husband, "I have never seen you a""u"0ross before. I can hardly believe that it is you." "I Lave no great reason to rejoice that I am myself," she said. "If you are disappointed in me, so am I in you." "But, Gertrude, darling, I am not die• appointed in you," he said ; and there was something of 'grieved annoyance in his face. "Who could say so? How could you dream of such a thing? Have I not always loved you better than any one or anything?" "I know you have said so," she an- swered, with a darkling frown on her beautiful face; "but I can see how it is. You are infatuated over the claims of high descent, and you look down upon me because I am the daughter of a city knight. I can me it in a thousand different ways." "You cannot see it in one," ho replied. "You have grieved and distressed me greatly, Gertrude." "You have done the same to me," she said. He was silent for a few minutes, thinking to himself that he had never seen his young wife so angry. Then he went up to her frankly, and held out his band to her. "If it really be my fault," he said, "I am very sorry. Kiss and be friends, Gertrude." "I decline," she answered, proudly ; and rising with stately grace, beautiful Lady Castlemaine quitted the room. Sho had gratified her pride, but she was not quite easy in her mind. After all, why had she quarreled with her bus - band, and why had she refused to be friends ? She did not know the answer to the question, or she would have said that Isabel Hyde had slowly poisoned her mind and distorted her ideas. CHAPTER XIX. THE THIN END OF THE WEDGE. They are grand old words that say, "Let not the sun go down upon your wrath," and this would be a very differ- ent place if people acted more upon them. Nothingcan be more fatal to love and happiness than letting a quarrel pass over and die of itself. Words of peace and pardon should always be spoken. The next time Lady Castlemaine met her husband, which was in the break- fast -room, he gave her the usual greet- ing. She answered him coldly: Good -morning." Lord Castlemaine felt annoyed. "She will speak first herself next time," he said. "I do not deserve it." And it is of such trifles as these that half the quarrels in the world are made. The nowt time they met, which was in their own drawing -room, where several visitors were, they did not speak at all, and babel Hyde saw it with un speakable joy. She did not know exactly what had gone wrong, but she saw that between husband and wife some shadow had fallen, some difficulty had arisen. She might fan it, she might increase it. When Lady Caatlemaine and she took their usual cup of tea in the boudoir, Isabel broached the subjoot carefully. "Is Lord Castlemaine well 2" she ask- ed. "Yes, I believe so," was the reply. "Then ho is not in his usual good humor, I thought this afternoon that he looked unusually dull or gloomy, or out of spirits." "He was merely cross," said Lady Castlemaine, half scornfully. The worst thing that any young wife can do is to make a confidant of any one against her husband. Tho faults of a husband should be sacred, should not be spoken of, A quarrel, however small, should be kept a secret between the two, who are so thoroughly one. There should be perfect loyalty, perfect honor, and the most perfect keeping of secrets. Surely Lady Castlemaine took one of the most fatal stops in her life when she confided in Isabel Hyde against her husband. Hers was the fault—childish angor, born of pique and devoid of Mabee Isabel fanned it into a flame. "I have always understood," she said, slowly, "that sooner 0r later, after mar. riago,thero is a stru ggle for authority between husband and wife." "And which, as a rule, wins ?" asked Lady Castlemaine. "You coo, Isabel, I was very young when I married, and it was only my first season. I had not 7 had muoh experience. Wbioh wins, AS a rule 3" "Tbe wives, my dear, if they know how to manage it, replied Miss Hyde, her beautiful face for once aseuming the wisdom of a matron of fifty. The thing is, Gertrude, never to give in, to holism from the drat ; if there is a sli ht misunderstanding, to wait until the husband makoe the that advance. The woman who goes pleading and crying to her husband after a quarrel is lost. Take my word for it." "Is she 2" said Lady Castlemaine, dreamily. "But then, Isabel, that does not seem (Vfto right. After all, the husband is head, you know." "Nonsense 1 That is an old exploded superstition, Why should it be so ? If you adopt those principles you will have a gloomy life of it. Why should men assume command