Villette (Barnes & Noble Classics Series) Read online

  ‘She is my comfort!’ he could not help saying to Mrs. Bretton. That lady had her own ‘comfort’ and nonpareil on a much larger scale, and for the moment, absent: so she sympathized with his foible.

  This second ‘comfort’ came on the stage in the course of the evening. I knew this day had been fixed for his return, and was aware that Mrs. Bretton had been expecting him through all its hours. We were seated round the fire, after tea, when Graham joined our circle: I should rather say, broke it up—for, of course, his arrival made a bustle; and then, as Mr. Graham was fasting, there was refreshment to be provided. He and Mr. Home met as old acquaintance; of the little girl he took no notice for a time.

  His meal over, and numerous questions from his mother answered, he turned from the table to the hearth. Opposite where he had placed himself was seated Mr. Home, and at his elbow, the child. When I say child I use an inappropriate and undescriptive term—a term suggesting any picture rather than that of the demure little person in a mourning frock and white chemisette, that might just have fitted a good-sized doll—perched now on a high chair beside a stand, whereon was her toy work-box of white varnished wood, and holding in her hands a shred of a handkerchief, which she was professing to hem, and at which she bored perseveringly with a needle, that in her fingers seemed almost a skewer, pricking herself ever and anon, marking the cambric with a track of minute red dots; occasionally starting when the perverse weapon—swerving from her control—inflicted a deeper stab than usual; but still silent, diligent, absorbed, womanly.

  Graham was at that time a handsome, faithless-looking youth of sixteen. I say faithless-looking, not because he was really of a very perfidious disposition, but because the epithet strikes me as proper to describe the fair, Celtic (not Saxon) character of his good looks; his waved light auburn hair, his supple symmetry, his smile frequent, and destitute neither of fascination nor of subtlety, (in no bad sense). A spoiled, whimsical boy he was in those days.

  ‘Mother,’ he said, after eyeing the little figure before him in silence for some time, and when the temporary absence of Mr. Home from the room relieved him from the half-laughing bashfulness, which was all he knew of timidity—‘Mother, I see a young lady in the present society to whom I have not been introduced.’

  ‘Mr. Home’s little girl, I suppose you mean,’ said his mother.

  ‘Indeed, ma’am,‘ replied her son, ‘I consider your expression of the least ceremonious: Miss Home I should certainly have said, in venturing to speak of the gentlewoman to whom I allude’.

  ‘Now, Graham, I will not have that child teazed. Don’t flatter yourself that I shall suffer you to make her your butt.’

  ‘Miss Home,’ pursued Graham, undeterred by his mother’s remonstrance, ‘might I have the honour to introduce myself, since no one else seems willing to render you and me that service? Your slave, John Graham Bretton.’

  She looked at him; he rose and bowed quite gravely. She deliberately put down thimble, scissors, work; descended with precaution from her perch, and curtsying with unspeakable seriousness, said, ‘How do you do?’

  ‘I have the honour to be in fair health, only in some measure fatigued with a hurried journey. I hope, ma’am, I see you well.’

  ‘Tor-rer-ably well,’ was the ambitious reply of the little woman; and she now essayed to regain her former elevation, but finding this could not be done without some climbing and straining—a sacrifice of decorum not to be thought of—and being utterly disdainful of aid in the presence of a strange young gentleman, she relinquished the high chair for a low stool: towards that low stool Graham drew in his chair.

  ‘I hope, ma’am, the present residence, my mother’s house, appears to you a convenient place of abode?’

  ‘Not par-tic-er-er-ly: I want to go home.’

  ‘A natural and laudable desire, ma’am; but one which, notwithstanding, I shall do my best to oppose. I reckon on being able to get out of you a little of that precious commodity called amusement, which mama and Mistress Snowe there fail to yield me.’

  ‘I shall have to go with papa soon: I shall not stay long at your mother’s.’

  ‘Yes, yes; you will stay with me I am sure. I have a pony on which you shall ride, and no end of books with pictures to show you.’

  ‘Are you going to live here now?’

  ‘I am. Does that please you? Do you like me?’

  ‘No.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘I think you queer.’

