THE most natural sequel to a mutual understanding, such as this between the two lovers, would be that they should get married with the least possible delay; and, as a matter of fact, that is what happened. The legacy having been handed back at Marion’s instance and with Philip’s consent, Marion would hardly be justified in opposing any unreasonable delay to the personal claims of so obedient a lover. It is not every man, however much in love he may be, who will surrender twenty thousand pounds without a murmur. But Philip, in the first place, was not of a specially avaricious disposition; and the unexpected success of his poem had impressed him with a belief in the pecuniary possibilities of a literary career, such as rendered him comparatively indifferent to extraneous resources. Beyond this, however, he had the insight to discern that the fundamental motive of Marion’s action had not transpired in her arguments. What really moved her was some lurking tinge of jealousy with regard to the past relations between himself and Perdita. What basis there may have been for such jealousy, if there were any basis for it, Philip may have known; but he had always avoided any reference to it, and he probably did not care to risk the opening of the subject which would be likely to follow Marion’s enforced acceptance of the legacy. Marion would never be happy under the persuasion that she was in possession of money which, in the natural course of things, should have gone to Perdita. Philip, therefore, capitulated with less parley than he might otherwise have attempted.

They were married in the course of three or four weeks, and went to spend their honeymoon on the Continent; the chief goal of their pilgrimage being the field of Waterloo, where Marion saw her father’s grave. There was no drawback to the enjoyment of the journey; it was a period of serene and profound happiness on which it would be pleasant to dwell at more length. But happiness has few events, nor any apparent movement; it is like a chapter from eternity, which is the infinite development of the present moment. Time loses its semblance of reality, and the discovery that it does, nevertheless, continue to pass, comes as a surprise. The time arrived when Mr. and Mrs. Lancaster were constrained to set their faces homeward: but they did so with unshadowed hearts. Life had begun for them with the sweetest auspices, and there seemed no reason to anticipate that it would not proceed to still brighter issues.

The home of the newly-wedded couple was to be, for the present, in the old house in Hammersmith, which, with some alterations in the way of furniture, would be commodious enough, and which was endeared by association to Marion and her mother, and to Philip also, as being the place where he had first met his bride. It was now the “little season” in London; Parliament was to sit early, and the town was rapidly filling up. The excitement of war being over, every one was set upon getting the largest possible amount of excitement out of society, and the next few months promised to be brilliant ones. Among the literary celebrities of the day, no man’s reputation stood higher at this moment than that of Philip Lancaster. He was mentioned in the same breath with Byron and Shelley, and there were not wanting persons who professed to find in him qualities quite equal to those of the latter poets. It was rumored, also, that his personal advantages were on a par with his mental ones; that he had married a great heiress; that he was the younger son of an earl; that his past career had been distinguished by many romantic and mysterious episodes, involving the reputation of more than a few personages of rank both in England and on the Continent; together with a score of other reports, true, half true and untrue, such as invariably herald the appearance in a prominent position of any one whom nobody ever heard of before.

It was the custom at this period for men and women who happened to have achieved distinction either by their brains or by some equally uncommon means, to be invited to social entertainments at the house of Lady Flanders. To be seen there conferred the insignia of a kind of nobility which had nothing to do with the peerage, but which was, perhaps, scarcely the less valued by the recipients of it. Accordingly it was not without satisfaction that Philip, a few days after his return to Hammersmith, received a communication from her ladyship, conveying her compliments, and an urgent desire to have the honor of welcoming the author of “Iduna” at her abode on the following Wednesday evening, at seven o’clock. Mrs. Lancaster was included in the invitation (not an invariable corollary in similar cases); and, indeed, her ladyship’s carriage had left cards the day before Philip’s return from abroad, as Mrs. Lockhart testified.

