第24章 CHAPTER VII.(1)

COMPARE a November day with a May day. They are not more unlike than a beautiful woman in company with a man she is indifferent to or averse, and the same woman with the man of her heart by her side.

At sight of Mr. Vane, all her coldness and _nonchalance_ gave way to a gentle complacency; and when she spoke to him, her voice, so clear and cutting in the late _assaut d'armes,_ sank of its own accord into the most tender, delicious tone imaginable.

Mr. Vane and she made love. He pleased her, and she desired to please him. My reader knows her wit, her _finesse,_ her fluency; but he cannot conceive how god-like was her way of making love. I can put a few of the corpses of her words upon paper, but where are the heavenly tones--now calm and convincing, now soft and melancholy, now thrilling with tenderness, now glowing with the fiery eloquence of passion? She told him that she knew the map of his face; that for some days past he had been subject to an influence adverse to her. She begged him, calmly, for his own sake, to distrust false friends, and judge her by his own heart, eyes, and judgment. He promised her he would.

"And I do trust you, in spite of them all," said he; "for your face is the shrine of sincerity and candor. I alone know you.

Then she prayed him to observe the heartlessness of his sex, and to say whether she had done ill to hide the riches of her heart from the cold and shallow, and to keep them all for one honest man, "who will be my friend, I hope," said she, "as well as my lover."

"Ah!" said Vane, "that is my ambition."

"We actresses," said she, "make good the old proverb, 'Many lovers, but few friends.' And oh, 'tis we who need a friend. Will you be mine?"

While he lived, he would.

In turn, he begged her to be generous, and tell him the way for him, Ernest Vane, inferior in wit and address to many of her admirers, to win her heart from them all.

This singular woman's answer is, I think, worth attention.

"Never act in my presence; never try to be eloquent, or clever; never force a sentiment, or turn a phrase. Remember, I am the goddess of tricks. Do not descend to competition with me and the Pomanders of the world. At all littlenesses, you will ever be awkward in my eyes. And I am a woman. I must have a superior to love--lie open to my eye. Light itself is not more beautiful than the upright man, whose bosom is open to the day. Oh yes! fear not you will be my superior, dear; for in me honesty has to struggle against the habits of my art and life. Be simple and sincere, and I shall love you, and bless the hour you shone upon my cold, artificial life. Ah, Ernest!" said she, fixing on his eye her own, the fire of which melted into tenderness as she spoke, "be my friend. Come between me and the temptations of an unprotected life--the recklessness of a vacant heart."

He threw himself at her feet. He called her an angel. He told her he was unworthy of her, but that he would try and deserve her. Then he hesitated, and trembling he said:

"I will be frank and loyal. Had I not better tell you everything? You will not hate me for a confession I make myself?"

"I shall like you better--oh! so much better!"

"Then I will own to you--"

"Oh, do not tell me you have ever loved before me! I could not bear to hear it!" cried this inconsistent personage.

The other weak creature needed no more.

"I see plainly I never loved but you," said he.

"Let me hear that only!" cried she; "I am jealous even of the past. Say you never loved but me. Never mind whether it is true. My child, you do not even yet know love. Ernest, shall I make you love--as none of your sex ever loved--with heart, and brain, and breath, and life, and soul?"

With these rapturous words, she poured the soul of love into his eyes; he forgot everything in the world but her; he dissolved in present happiness and vowed himself hers forever. And she, for her part, bade him but retain her esteem and no woman ever went further in love than she would.

She was a true epicure. She had learned that passion, vulgar in itself, is god-like when based upon esteem.

This tender scene was interrupted by the call-boy, who brought Mrs.

Woffington a note from the manager, informing her there would be no rehearsal. This left her at liberty, and she proceeded to take a somewhat abrupt leave of Mr. Vane. He was endeavoring to persuade her to let him be her companion until dinner-time (she was to be his quest), when Pomander entered the room.

Mrs. Woffington, however, was not to be persuaded, she excused herself on the score of a duty which she said she had to perform, and whispering as she passed Pomander, "Keep your own counsel," she went out rather precipitately.

Vane looked slightly disappointed.

Sir Charles, who had returned to see whether (as he fully expected) she had told Vane everything--and who, at that moment, perhaps, would not have been sorry had Mrs. Woffington's lover called him to serious account--finding it was not her intention to make mischief, and not choosing to publish his own defeat, dropped quietly into his old line, and determined to keep the lovers in sight, and play for revenge. He smiled and said: "My good sir, nobody can hope to monopolize Mrs.

Woffington. She has others to do justice to besides you."

To his surprise, Mr. Vane turned instantly round upon him, and, looking him haughtily in the face, said: "Sir Charles Pomander, the settled malignity with which you pursue that lady is unmanly and offensive to me, who love her. Let our acquaintance cease here, if you please, or let her be sacred from your venomous tongue."

Sir Charles bowed stiffly, and replied, that it was only due to himself to withdraw a protection so little appreciated.

The two friends were in the very act of separating forever, when who should run in but Pompey, the renegade. He darted up to Sir Charles, and said: "Massa Pomannah she in a coach, going to 10, Hercules Buildings.

I'm in a hurry, Massa Pomannah."