"Why, he has made a codicil to his will, to say the property was all to go away from you if you married--I mean--""That is of no consequence," said Dorothea, breaking in impetuously.
"But if you married Mr. Ladislaw, not anybody else," Celia went on with persevering quietude. "Of course that is of no consequence in one way--you never WOULD marry Mr. Ladislaw; but that only makes it worse of Mr. Casaubon."The blood rushed to Dorothea's face and neck painfully. But Celia was administering what she thought a sobering dose of fact.
It was taking up notions that had done Dodo's health so much harm.
So she went on in her neutral tone, as if she had been remarking on baby's robes.
"James says so. He says it is abominable, and not like a gentleman.
And there never was a better judge than James. It is as if Mr. Casaubon wanted to make people believe that you would wish to marry Mr. Ladislaw--which is ridiculous. Only James says it was to hinder Mr. Ladislaw from wanting to marry you for your money--just as if he ever would think of making you an offer. Mrs. Cadwallader said you might as well marry an Italian with white mice! But Imust just go and look at baby," Celia added, without the least change of tone, throwing a light shawl over her, and tripping away.
Dorothea by this time had turned cold again, and now threw herself back helplessly in her chair. She might have compared her experience at that moment to the vague, alarmed consciousness that her life was taking on a new form that she was undergoing a metamorphosis in which memory would not adjust itself to the stirring of new organs.
Everything was changing its aspect: her husband's conduct, her own duteous feeling towards him, every struggle between them--and yet more, her whole relation to Will Ladislaw. Her world was in a state of convulsive change; the only thing she could say distinctly to herself was, that she must wait and think anew.
One change terrified her as if it had been a sin; it was a violent shock of repulsion from her departed husband, who had had hidden thoughts, perhaps perverting everything she said and did.
Then again she was conscious of another change which also made her tremulous; it was a sudden strange yearning of heart towards Will Ladislaw. It had never before entered her mind that he could, under any circumstances, be her lover: conceive the effect of the sudden revelation that another had thought of him in that light--that perhaps he himself had been conscious of such a possibility,--and this with the hurrying, crowding vision of unfitting conditions, and questions not soon to be solved.
It seemed a long while--she did not know how long--before she heard Celia saying, "That will do, nurse; he will be quiet on my lap now.
You can go to lunch, and let Garratt stay in the next room.""What I think, Dodo," Celia went on, observing nothing more than that Dorothea was leaning back in her chair, and likely to be passive, "is that Mr. Casaubon was spiteful. I never did like him, and James never did. I think the corners of his mouth were dreadfully spiteful.
And now he has behaved in this way, I am sure religion does not require you to make yourself uncomfortable about him. If he has been taken away, that is a mercy, and you ought to be grateful.
We should not grieve, should we, baby?" said Celia confidentially to that unconscious centre and poise of the world, who had the most remarkable fists all complete even to the nails, and hair enough, really, when you took his cap off, to make--you didn't know what:--in short, he was Bouddha in a Western form.
At this crisis Lydgate was announced, and one of the first things he said was, "I fear you are not so well as you were, Mrs. Casaubon;have you been agitated? allow me to feel your pulse." Dorothea's hand was of a marble coldness.
"She wants to go to Lowick, to look over papers," said Celia.
"She ought not, ought she?"
Lydgate did not speak for a few moments. Then he said, looking at Dorothea. "I hardly know. In my opinion Mrs. Casaubon should do what would give her the most repose of mind.
That repose will not always come from being forbidden to act.""Thank you;" said Dorothea, exerting herself, "I am sure that is wise.
There are so many things which I ought to attend to. Why should I sit here idle?" Then, with an effort to recall subjects not connected with her agitation, she added, abruptly, "You know every one in Middlemarch, I think, Mr. Lydgate. I shall ask you to tell me a great deal.
I have serious things to do now. I have a living to give away.
You know Mr. Tyke and all the--" But Dorothea's effort was too much for her; she broke off and burst into sobs. Lydgate made her drink a dose of sal volatile.
"Let Mrs. Casaubon do as she likes," he said to Sir James, whom he asked to see before quitting the house. "She wants perfect freedom, I think, more than any other prescription."His attendance on Dorothea while her brain was excited, had enabled him to form some true conclusions concerning the trials of her life.
He felt sure that she had been suffering from the strain and conflict of self-repression; and that she was likely now to feel herself only in another sort of pinfold than that from which she had been released.
Lydgate's advice was all the easier for Sir James to follow when he found that Celia had already told Dorothea the unpleasant fact about the will. There was no help for it now--no reason for any further delay in the execution of necessary business.
And the next day Sir James complied at once with her request that he would drive her to Lowick.
"I have no wish to stay there at present," said Dorothea;"I could hardly bear it. I am much happier at Freshitt with Celia.