  ‘My face, ma’am?’

  ‘Your face and all about you. You have long red hair.’

  ‘Auburn hair, if you please: mama calls it auburn, or golden, and so do all her friends. But even with my “long red hair,” ’ (and he waved his mane with a sort of triumph—tawny he himself well knew that it was, and he was proud of the leonine hue) ‘I cannot possibly be queerer than is your ladyship.’

  ‘You call me queer?’

  ‘Certainly.’

  (After a pause) ‘I think I shall go to bed.’

  ‘A little thing like you ought to have been in bed many hours since; but you probably sat up in the expectation of seeing me?’

  ‘No, indeed.’

  ‘You certainly wished to enjoy the pleasure of my society. You knew I was coming home, and would wait to have a look at me.’

  ‘I sat up for papa, and not for you.’

  ‘Very good, Miss Home. I am going to be a favourite: preferred before papa soon, I dare say.’

  She wished Mrs. Bretton and myself good night; she seemed hesitating whether Graham’s deserts entitled him to the same attention, when he caught her up with one hand, and with that one hand held her poised aloft above his head. She saw herself thus lifted up on high, in the glass over the fireplace. The suddenness, the freedom, the disrespect of the action were too much.

  ‘For shame, Mr. Graham!’ was her indignant cry, ‘put me down!’—and when again on her feet, ‘I wonder what you would think of me if I were to treat you in that way, lifting you with my hand’ (raising that mighty member) ‘as Warren lifts the little cat?’

  So saying, she departed.

  CHAPTER 3

  The Playmates

  Mr. Home stayed two days. During his visit he could not be prevailed on to go out: he sat all day long by the fireside, sometimes silent, sometimes receiving and answering Mrs. Bretton’s chat, which was just of the proper sort for a man in his morbid mood—not over-sympathetic, yet not too uncongenial, sensible; and even with a touch of the motherly—she was sufficiently his senior to be permitted this touch.

  As to Paulina, the child was at once happy and mute, busy and watchful. Her father frequently lifted her to his knee; she would sit there till she felt or fancied he grew restless; then it was—

  ‘Papa, put me down; I shall tire you with my weight.’

  And the mighty burden slid to the rug, and establishing itself on carpet or stool just at ‘papa’s’ feet, the white work-box and the scarlet-speckled handkerchief came into play. This handkerchief it seems was intended as a keepsake for ‘papa,’ and must be finished before his departure; consequently the demand on the sempstress’s industry (she accomplished about a score of stitches in half an hour) was stringent.

  The evening, by restoring Graham to the maternal roof (his days were passed at school), brought us an accession of animation—a quality not diminished by the nature of the scenes pretty sure to be enacted between him and Miss Paulina.

  A distant and haughty demeanour had been the result of the indignity put upon her the first evening of his arrival: her usual answer, when he addressed her, was—

  ‘I can’t attend to you; I have other things to think about.’ Being implored to state what things: ‘Business.’

  Graham would endeavour to seduce her attention by opening his desk and displaying its multifarious contents: seals, bright sticks of wax, pen-knives, with a miscellany of engravings-some of them gaily coloured—which he had amassed from time to time. Nor was this powerful temptation wholly u
navailing: her eyes, furtively raised from her work, cast many a peep towards the writing-table, rich in scattered pictures. An etching of a child playing with a Blenheim spaniel happened to flutter to the floor.

  ‘Pretty little dog!’ said she, delighted.

  Graham prudently took no notice. Ere long, stealing from her corner, she approached to examine the treasure more closely. The dog’s great eyes and long ears, and the child’s hat and feathers, were irresistible.

  ‘Nice picture!’ was her favourable criticism.

  ‘Well—you may have it,’ said Graham.

  She seemed to hesitate. The wish to possess was strong, but to accept would be a compromise of dignity. No. She put it down and turned away.

  ‘You won’t have it then, Polly?’

  ‘I would rather not, thank you.’

  ‘Shall I tell you what I will do with the picture if you refuse it?’ She half turned to listen.

  ‘Cut it into strips for lighting the taper.’

  ‘No!’

  ‘But I shall.’

