Daniel Deronda, George Eliot [portable ebook reader .TXT] 📗

observations, nay, her total silence about his characteristics, a silence which Mrs. Davilow did not dare to break. “Is he a man she would be happy with?”⁠—was a question that inevitably arose in the mother’s mind. “Well, perhaps as happy as she would be with anyone else⁠—or as most other women are”⁠—was the answer with which she tried to quiet herself; for she could not imagine Gwendolen under the influence of any feeling which would make her satisfied in what we traditionally call “mean circumstances.”

Grandcourt’s own thought was looking in the same direction: he wanted to have done with the uncertainty that belonged to his not having spoken. As to any further uncertainty⁠—well, it was something without any reasonable basis, some quality in the air which acted as an irritant to his wishes.

Gwendolen enjoyed the riding, but her pleasure did not break forth in girlish unpremeditated chat and laughter as it did on that morning with Rex. She spoke a little, and even laughed, but with a lightness as of a far-off echo: for her too there was some peculiar quality in the air⁠—not, she was sure, any subjugation of her will by Mr. Grandcourt, and the splendid prospects he meant to offer her; for Gwendolen desired everyone, that dignified gentleman himself included, to understand that she was going to do just as she liked, and that they had better not calculate on her pleasing them. If she chose to take this husband, she would have him know that she was not going to renounce her freedom, or according to her favorite formula, “not going to do as other women did.”

Grandcourt’s speeches this morning were, as usual, all of that brief sort which never fails to make a conversational figure when the speaker is held important in his circle. Stopping so soon, they give signs of a suppressed and formidable ability so say more, and have also the meritorious quality of allowing lengthiness to others.

“How do you like Criterion’s paces?” he said, after they had entered the park and were slacking from a canter to a walk.

“He is delightful to ride. I should like to have a leap with him, if it would not frighten mamma. There was a good wide channel we passed five minutes ago. I should like to have a gallop back and take it.”

“Pray do. We can take it together.”

“No, thanks. Mamma is so timid⁠—if she saw me it might make her ill.”

“Let me go and explain. Criterion would take it without fail.”

“No⁠—indeed⁠—you are very kind⁠—but it would alarm her too much. I dare take any leap when she is not by; but I do it and don’t tell her about it.”

“We can let the carriage pass and then set off.”

“No, no, pray don’t think of it any more: I spoke quite randomly,” said Gwendolen; she began to feel a new objection to carrying out her own proposition.

“But Mrs. Davilow knows I shall take care of you.”

“Yes, but she would think of you as having to take care of my broken neck.”

There was a considerable pause before Grandcourt said, looking toward her, “I should like to have the right always to take care of you.”

Gwendolen did not turn her eyes on him; it seemed to her a long while that she was first blushing, and then turning pale, but to Grandcourt’s rate of judgment she answered soon enough, with the lightest flute-tone and a careless movement of the head, “Oh, I am not sure that I want to be taken care of: if I chose to risk breaking my neck, I should like to be at liberty to do it.”

She checked her horse as she spoke, and turned in her saddle, looking toward the advancing carriage. Her eyes swept across Grandcourt as she made this movement, but there was no language in them to correct the carelessness of her reply. At that very moment she was aware that she was risking something⁠—not her neck, but the possibility of finally checking Grandcourt’s advances, and she did not feel contented with the possibility.

“Damn her!” thought Grandcourt, as he too checked his horse. He was not a wordy thinker, and this explosive phrase stood for mixed impressions which eloquent interpreters might have expanded into some sentences full of an irritated sense that he was being mystified, and a determination that this girl should not make a fool of him. Did she want him to throw himself at her feet and declare that he was dying for her? It was not by that gate that she could enter on the privileges he could give her. Or did she expect him to write his proposals? Equally a delusion. He would not make his offer in any way that could place him definitely in the position of being rejected. But as to her accepting him, she had done it already in accepting his marked attentions: and anything which happened to break them off would be understood to her disadvantage. She was merely coquetting, then?

However, the carriage came up, and no further tête-à-tête could well occur before their arrival at the house, where there was abundant company, to whom Gwendolen, clad in riding-dress, with her hat laid aside, clad also in the repute of being chosen by Mr. Grandcourt, was naturally a centre of observation; and since the objectionable Mr. Lush was not there to look at her, this stimulus of admiring attention heightened her spirits, and dispersed, for the time, the uneasy consciousness of divided impulses which threatened her with repentance of her own acts. Whether Grandcourt had been offended or not there was no judging: his manners were unchanged, but Gwendolen’s acuteness had not gone deeper than to discern that his manners were no clue for her, and because these were unchanged she was not the less afraid of him.

She had not been at Diplow before except to dine; and since certain points of view from the windows and the garden were worth showing, Lady Flora Hollis proposed after luncheon, when some of the guests had