The Daughters of Danaus Part 58

CHAPTER x.x.xVI.

It was with great reluctance that Jouffroy acceded to Hadria's wish to return home alone. She watched the river banks, and the boats coming and pa.s.sing, with a look of farewell in her eyes. She meant to hold out to the utmost limits of the possible, but she knew that the possible _had_ limits, and she awaited judgment at the bar of destiny.

She hurried home on arriving at the quay, and found Henriette waiting for her.

"What is it? Tell me at once, if anything is wrong."

"Then you knew I was here!" exclaimed Miss Temperley.

"Yes; M. Jouffroy told me. He found me at St. Cloud. Quick, Henriette, don't keep me in suspense."

"There is nothing of immediate seriousness," Henriette replied, and her sister-in-law drew a breath of relief. Tea was brought in by Hannah, and a few questions were asked and answered. Miss Temperley having been installed in an easy chair, and her cloak and hat removed, said that her stay in Paris was uncertain as to length. It would depend on many things. Hadria rang for the tray to be taken away, after tea was over, and as Hannah closed the door, a sensation of sick apprehension overcame her, for a moment. Henriette had obviously come to Paris in order to recapture the fugitive, and meant to employ all her tact in the delicate mission. She was devoted to Hubert and the children, heart and soul, and would face anything on their behalf, including the present disagreeable task. Hadria looked at her sister-in-law with admiration. She offered homage to the prowess of the enemy.

Miss Temperley held a commanding position, fortified by ideas and customs centuries old, and supported by allies on every side.

It ran through Hadria's mind that it was possible to refuse to allow the subject to be broached, and thus escape the encounter altogether. It would save many words on both sides. But Henriette had always been in Hubert's confidence, and it occurred to Hadria that it might be well to define her own position once more, since it was thus about to be directly and frankly attacked. Moreover, Hadria began to be fired with the spirit of battle. It was not merely for herself, but on behalf of her s.e.x, that she longed to repudiate the insult that seemed to her, to be involved in Henriette's whole philosophy.

However, if the enemy shewed no signs of hostility, Hadria resolved that she also would keep the truce.

Miss Temperley had already mentioned that Mrs. Fullerton was now staying at the Red House, for change of air. She had been far from well, and of course was worrying very much over these money troubles and perils ahead, as well as about Hadria's present action. Mrs. Fullerton had herself suggested that Henriette should go over to Paris to see what could be done to patch up the quarrel.

"Ah!" exclaimed Hadria, and a cloud settled on her brow. Henriette had indeed come armed _cap a pie!_

There was a significant pause. "And your mission," said Hadria at length, "is to recapture the lost bird."

"We are considering your own good," murmured Miss Temperley.

"If I have not always done what I ought to have done in my life, it is not for want of guidance and advice from others," said Hadria with a smile and a sigh.

"You are giving everyone so much pain, Hadria. Do you never think of that?"

There was another long pause. The two women sat opposite one another.

Miss Temperley's eyes were bent on the carpet; Hadria's on a patch of blue sky that could be seen through a side street, opposite.

"If you would use your ability on behalf of your s.e.x instead of against it, Henriette, women would have cause to bless you, for all time!"

"Ah! if you did but know it, I _am_ using what ability I have on their behalf," Miss Temperley replied. "I am trying to keep them true to their n.o.ble mission. But I did not come to discuss general questions. I came to appeal to your best self, Hadria."

"I am ready," said Hadria. "Only, before you start, I want you to remember clearly what took place at Dunaghee before my marriage; for I foresee that our disagreement will chiefly hang upon your lapse of memory on that point, and upon my perhaps inconveniently distinct recollection of those events."

"I wish to lay before you certain facts and certain results of your present conduct," said Henriette.

"Very good. I wish to lay before you certain facts and certain results of your past conduct."

"Ah! do not let us wrangle, Hadria."

"I don't wish to wrangle, but I must keep hold of these threads that you seem always to drop. And then there is another point: when I talked of leaving home, it was not _I_ who suggested that it should be for ever."

"I know, I know," cried Henriette hastily. "I have again and again pointed out to Hubert how wrong he was in that, and how he gave you a pretext for what you have done. I admit it and regret it deeply. Hubert lost his temper; that is the fact of the matter. He thought himself bitterly wronged by you."

"Quite so; he felt it a bitter wrong that I should claim that liberty of action which I warned him before our marriage that I _should_ claim. He made no objection _then_: on the contrary, he professed to agree with me; and declared that he did not care what I might think; but now he says that in acting as I have acted, I have forfeited my position, and need not return to the Red House."

"I know. But he spoke in great haste and anger. He has made me his _confidante_."

"And his amba.s.sador?"

Henriette shook her head. No; she had acted entirely on her own responsibility. She could not bear to see her brother suffering. He had felt the quarrel deeply.

"On account of the stupid talk," said Hadria. "_That_ will soon blow over."

"On account of the talk partly. You know his sensitiveness about anything that concerns his domestic life. He acutely feels your leaving the children, Hadria. Try to put yourself in his place. Would _you_ not feel it?"

"If I were a man with two children of whom I was extremely fond, I have no doubt that I should feel it very much indeed if I lost an intelligent and trustworthy superintendent, whose services a.s.sured the children's welfare, and relieved me of all anxiety on their account."

"If you are going to take this hard tone, Hadria, I fear you will never listen to reason."

"Henriette, when people look popular sentiments squarely in the face, they are always called hard, or worse. You have kept yourself thoroughly informed of our affairs. Whose parental sentiments were gratified by the advent of those children--Hubert's or mine?"

"But you are a mother."

Hadria laughed. "You play into my hands, Henriette. You tacitly acknowledge that it was not for _my_ gratification that those children were brought into the world (a common story, let me observe), and then you remind me that I am a mother! Your mentor must indeed be slumbering.

You are simply scathing--on my behalf! Have you come all the way from England for this?"

"You _won't_ understand. I mean that motherhood has duties. You can't deny that."

"I can and I do."

Miss Temperley stared. "You will find no human being to agree with you,"

she said at length.

"That does not alter my opinion."

"Oh, Hadria, explain yourself! You utter paradoxes. I want to understand your point of view."

"It is simple enough. I deny that motherhood has duties except when it is absolutely free, absolutely uninfluenced by the pressure of opinion, or by any of the innumerable tyrannies that most children have now to thank for their existence."

Miss Temperley shook her head. "I don't see that any 'tyranny,' as you call it, exonerates a mother from her duty to her child."

"There we differ. Motherhood, in our present social state, is the sign and seal as well as the means and method of a woman's bondage. It forges chains of her own flesh and blood; it weaves cords of her own love and instinct. She agonizes, and the fruit of her agony is not even legally hers. Name me a position more abject! A woman with a child in her arms is, to me, the symbol of an abas.e.m.e.nt, an indignity, more complete, more disfiguring and terrible, than any form of humiliation that the world has ever seen."

"You must be mad!" exclaimed Miss Temperley. "That symbol has stood to the world for all that is sweetest and holiest."

"I know it has! So profound has been our humiliation!"

"I don't know what to say to anyone so wrong-headed and so twisted in sentiment."