  ‘Please—don’t.’

  Graham waxed inexorable on hearing the pleading tone; he took the scissors from his mother’s work-casket.

  ‘Here goes!’ said he, making a menacing flourish. ‘Right through Fido’s head, and splitting little Harry’s nose.’

  ‘No! No! NO!’

  ‘Then come to me. Come quickly, or it is done.’

  She hesitated, lingered, but complied.

  ‘Now, will you have it?’ he asked, as she stood before him.

  ‘Please.’

  ‘But I shall want payment.’

  ‘How much?’

  ‘A kiss.’

  ‘Give the picture first into my hand.’

  Polly, as she said this, looked rather faithless in her turn. Graham gave it. She absconded a debtor, darted to her father, and took refuge on his knee. Graham rose in mimic wrath and followed. She buried her face in Mr. Home’s waistcoat.

  ‘Papa—papa—send him away!’

  ‘I’ll not be sent away,’ said Graham.

  With face still averted, she held out her hand to keep him off.

  ‘Then, I shall kiss the hand,’ said he; but that moment it became a miniature fist, and dealt him payment in a small coin that was not kisses.

  Graham—not failing in his way to be as wily as his little playmate—retreated apparently quite discomfited; he flung himself on a sofa, and resting his head against the cushion, lay like one in pain. Polly, finding him silent, presently peeped at him. His eyes and face were covered with his hands. She turned on her father’s knee, and gazed at her foe anxiously and long. Graham groaned.

  ‘Papa, what is the matter?’ she whispered.

  ‘You had better ask him, Polly.’

  ‘Is he hurt?’ (groan second).

  ‘He makes a noise as if he were,’ said Mr. Home.

  ‘Mother,’ suggested Graham, feebly, ‘I think you had better send for the doctor. Oh my eye!’ (renewed silence broken only by sighs from Graham.)

  ‘If I were to become blind—?’ suggested this last.

  His chastiser could not bear the suggestion. She was beside him directly.

  ‘Let me see your eye: I did not mean to touch it, only your mouth; and I did not think I hit so very hard.’

  Silence answered her. Her features worked,—‘I am sorry; I am sorry!’

  Then succeeded emotion, faltering, weeping.

  ‘Have done trying that child, Graham,’ said Mrs. Bretton.

  ‘It is all nonsense, my pet,’ cried Mr. Home.

  And Graham once more snatched her aloft, and she again punished him; and while she pulled his lion’s locks, termed him—

  ‘The naughtiest, rudest, worst, untruest person that ever was.’

  On the morning of Mr. Home’s departure, he and his daughter had some conversation in a window-recess by themselves; I heard part of it.

  ‘Couldn’t I pack my box and go with you, papa?’ she whispered earnestly.

  He shook his head.

  ‘Should I be a trouble to you?’

  ‘Yes, Polly.’

  ‘Because I am little?’

  ‘Because you are little and tender. It is only great, strong people that should travel. But don’t look sad, my little girl; it breaks my heart. Papa will soon come back to his Polly.’

  ‘Indeed, indeed, I am not sad, scarcely at all.’

  ‘Polly would be sorry to give papa pain; would she not?’

  ‘Sorrier than sorry.’

  Then Polly must be cheerful: not cry at parting; not fret afterwards. She must look forward to meeting again, and try to be happy meanwhile. Can she do this?’

  ‘She will try.’

  ‘I see she will. Farewell, then. It is time to go.’

  ‘Now?—just now?’

  ‘Just now.’

  She held up quivering lips. Her father sobbed, but she, I remarked, did not. Having put her down, he shook hands with the rest present, and departed.

  When the street-door closed, she dropped on her knees at a chair with a cry—‘Papa!’

  It was low and long; a sort of ‘Why hast thou forsaken me?’ During an ensuing space of some minutes, I perceived she endured agony. She went through, in that brief interval of her infant life, emotions such as some never feel; it was in her constitution: she would have more of such instants if she lived. Nobody spoke. Mrs. Bretton, being a mother, shed a tear or two. Graham, who was writing, lifted up his eyes and gazed at her. I, Lucy Snowe, was calm.