Of course, they could have no hesitation in availing themselves of this first social recognition, in the capital of the world, of Philip’s genius; and Marion prepared herself for the occasion with a sentiment of wifely pride, at the thought that the world should so soon confirm that opinion of her husband, which she herself had more or less avowedly entertained ever since the first moment she beheld him. The young people attired themselves in a manner which would excite less remark in the present day than it might have done ten or twenty years ago, but which, at all events, at the period we write of, was altogether in the mode. Shortly before the carriage was announced, Marion, being ready, went down stairs, and saw lying on the hall table a letter addressed to Philip Lancaster, Esquire, in Mr. Fillmore’s handwriting. Now Marion had a day or two before written to Fillmore, inquiring whether there were any formalities to be observed in relation to her rejection of the legacy; and she took it for granted that this letter, although addressed to her husband, was the answer to her question. She and Philip had not as yet had occasion to come to any understanding as to their liberty to open each other’s letters; and, though Marion would probably, in an ordinary case, have let the letter alone, in this instance she had no hesitation in appropriating it. But at this juncture Mrs. Lockhart came into the hall and detected something about Marion’s dress that needed readjustment. Marion put the letter in her pocket and forgot all about it.

They arrived safely at their destination, and were ushered into the presence of their hostess, an immensely tall old lady, with a turban, overhanging eyebrows and a prominent chin. She was of noble descent, and was now recognized as among the most eminent encouragers of literature and the liberal arts; but there were terrible stories told about her youth, when she was said to have traveled in Europe in male attire, to have fought a duel and killed her man, and to have lived several years in some part of Asia under circumstances known only to herself. At this stage of her career, however, she was a great card-player, sternly religious in the way of forms and etiquette, and reputed to have one of the wittiest and sharpest tongues in London. To Philip she contented herself with saying: “Young gentleman, I used to know your grand-uncle. He was not so handsome a man as you. ’Tis a dangerous thing, sir, to be handsome and to write poetry. People who see you will expect your poetry to be as well as you are, and, if they find it is not, they’ll call you both humbugs. I haven’t read your poem, Mr. Lancaster, but now that I have seen you I mean to, and then I shall tell you just what I think of it! Mrs. Lancaster, I like you better than your husband; he’s not good enough for you, though he’ll try and make you believe the contrary. Never let him print anything that you don’t like—else he’ll make a failure. There—run along now and enjoy yourselves, and you may come here again as often as you like.”

The rooms were full of people, many of whom one would be glad enough to see now-a-days, after seventy years’ vicarious acquaintance with them, through books and tradition. There is no need of naming them here, nor were their appearance and casual conversation (temporary costumes and customs aside) any more remarkable than would be the case in a similar gathering in the London of our times. Philip, indeed, was quite as well worth noticing as any other person there; and he certainly was noticed to the full extent of his deserts. There were murmurs on every side of “That’s he!”—“Which?”—“There—tall, short curling hair and white forehead.”—“What splendid eyes!”—“Oh, did he write ‘Iduna’?”—“Yes, madam: looks like his own hero, doesn’t he?”—“Is he married?”—“No.”—“Yes, I assure you: two hundred thousand pounds and a beauty.”—“Is she like ‘Iduna’?”—“She’s sixty and a fright!”—“Have you read the poem?”—“Yes—very pretty: vastly entertaining, indeed.”—“Here he comes!”—“Oh, pray introduce me!” Amidst such comments and exclamations the poet of the hour found himself adrift, with a tolerably calm and impassive exterior, and within, a voice, half sad, half comical, repeating, “This is fame!”

Meanwhile, Marion had been deployed in another direction, her heart and thoughts remaining with Philip; and in this condition she was able to pay but imperfect attention to the curly-haired and bright-eyed little gentleman who had just been presented to her, and whose name she had not caught. He spoke with a slight Irish brogue, and there was a kind of vivacious sentimentality in the tone of his remarks, which had a tendency, moreover, to become inconveniently high-flown and figurative. At length, to be rid of him, she got him to conduct her to a chair, and then sent him off to fetch her a glass of water. “Who’s that girl Tom was talking to just now?” said one man to another, as she sat alone. “Don’t know: nice fresh young creature; oh, let Tom alone for being first in the field with whatever’s going: and in a week he’ll have put her in the Irish melodies, and then the next man may take what is left!” This dialogue was so little to Marion’s taste that she rose from her seat and established herself under the wing of an elderly dowager with whom she happened to have some acquaintance; and there, putting her hand in her pocket to find her smelling-salts, she felt the letter that she had forgotten: whereupon she drew it forth and opened it, and was actually absorbed in its contents at the very moment when the author of “Lallah Rookh” was searching for her everywhere with a glass of water in his hand.

