The Age of Innocence
shadow of a smile, made the almost invariable reply: "I shall first
have to talk this over with my husband."
She and Mr. van der Luyden were so exactly alike that Archer often
wondered how, after forty years of the closest conjugality, two such
merged identities ever separated themselves enough for anything as
controversial as a talking-over. But as neither had ever reached a
decision without prefacing it by this mysterious conclave, Mrs. Archer
and her son, having set forth their case, waited resignedly for the
familiar phrase.
Mrs. van der Luyden, however, who had seldom surprised any one, now
surprised them by reaching her long hand toward the bell-rope.
"I think," she said, "I should like Henry to hear what you have told
me."
A footman appeared, to whom she gravely added: "If Mr. van der Luyden
has finished reading the newspaper, please ask him to be kind enough to
come."
She said "reading the newspaper" in the tone in which a Minister's
wife might have said: "Presiding at a Cabinet meeting"--not from any
arrogance of mind, but because the habit of a life-time, and the
attitude of her friends and relations, had led her to consider Mr. van
der Luyden's least gesture as having an almost sacerdotal importance.
Her promptness of action showed that she considered the case as
pressing as Mrs. Archer; but, lest she should be thought to have
committed herself in advance, she added, with the sweetest look:
"Henry always enjoys seeing you, dear Adeline; and he will wish to
congratulate Newland."
The double doors had solemnly reopened and between them appeared Mr.
Henry van der Luyden, tall, spare and frock-coated, with faded fair
hair, a straight nose like his wife's and the same look of frozen
gentleness in eyes that were merely pale grey instead of pale blue.
Mr. van der Luyden greeted Mrs. Archer with cousinly affability,
proffered to Newland low-voiced congratulations couched in the same
language as his wife's, and seated himself in one of the brocade
armchairs with the simplicity of a reigning sovereign.
"I had just finished reading the Times," he said, laying his long
finger-tips together. "In town my mornings are so much occupied that I
find it more convenient to read the newspapers after luncheon."
"Ah, there's a great deal to be said for that plan--indeed I think my
uncle Egmont used to say he found it less agitating not to read the
morning papers till after dinner," said Mrs. Archer responsively.
"Yes: my good father abhorred hurry. But now we live in a constant
rush," said Mr. van der Luyden in measured tones, looking with pleasant
deliberation about the large shrouded room which to Archer was so
complete an image of its owners.
"But I hope you _had_ finished your reading, Henry?" his wife
interposed.
"Quite--quite," he reassured her.
"Then I should like Adeline to tell you--"
"Oh, it's really Newland's story," said his mother smiling; and
proceeded to rehearse once more the monstrous tale of the affront
inflicted on Mrs. Lovell Mingott.
"Of course," she ended, "Augusta Welland and Mary Mingott both felt
that, especially in view of Newland's engagement, you and Henry _ought
to know_."
"Ah--" said Mr. van der Luyden, drawing a deep breath.
There was a silence during which the tick of the monumental ormolu
clock on the white marble mantelpiece grew as loud as the boom of a
minute-gun. Archer contemplated with awe the two slender faded figures,
seated side by side in a kind of viceregal rigidity, mouthpieces of
some remote ancestral authority which fate compelled them to wield,
when they would so much rather have lived in simplicity and seclusion,
digging invisible weeds out of the perfect lawns of Skuytercliff, and
playing Patience together in the evenings.
Mr. van der Luyden was the first to speak.
"You really think this is due to some--some intentional interference of
Lawrence Lefferts's?" he enquired, turning to Archer.
"I'm certain of it, sir. Larry has been going it rather harder than
usual lately--if cousin Louisa won't mind my mentioning it--having
rather a stiff affair with the postmaster's wife in their village, or
some one of that sort; and whenever poor Gertrude Lefferts begins to
suspect anything, and he's afraid of trouble, he gets up a fuss of
this kind, to show how awfully moral he is, and talks at the top of
his voice about the impertinence of inviting his wife to meet people
he doesn't wish her to know. He's simply using Madame Olenska as a
lightning-rod; I've seen him try the same thing often before."
"The _Leffertses_!--" said Mrs. van der Luyden.
"The _Leffertses_!--" echoed Mrs. Archer. "What would uncle Egmont have
said of Lawrence Lefferts's pronouncing on anybody's social position?
It shows what Society has come to."
"We'll hope it has not quite come to that," said Mr. van der Luyden
firmly.
"Ah, if only you and Louisa went out more!" sighed Mrs. Archer.
But instantly she became aware of her mistake. The van der Luydens were
morbidly sensitive to any criticism of their secluded existence. They
were the arbiters of fashion, the Court of last Appeal, and they knew
it, and bowed to their fate. But being shy and retiring persons, with
no natural inclination for their part, they lived as much as possible
in the sylvan solitude of Skuytercliff, and when they came to town,
declined all invitations on the plea of Mrs. van der Luyden's health.
Newland Archer came to his mother's rescue. "Everybody in New York
knows what you and cousin Louisa represent. That's why Mrs. Mingott
felt she ought not to allow this slight on Countess Olenska to pass
without consulting you."
Mrs. van der Luyden glanced at her husband, who glanced back at her.