and women promise obedience, when, as every one knows, in these days, there is porfeot equality between the sexes ? Your motto—in- deed the motto of every wife—should be, 'gold your own."" Lady Castlemaine looked thoughtful. "But does not that make a good deal of misery and quarreling ?" she asked. "There will always be quarreling, but much less this way. If a husband sees that his wife knows, underatands, and appreciates the value of her own posi- tion, knows how to take hor stand, he treats her with a certain kind of re- spect. If he see she is frightened at him,. that she is ready to yield him a slavish obedience, be once, he despises her and tires of ber." But that is not like marriage, as I thought it was," saidLady Castlemaine. "There is nothing in all this about the union of souls." "All nonsense I" cried Isabel, scorn- fully. "One would think you had lived in Arcadia. Talk of union of money, union of estate, of position, of anything you will; but not of union of souls. The better plan is for each one to steer his own course ; but I know what I should do." "What ?" asked Lady Castlemaine, slowly. I should hold my own," replied Isabel. "There aro two ways of set- tling even this little quarrel of yours, which is not worth mentioning." A faint ebadow fell over the beautiful face of the young wife. "Perhaps," said Isabel Hyde, "you would rather that I did not say what I think on the subject; if eo, I can be silent." "No, I should like to know what you think," saidLady Castlemaine ; but the shadow deepened. "I should wait until he made the first advance. I should not let him see that I was in a great hurry to be friends." "I shall not," said Lady Castlemaine. Yet in her heart she felt a yearning for hie presence, a longing for him. She would have liked hie arm round her waist ; she would have liked his warm, loving caress. He had been so long a part of her life that it seemed strange to exist for even a few hours estranged from him. She looked up with a sudden light in her blue eyes. "Isabel," she said, "Rudolph likes tea here in my boudoir. Shall I send for him?" Then Isabel's heart sank within her. After her long lesson, after her earnest endeavour to instill quite the opposite ideas into box mind, the sole result Was; "Shonld she ask hor husband up to tea." "My dear Gertrude," she said, "why consult me. I have given you my thoughts in the matter. "Ah, then, you would not ask him," said Lady Caatlemaine. "Yon must look at it fairly," said Isabel. "If you invite him, and he re. fuses, you will have drawn your own humiliation on yourself." '"I do not like humiliation," said Lady Castlemaine. Few people do, but you will have deserved it if you do this." The consequence was that these words wont deeply into Lady Castle. maine's heart, and she determined not to invite her husband—to let him see that she could be cold and haughty as well as himself. She could do without him if he could do without her, and to herself she uttered all the other silly sayings, and harbored the senseless fancies by which women seek to strengthen themselves in wrong -doing. Lord Castlemaine did not like thio temporary separation from his wife, but be consoled himself by thinking it would be all right, that she would be sure to end for him as usual, to join her at tea. He waited with a certain sense of im• patience for the summons which never Cam0. 'It does not matter," he said to him- self, haughtily. "Nothing could matter loss. If she does not want me, I can do equally well without her, as I shall let her see," There was bitterness in each heart, and a determination not to make thofixst advance. Husband and wife met at dinner. They were compelled to exchange the ordinary civilities and courtosies of the dinner table ; but it was done with cold looks and averted eyes, which Isabel Hrejydeoiceald.one noticed, and at which she There was a dinner -party at Heath House that night, to be followed by a dauco, and not one of the visitors noted the estrangement between the boauti- fol young wife and her husband. On that evening Isabel Hyde looked perfectly and radiantly beautiful. Her dress was of pale rose -pink and the richest blank lace. She worn some fine pearls, the gift of Lady Cresson. As usual sho shared the honors with Lady Castlemaine, No one know which to admire the most, the lovely hostess, or hor brilli• leo nl* CONTINUED.) oie Y' f— w it 0 av 1 CDO ryry1 cD P P ni1t cf) CD cn ct- 5. C. ~`' 0-1 f—^ ca ti(gy�pp•, S ct- t< f"+ fyq F�-I • O `:3 CD t f—czi 1-1 e C`5 y 0-4 0 1-4 6' O C• a' (.1) 0-1 !