The letter was not long, but Marion found it unexpectedly interesting, insomuch that she read it over three or four times, with a constantly expanding sense of its importance. It was not the answer to her own letter, nor had it any reference to that; it was addressed to Philip throughout, and treated of business which was as new as it was surprising. After having considered the written words from every point of view, Marion sat with the letter in her lap and her eyes gazing at nothing, in a state of mingled bewilderment and distress. She had contended against destiny, and had seemed at first to win; but now her flank was turned, and the day was against her.

Through the midst of her perplexity she presently became aware of a dapper little figure standing before her with a glass of water in its hand: she gazed at him uncomprehendingly. Just then, however, another face, which she immediately recognized, appeared amidst the crowd, and not only restored her self-possession, but set all her faculties on edge. She rose quickly, and eluding the astonished water-carrier, she reached Fillmore’s side and touched him on the arm.

“Mr. Fillmore, will you please give me your arm? I have read your letter. I wish to talk to you. Take me somewhere where we can be uninterrupted for a few minutes.” Fillmore complied without asking any questions, and without showing any particular symptoms of surprise.

Philip, the lion of the evening, was, in the meantime, getting on very agreeably. After running the gauntlet of numerous promiscuous admirers, who besought him to tell them whether Iduna was drowned, whether the sea-god were real or only a fancy of hers, whether she married her mortal lover, and whether the latter managed to get safe off on the wreck of the castle, and much more to the same effect—after he had been parrying such inquiries as these, with what ingenuity and good humor he might, for some time, he happened to raise his eyes, and saw the eyes of Perdita directed upon him from a little distance, with a beckoning expression. In a few minutes he succeeded in placing himself, with a feeling of genuine relief, by her side. And indeed he had no reason to be dissatisfied with his position. If there were, in that assembly, any woman more classically handsome than Perdita, there was certainly no one who could compare with her in brilliance and subtle attractiveness; nor any who knew so well how to say what a man would like to hear; nor any who, in the present instance, was better disposed to say it. She touched his shoulder lightly with her hand as he sat down, with an air and smile as if she were conferring upon him a well-earned knighthood.

“This is the hardest part, you know,” she said. “Men who do great things are always beset by little people, with their discordant little adulations. It is like what you see on the stage; when Kean or Kemble has given a great passage, and your ears are ringing with it, there comes a flat racket of hand-clapping. That is the world’s applause!”

“We must take the deed for the will,” said Philip laughing, “and be glad to get it.”

“And so you wish me to believe,” pursued Perdita, “that love is a vision that cannot be realized in this world?”

“I don’t know that I mean that,” he replied; “and I don’t want to undertake the responsibility of my own poetical morals. But love is like life, perhaps, never to be found by any dissection of mortal hearts or brains. It is above what can be seen or touched, though that may embody it. You see I am as great a fool as any of my readers. I don’t know, any more than the young lady I just was talking with, whether Iduna was drowned or married. But neither do I care.”

“There is more than one man in every real poet,” remarked Perdita, looking at him intently for a moment, and then looking down; “and the one who appears in the flesh is not always, I suspect, the one best worth having. And yet he may be worth breaking one’s heart for. What do you think?”

“I don’t remember having made any experiments,” said Philip, rather awkwardly.

“Well, it is hardly worth remembering,” she rejoined with one of her ambiguous smiles. “If we remembered everything we should never do anything, probably; and that may be one reason why women do so little. And so you are married, Philip?”

“Yes,” he said, a little reluctant to follow up this turn of the conversation.