"It is the principle that I dislike," said Mr. van der Luyden. "As
long as a member of a well-known family is backed up by that family it
should be considered--final."
"It seems so to me," said his wife, as if she were producing a new
thought.
"I had no idea," Mr. van der Luyden continued, "that things had
come to such a pass." He paused, and looked at his wife again. "It
occurs to me, my dear, that the Countess Olenska is already a sort of
relation--through Medora Manson's first husband. At any rate, she will
be when Newland marries." He turned toward the young man. "Have you
read this morning's Times, Newland?"
"Why, yes, sir," said Archer, who usually tossed off half a dozen
papers with his morning coffee.
Husband and wife looked at each other again. Their pale eyes clung
together in prolonged and serious consultation; then a faint smile
fluttered over Mrs. van der Luyden's face. She had evidently guessed
and approved.
Mr. van der Luyden turned to Mrs. Archer. "If Louisa's health allowed
her to dine out--I wish you would say to Mrs. Lovell Mingott--she
and I would have been happy to--er--fill the places of the Lawrence
Leffertses at her dinner." He paused to let the irony of this sink in.
"As you know, this is impossible." Mrs. Archer sounded a sympathetic
assent. "But Newland tells me he has read this morning's Times;
therefore he has probably seen that Louisa's relative, the Duke of St.
Austrey, arrives next week on the Russia. He is coming to enter his
new sloop, the Guinevere, in next summer's International Cup Race; and
also to have a little canvasback shooting at Trevenna." Mr. van der
Luyden paused again, and continued with increasing benevolence: "Before
taking him down to Maryland we are inviting a few friends to meet him
here--only a little dinner--with a reception afterward. I am sure
Louisa will be as glad as I am if Countess Olenska will let us include
her among our guests." He got up, bent his long body with a stiff
friendliness toward his cousin, and added: "I think I have Louisa's
authority for saying that she will herself leave the invitation to
dine when she drives out presently: with our cards--of course with our
cards."
Mrs. Archer, who knew this to be a hint that the seventeen-hand
chestnuts which were never kept waiting were at the door, rose with a
hurried murmur of thanks. Mrs. van der Luyden beamed on her with the
smile of Esther interceding with Ahasuerus; but her husband raised a
protesting hand.
"There is nothing to thank me for, dear Adeline; nothing whatever. This
kind of thing must not happen in New York; it shall not, as long as I
can help it," he pronounced with sovereign gentleness as he steered his
cousins to the door.
Two hours later, every one knew that the great C-spring barouche in
which Mrs. van der Luyden took the air at all seasons had been seen at
old Mrs. Mingott's door, where a large square envelope was handed in;
and that evening at the Opera Mr. Sillerton Jackson was able to state
that the envelope contained a card inviting the Countess Olenska to the
dinner which the van der Luydens were giving the following week for
their cousin, the Duke of St. Austrey.
Some of the younger men in the club box exchanged a smile at this
announcement, and glanced sideways at Lawrence Lefferts, who sat
carelessly in the front of the box, pulling his long fair moustache,
and who remarked with authority, as the soprano paused: "No one but
Patti ought to attempt the Sonnambula."
VIII.
It was generally agreed in New York that the Countess Olenska had "lost
her looks."
She had appeared there first, in Newland Archer's boyhood, as a
brilliantly pretty little girl of nine or ten, of whom people said that
she "ought to be painted." Her parents had been continental wanderers,
and after a roaming babyhood she had lost them both, and been taken in
charge by her aunt, Medora Manson, also a wanderer, who was herself
returning to New York to "settle down."
Poor Medora, repeatedly widowed, was always coming home to settle down
(each time in a less expensive house), and bringing with her a new
husband or an adopted child; but after a few months she invariably
parted from her husband or quarrelled with her ward, and, having got
rid of her house at a loss, set out again on her wanderings. As her
mother had been a Rushworth, and her last unhappy marriage had linked
her to one of the crazy Chiverses, New York looked indulgently on her
eccentricities; but when she returned with her little orphaned niece,
whose parents had been popular in spite of their regrettable taste for
travel, people thought it a pity that the pretty child should be in
such hands.
Every one was disposed to be kind to little Ellen Mingott, though her
dusky red cheeks and tight curls gave her an air of gaiety that seemed
unsuitable in a child who should still have been in black for her
parents. It was one of the misguided Medora's many peculiarities to
flout the unalterable rules that regulated American mourning, and when
she stepped from the steamer her family were scandalised to see that
the crape veil she wore for her own brother was seven inches shorter
than those of her sisters-in-law, while little Ellen was in crimson
merino and amber beads, like a gipsy foundling.
But New York had so long resigned itself to Medora that only a few old
ladies shook their heads over Ellen's gaudy clothes, while her other
relations fell under the charm of her high colour and high spirits.
She was a fearless and familiar little thing, who asked disconcerting
questions, made precocious comments, and possessed outlandish arts,
such as dancing a Spanish shawl dance and singing Neapolitan love-songs
to a guitar. Under the direction of her aunt (whose real name was Mrs.
Thorley Chivers, but who, having received a Papal title, had resumed
her first husband's patronymic, and called herself the Marchioness
Manson, because in Italy she could turn it into Manzoni) the little
girl received an expensive but incoherent education, which included