had allowed herself easily to be arrested. It seemed to her that only now she fully measured thegreat undertaking of matrimony. Marriage meant that in such a case as this, when one had tochoose, one chose as a matter of course for one's husband. "I'm afraid--yes, I'm afraid," she said toherself more than once, stopping short in her walk. But what she was afraid of was not herhusband--his displeasure, his hatred, his revenge; it was not even her own later judgement of herconduct a consideration which had often held her in check; it was simply the violence there wouldbe in going when Osmond wished her to remain. A gulf of difference had opened between them,but nevertheless it was his desire that she should stay, it was a horror to him that she should go.She knew the nervous fineness with which he could feel an objection. What he thought of her sheknew, what he was capable of saying to her she had felt; yet they were married, for all that, and第 357 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网marriage meant that a woman should cleave to the man with whom, uttering tremendous vows, shehad stood at the altar. She sank down on her sofa at last and buried her head in a pile of cushions.When she raised her head again the Countess Gemini hovered before her. She had come in allunperceived; she had a strange smile on her thin lips and her whole face had grown in an hour ashining intimation. She lived assuredly, it might be said, at the window of her spirit, but now shewas leaning far out. "I knocked," she began, "but you didn't answer me. So I ventured in. I've beenlooking at you for the past five minutes. You're very unhappy.""Yes; but I don't think you can comfort me.""Will you give me leave to try?" And the Countess sat down on the sofa beside her. She continuedto smile, and there was something communicative and exultant in her expression. She appeared tohave a deal to say, and it occurred to Isabel for the first time that her sister-in-law might saysomething really human. She made play with her glittering eyes, in which there was an unpleasantfascination. "After all," she soon resumed, "I must tell you, to begin with, that I don't understandyour state of mind. You seem to have so many scruples, so many reasons, so many ties. When Idiscovered, ten years ago, that my husband's dearest wish was to make me miserable--of late hehas simply let me alone --ah, it was a wonderful simplification! My poor Isabel, you're not simpleenough.""No, I'm not simple enough," said Isabel."There's something I want you to know," the Countess declared-- "because I think you ought toknow it. Perhaps you do; perhaps you've guessed it. But if you have, all I can say is that Iunderstand still less why you shouldn't do as you like.""What do you wish me to know?" Isabel felt a foreboding that made her heart beat faster. TheCountess was about to justify herself, and this alone was portentous.But she was nevertheless disposed to play a little with her subject. "In your place I should haveguessed it ages ago. Have you never really suspected?""I've guessed nothing. What should I have suspected? I don't know what you mean.""That's because you've such a beastly pure mind. I never saw a woman with such a pure mind!"cried the Countess.Isabel slowly got up. "You're going to tell me something horrible.""You can call it by whatever name you will!" And the Countess rose also, while her gatheredperversity grew vivid and dreadful. She stood a moment in a sort of glare of intention and, asseemed to Isabel even then, of ugliness; after which she said: "My first sister-in-law had nochildren."Isabel stared back at her; the announcement was an anticlimax. "Your first sister-in-law?""I suppose you know at least, if one may mention it, that Osmond has been married before! I'venever spoken to you of his wife; I thought it mightn't be decent or respectful. But others, lessparticular, must have done so. The poor little woman lived hardly three years and died childless. Itwasn't till after her death that Pansy arrived."第 358 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网Isabel's brow had contracted to a frown; her lips were parted in pale, vague wonder. She was tryingto follow; there seemed so much more to follow than she could see. "Pansy's not my husband'schild then?""Your husband's--in perfection! But no one else's husband's. Some one else's wife's. Ah, my goodIsabel," cried the Countess, "with you one must dot one's i's!""I don't understand. Whose wife's?" Isabel asked."The wife of a horrid little Swiss who died--how long?--a dozen, more than fifteen, years ago. Henever recognised Miss Pansy, nor, knowing what he was about, would have anything to say to her;and there was no reason why he should. Osmond did, and that was better; though he had to fit onafterwards the whole rigmarole of his own wife's having died in childbirth, and of his having, ingrief and horror, banished the little girl from his sight for as long as possible before taking herhome from nurse. His wife had really died, you know, of quite another matter and in quite anotherplace: in the Piedmontese mountains, where they had gone, one August, because her healthappeared to require the air, but where she was suddenly taken worse-- fatally ill. The story passed,sufficiently; it was covered by the appearances so long as nobody heeded, as nobody cared to lookinto it. But of course I knew--without researches," the Countess lucidly proceeded; "as also, you'llunderstand, without a word said between us--I mean between Osmond and me. Don't you see himlooking at me, in silence, that way, to settle it?