  The little creature, thus left unharassed, did for herself what none other could do—contended with an intolerable feeling; and, ere long, in some degree, repressed it. That day she would accept solace from none; nor the next day: she grew more passive afterwards.

  On the third evening, as she sat on the floor, worn and quiet, Graham, coming in, took her up gently, without a word. She did not resist: she rather nestled in his arms, as if weary. When he sat down, she laid her head against him; in a few minutes she slept; he carried her up-stairs to bed. I was not surprised that, the next morning, the first thing she demanded was ‘Where is Mr. Graham?’

  It happened that Graham was not coming to the breakfast-table; he had some exercises to write for that morning’s class, and had requested his mother to send a cup of tea into the study. Polly volunteered to carry it: she must be busy about something, look after somebody. The cup was entrusted to her: for, if restless, she was also careful. As the study was opposite the breakfast-room, the doors facing across the passage, my eye followed her.

  ‘What are you doing?’ she asked, pausing on the threshold.

  ‘Writing,’ said Graham.

  ‘Why don’t you come to take breakfast with your mama?’

  ‘Too busy.’

  ‘Do you want any breakfast?’

  ‘Of course.’

  ‘There then.’

  And she deposited the cup on the carpet, like a jailer putting a prisoner’s pitcher of water through his cell-door, and retreated. Presently she returned.

  ‘What will you have besides tea—what to eat?’

  ‘Anything good. Bring me something particularly nice; that’s a kind little woman.’

  She came back to Mrs. Bretton.

  ‘Please, ma’am, send your boy something good.’

  ‘You shall choose for him, Polly; what shall my boy have?’

  She selected a portion of whatever was best on the table, and ere long, came back with a whispered request for some marmalade, which was not there. Having got it, however (for Mrs. Bretton refused the pair nothing), Graham was shortly after heard lauding her to the skies; promising that, when he had a house of his own, she should be his housekeeper, and perhaps—if she showed any culinary genius—his cook; and, as she did not return, and I went to look after her, I found Graham and her breakfasting tête-à-tête—she standing at his elbow, and sharing his fare: excepting the marmalade, which she delicately refused to touch; lest, I suppose, it should appear that
she had procured it as much on her own account as his. She constantly evinced these nice perceptions and delicate instincts.

  The league of acquaintanceship thus struck up was not hastily dissolved; on the contrary, it appeared that time and circumstances served rather to cement than loosen it. Ill-assimilated as the two were in age, sex, pursuits, &c., they somehow found a great deal to say to each other. As to Paulina, I observed that her little character never properly came out, except with young Bretton. As she got settled, and accustomed to the house, she proved tractable enough with Mrs. Bretton; but she would sit on a stool at that lady’s feet all day long, learning her task, or sewing, or drawing figures with a pencil on a slate, and never kindling once to originality, or showing a single gleam of the peculiarities of her nature. I ceased to watch her under such circumstances: she was not interesting. But the moment Graham’s knock sounded of an evening, a change occurred; she was instantly at the head of the staircase. Usually her welcome was a reprimand or a threat.

  ‘You have not wiped your shoes properly on the mat. I shall tell your mama.’

  ‘Little busybody! Are you there?’

  ‘Yes—and you can’t reach me: I am higher up than you’ (peeping between the rails of the bannister; she could not look over them).

  ‘Polly!’

  ‘My dear boy!’ (such was one of her terms for him, adopted in imitation of his mother.)

  ‘I am fit to faint with fatigue,’ declared Graham, leaning against the passage-wall in seeming exhaustion. ‘Dr. Digby’ (the head-master) ‘has quite knocked me up with over-work. Just come down and help me to carry up my book.’

  ‘Ah! You’re cunning!’

  ‘Not at all, Polly—it is positive fact. I’m as weak as a rush. Come down.’

  ‘Your eyes are quiet like the cat’s, but you’ll spring.’

  ‘Spring? Nothing of the kind: it isn’t in me. Come down.’

  ‘Perhaps I may—if you’ll promise not to touch—not to snatch me up, and not to whirl me round.’

  ‘I? I couldn’t do it!’ (sinking into a chair.)