“What a delightful thing a true marriage must be,” she went on, “especially when a poet is the bridegroom. For he must know, better than any other man, what woman to choose. You have seen the world, my friend, and studied the human heart; and I congratulate you on having found the woman best suited to make you happy.”

“I’m not so difficult as you seem to think,” returned Philip; “but if I were ten times more so than I am, I should be more than content.”

“I am sure of that,” said Perdita, smiling again; “if all men were as fortunate as you, mon ami, the world would be the happier. Marion is a poet’s wife. She comprehends you. She reverences your genius even more than you do, and she will do more than your genius to make you illustrious. She has the simplicity and the unsuspiciousness that one finds only in the highest natures; she will never harass you with foolish doubts and questions: she will never do anything whimsical or arbitrary: she will never make you appear absurd. She makes me wish that I were like her.”

Perdita uttered the last sentences in a low and serious tone. She was looking her loveliest; fit to be the consort of a king or the heroine of an epic. She was warm, exquisite, tinted like a flower and sparkling like the gems upon her bosom; she had all the grace of a woman, and more than a woman’s substance and individuality, and she was telling Philip that she wished she were like his wife! Philip, though not exactly destitute of vanity or of liability to infatuation, was not readily to be deceived. He was quite able to believe that Perdita might be making game of him. And yet, hearing the tones of her voice and looking in her face, he did not believe it. Her words, indeed, could be taken with more than one signification; but there must be genuineness in them somewhere. She wished that she were like Philip’s wife. Did that mean that she really considered Marion’s qualities of mind and person were more desirable than her own? Or did she mean that there was some cause, unavowed but not unimaginable, why she should desire them more? Some cause not unimaginable: what? She had just expressed her conviction, in tones unusually earnest for an assemblage like Lady Flanders’, that Marion’s qualities were such as must command Philip’s love. What then was the significance of her wishing they might be hers? It was plain enough; indeed it was its very plainness that was the strongest obstacle in the way of Philip’s so understanding it. And yet, thorough as was his love for Marion, he recognized too clearly the wonderful charms and fascinations of Perdita to believe that she could compare herself with his wife to her own disadvantage. No: what she had said was, at least, an implicit censure of his blindness in having preferred Marion or any other woman to Perdita herself.

It is to Philip’s credit that he did not allow himself to appear in the least conscious of the unavoidable inference in the matter; but only laughed, and said that he had no doubt any one would like his wife better than his poetry, if they could be afforded the opportunity. And before anything else could be said, who should appear before them but Marion herself, leaning on Merton Fillmore’s arm, looking very pale, and with a peculiar satirical touch to her expression which Philip had not seen there since the early days of his acquaintance with her, and which made him a little uneasy. As for Fillmore, his demeanor was, as usual, admirably composed; but Philip fancied that there was something in the glance he bestowed upon him that seemed to say, “Can a honeymoon be eclipsed?”

“Good evening, Madame Desmoines,” said Marion, lightly; “I hope I see you well in health? Do you like my husband?”

“His poetry has made me rather disappointed with himself; but he is all the better for having such a wife,” returned the Marquise, with engaging courtesy.

“I am only afraid of his being too fortunate ... in some things!” Marion said laughingly; “so, to make the balance even, I am going to inflict on him the misfortune of taking me home. That is, if he will.”

“That misfortune is the best of all his fortunes this evening,” was Perdita’s reply; “and I am enough his friend to be glad of it.”

While these courtesies were passing between the ladies, Philip, who perceived that something serious was the matter, had risen and placed himself by Marion’s side, and they now moved away together, while Fillmore appropriated Philip’s vacated chair. When the young poet and his wife went to make their adieux to Lady Flanders, her ladyship said to Marion, “I saw your husband flirting with that little Marquise. Don’t you let him do it! She’s the most dangerous woman in this room, and the only one who is cleverer than I am. But I’m clever enough to see through her, and I hope you are!”

And with this benediction the young couple set out homewards.