--that is to settle ME if I should say anything. I saidnothing, right or left--never a word to a creature, if you can believe that of me: on my honour, mydear, I speak of the thing to you now, after all this time, as I've never, never spoken. It was to beenough for me, from the first, that the child was my niece--from the moment she was my brother'sdaughter. As for her veritable mother--!" But with this Pansy's wonderful aunt dropped--as,involuntarily, from the impression of her sister-in-law's face, out of which more eyes might haveseemed to look at her than she had ever had to meet.She had spoken no name, yet Isabel could but check, on her own lips, an echo of the unspoken.She sank to her seat again, hanging her head. "Why have you told me this?" she asked in a voicethe Countess hardly recognised."Because I've been so bored with your not knowing. I've been bored, frankly, my dear, with nothaving told you; as if, stupidly, all this time I couldn't have managed! Ca me depasse, if you don'tmind my saying so, the things, all round you, that you've appeared to succeed in not knowing. It's asort of assistance--aid to innocent ignorance--that I've always been a bad hand at rendering; and inthis connexion, that of keeping quiet for my brother, my virtue has at any rate finally found itselfexhausted. It's not a black lie, moreover, you know," the Countess inimitably added. "The facts areexactly what I tell you.""I had no idea," said Isabel presently; and looked up at her in a manner that doubtless matched theapparent witlessness of this confession."So I believed--though it was hard to believe. Had it never occurred to you that he was for six orseven years her lover?""I don't know. Things HAVE occurred to me, and perhaps that was what they all meant."第 359 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网"She has been wonderfully clever, she has been magnificent, about Pansy!" the Countess, beforeall this view of it, cried."Oh, no idea, for me," Isabel went on, "ever DEFINITELY took that form." She appeared to bemaking out to herself what had been and what hadn't. "And as it is--I don't understand."She spoke as one troubled and puzzled, yet the poor Countess seemed to have seen her revelationfall below its possibilities of effect. She had expected to kindle some responsive blaze, but hadbarely extracted a spark. Isabel showed as scarce more impressed than she might have been, as ayoung woman of approved imagination, with some fine sinister passage of public history. "Don'tyou recognise how the child could never pass for HER husband's?--that is with M. Merle himself,"her companion resumed. "They had been separated too long for that, and he had gone to some farcountry--I think to South America. If she had ever had children--which I'm not sure of--she hadlost them. The conditions happened to make it workable, under stress (I mean at so awkward apinch), that Osmond should acknowledge the little girl. His wife was dead--very true; but she hadnot been dead too long to put a certain accommodation of dates out of the question--from themoment, I mean, that suspicion wasn't started; which was what they had to take care of. What wasmore natural than that poor Mrs. Osmond, at a distance and for a world not troubling about trifles,should have left behind her, poverina, the pledge of her brief happiness that had cost her her life?With the aid of a change of residence--Osmond had been living with her at Naples at the time oftheir stay in the Alps, and he in due course left it for ever--the whole history was successfully setgoing. My poor sister-in-law, in her grave, couldn't help herself, and the real mother, to save HERskin, renounced all visible property in the child.""Ah, poor, poor woman!" cried Isabel, who herewith burst into tears. It was a long time since shehad shed any; she had suffered a high reaction from weeping. But now they flowed with anabundance in which the Countess Gemini found only another discomfiture."It's very kind of you to pity her!" she discordantly laughed. "Yes indeed, you have a way of yourown--!""He must have been false to his wife--and so very soon!" said Isabel with a sudden check."That's all that's wanting--that you should take up her cause!" the Countess went on. "I quite agreewith you, however, that it was much too soon.""But to me, to me--?" And Isabel hesitated as if she had not heard; as if her question--though it wassufficiently there in her eyes--were all for herself."To you he has been faithful? Well, it depends, my dear, on what you call faithful. When hemarried you he was no longer the lover of another woman--SUCH a lover as he had been, caramia, between their risks and their precautions, while the thing lasted! That state of affairs hadpassed away; the lady had repented, or at all events, for reasons of her own, drawn back: she hadalways had, too, a worship of appearances so intense that even Osmond himself had got bored withit. You may therefore imagine what it was--when he couldn't patch it on conveniently to ANY ofthose he goes in for! But the whole past was between them.""Yes," Isabel mechanically echoed, "the whole past is between them.""Ah, this later past is nothing. But for six or seven years, as I say, they had kept it up."第 360 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网She was silent a little. "Why then did she want him to marry me?""Ah my dear, that's her superiority! Because you had money; and because she believed you wouldbe good to Pansy.""Poor woman--and Pansy who doesn't like her!" cried Isabel."That's the reason she wanted some one whom Pansy would like. She knows it; she knowseverything.""Will she know that you've told me this?""That will depend upon whether you tell her. She's prepared for it, and do you know what shecounts upon for her defence? On your believing that I lie. Perhaps you do; don't make yourselfuncomfortable to hide it. Only, as it happens this time, I don't. I've told plenty of little idiotic fibs,but they've never hurt any one but myself."Isabel sat staring at her companion's story as at a bale of fantastic wares some strolling gypsymight have unpacked on the carpet at her feet. "Why did Osmond never marry her?" she finallyasked."Because she had no money." The Countess had an answer for everything, and if she lied she liedwell. "No one knows, no one has ever known, what she lives on, or how she has got all thosebeautiful things. I don't believe Osmond himself knows. Besides, she wouldn't have married him.""How can she have loved him then?""She doesn't love him in that way. She did at first, and then, I suppose, she would have marriedhim; but at that time her husband was living. By the time M. Merle had rejoined--I won't say hisancestors, because he never had any--her relations with Osmond had changed, and she had grownmore ambitious. Besides, she has never had, about him," the Countess went on, leaving Isabel towince for it so tragically afterwards--"she HAD never had, what you might call any illusions ofINTELLIGENCE. She hoped she might marry a great man; that has always been her idea. She haswaited and watched and plotted and prayed; but she has never succeeded. I don't call MadameMerle a success, you know. I don't know what she may accomplish yet, but at present she has verylittle to show. The only tangible result she has ever achieved--except, of course, getting to knowevery one and staying with them free of expense--has been her bringing you and Osmond together.Oh, she did that, my dear; you needn't look as if you doubted it. I've watched them for years; Iknow everything--everything. I'm thought a great scatterbrain, but I've had enough application ofmind to follow up those two. She hates me, and her way of showing it is to pretend to be for everdefending me. When people say I've had fifteen lovers she looks horrified and declares that quitehalf of them were never proved. She has been afraid of me for years, and she has taken greatcomfort in the vile, false things people have said about me. She has been afraid I'd expose her, andshe threatened me one day when Osmond began to pay his court to you. It was at his house inFlorence; do you remember that afternoon when she brought you there and we had tea in thegarden? She let me know then that if I should tell tales two could play at that game. She pretendsthere's a good deal more to tell about me than about her. It would be an interesting comparison! Idon't care a fig what she may say, simply because I know YOU don't care a fig. You can't troubleyour head about me less than you do already. So she may take her revenge as she chooses; I don't第 361 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网think she'll frighten you very much. Her great idea has been to be tremendously irreproachable--akind of full-blown lily--the incarnation of propriety. She has always worshipped that god. Thereshould be no scandal about Caesar's wife, you know; and, as I say, she has always hoped to marryCaesar. That was one reason she wouldn't marry Osmond; the fear that on seeing her with Pansypeople would put things together-- would even see a resemblance. She has had a terror lest themother should betray herself. She has been awfully careful; the mother has never done so.""Yes, yes, the mother has done so," said Isabel, who had listened to all this with a face more andmore wan. "She betrayed herself to me the other day, though I didn't recognise her. There appearedto have been a chance of Pansy's making a great marriage, and in her disappointment at its notcoming off she almost dropped the mask.""Ah, that's where she'd dish herself!" cried the Countess. "She has failed so dreadfully that she'sdetermined her daughter shall make it up."Isabel started at the words "her daughter," which her guest threw off so familiarly. "It seems verywonderful," she murmured; and in this bewildering impression she had almost lost her sense ofbeing personally touched by the story."Now don't go and turn against the poor innocent child!" the Countess went on. "She's very nice, inspite of her deplorable origin. I myself have liked Pansy; not, naturally, because she was hers, butbecause she had become yours.""Yes, she has become mine. And how the poor woman must have suffered at seeing me--!" Isabelexclaimed while she flushed at the thought."I don't believe she has suffered; on the contrary, she has enjoyed. Osmond's marriage has givenhis daughter a great little lift. Before that she lived in a hole. And do you know what the motherthought? That you might take such a fancy to the child that you'd do something for her. Osmond ofcourse could never give her a portion. Osmond was really extremely poor; but of course you knowall about that. Ah, my dear," cried the Countess, "why did you ever inherit money?" She stopped amoment as if she saw something singular in Isabel's face. "Don't tell me now that you'll give her adot. You're capable of that, but I would refuse to believe it. Don't try to be too good. Be a littleeasy and natural and nasty; feel a little wicked, for the comfort of it, once in your life!""It's very strange. I suppose I ought to know, but I'm sorry," Isabel said. "I'm much obliged toyou.""Yes, you seem to be!" cried the Countess with a mocking laugh. "Perhaps you are--perhaps you'renot. You don't take it as I should have thought.""How should I take it?" Isabel asked."Well, I should say as a woman who has been made use of." Isabel made no answer to this; sheonly listened, and the Countess went on. "They've always been bound to each other; they remainedso even after she broke off--or HE did. But he has always been more for her than she has been forhim. When their little carnival was over they made a bargain that each should give the othercomplete liberty, but that each should also do everything possible to help the other on. You mayask me how I know such a thing as that. I know it by the way they've behaved. Now see how muchbetter women are than men! She has found a wife for Osmond, but Osmond has never lifted a little第 362 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网finger for HER. She has worked for him, plotted for him, suffered for him; she has even more thanonce found money for him; and the end of it is that he's tired of her. She's an old habit; there aremoments when he needs her, but on the whole he wouldn't miss her if she were removed. And,what's more, today she knows it. So you needn't be jealous!" the Countess added humorously.Isabel rose from her sofa again; she felt bruised and scant of breath; her head was humming withnew knowledge. "I'm much obliged to you," she repeated. And then she added abruptly, in quite adifferent tone: "How do you know all this?"This enquiry appeared to ruffle the Countess more than Isabel's expression of gratitude pleasedher. She gave her companion a bold stare, with which, "Let us assume that I've invented it!" shecried. She too, however, suddenly changed her tone and, laying her hand on Isabel's arm, said withthe penetration of her sharp bright smile: "Now will you give up your journey?"Isabel started a little; she turned away. But she felt weak and in a moment had to lay her arm uponthe mantel-shelf for support. She stood a minute so, and then upon her arm she dropped her dizzyhead, with closed eyes and pale lips."I've done wrong to speak--I've made you ill!" the Countess cried."Ah, I must see Ralph!" Isabel wailed; not in resentment, not in the quick passion her companionhad looked for; but in a tone of far-reaching, infinite sadness.CHAPTER LIIThere was a train for Turin and Paris that evening; and after the Countess had left her Isabel had arapid and decisive conference with her maid, who was discreet, devoted and active. After this shethought (except of her journey) only of one thing. She must go and see Pansy; from her shecouldn't turn away. She had not seen her yet, as Osmond had given her to understand that it wastoo soon to begin. She drove at five o'clock to a high floor in a narrow street in the quarter of thePiazza Navona, and was admitted by the portress of the convent, a genial and obsequious person.Isabel had been at this institution before; she had come with Pansy to see the sisters. She knewthey were good women, and she saw that the large rooms were clean and cheerful and that thewell-used garden had sun for winter and shade for spring. But she disliked the place, whichaffronted and almost frightened her; not for the world would she have spent a night there. Itproduced to-day more than before the impression of a well-appointed prison; for it was notpossible to pretend Pansy was free to leave it. This innocent creature had been presented to her in anew and violent light, but the secondary effect of the revelation was to make her reach out a hand.The portress left her to wait in the parlour of the convent while she went to make it known thatthere was a visitor for the dear young lady. The parlour was a vast, cold apartment, with new-looking furniture; a large clean stove of white porcelain, unlighted, a collection of wax flowersunder glass, and a series of engravings from religious pictures on the walls. On the other occasionIsabel had thought it less like Rome than like Philadelphia, but to-day she made no reflexions; theapartment only seemed to her very empty and very soundless. The portress returned at the end ofsome five minutes, ushering in another person. Isabel got up, expecting to see one of the ladies ofthe sisterhood, but to her extreme surprise found herself confronted with Madame Merle. The第 363 页 共 391 页原版英语阅读网effect was strange, for Madame Merle was already so present to her vision that her appearance inthe flesh was like suddenly, and rather awfully, seeing a painted picture move. Isabel had beenthinking all day of her falsity, her audacity, her ability, her probable suffering; and these darkthings seemed to flash with a sudden light as she entered the room. Her being there at all had thecharacter of ugly evidence, of handwritings, of profaned relics, of grim things produced in court. Itmade Isabel feel faint; if it had been necessary to speak on the spot she would have been quiteunable. But no such necessity was distinct to her; it seemed to her indeed that she had absolutelynothing to say to Madame Merle. In one's relations with this lady, however, there were never anyabsolute necessities; she had a manner which carried off not only her own deficiencies but those ofother people. But she was different from usual; she came in slowly, behind the portress, and Isabelinstantly perceived that she was not likely to depend upon her habitual resources. For her too theoccasion was exceptional, and she had undertaken to treat it by the light of the moment. This gaveher a peculiar gravity; she pretended not even to smile, and though Isabel saw that she was morethan ever playing a part it seemed to her that on the whole the wonderful woman had never been sonatural. She looked at her young friend from head to foot, but not harshly nor defiantly; with a coldgentleness rather, and an absence of any air of allusion to their last meeting. It was as if she hadwished to mark a distinction. She had been irritated then, she was reconciled now.