She did not know then that it was Love who had come to her briefly, as in a dream before awaking, with the hues of morning on his wings—that it was Love to whom she was sobbing her farewell as his image was banished by the blameless rigor of irresistible day.
She only felt that there was something irrevocably amiss and lost in her lot, and her thoughts about the future were the more readily shapen into resolve.
Ardent souls, ready to construct their coming lives, are apt to commit themselves to the fulfilment of their own visions.
One day that she went to Freshitt to fulfil her promise of staying all night and seeing baby washed, Mrs. Cadwallader came to dine, the Rector being gone on a fishing excursion.
It was a warm evening, and even in the delightful drawing-room, where the fine old turf sloped from the open window towards a lilied pool and well-planted mounds, the heat was enough to make Celia in her white muslin and light curls reflect with pity on what Dodo must feel in her black dress and close cap.
But this was not until some episodes with baby were over, and had left her mind at leisure.
She had seated herself and taken up a fan for some time before she said, in her quiet guttural—
"Dear Dodo, do throw off that cap.
I am sure your dress must make you feel ill."
"I am so used to the cap—it has become a sort of shell," said Dorothea, smiling.
"I feel rather bare and exposed when it is off."
"I must see you without it; it makes us all warm," said Celia, throwing down her fan, and going to Dorothea.
It was a pretty picture to see this little lady in white muslin unfastening the widow's cap from her more majestic sister, and tossing it on to a chair.
Just as the coils and braids of dark-brown hair had been set free, Sir James entered the room.
He looked at the released head, and said, "Ah!" in a tone of satisfaction.
"It was I who did it, James," said Celia.
"Dodo need not make such a slavery of her mourning; she need not wear that cap any more among her friends."
"My dear Celia," said Lady Chettam, "a widow must wear her mourning at least a year."
"Not if she marries again before the end of it," said Mrs. Cadwallader, who had some pleasure in startling her good friend the Dowager.
Sir James was annoyed, and leaned forward to play with Celia's Maltese dog.
"That is very rare, I hope," said Lady Chettam, in a tone intended to guard against such events.
"No friend of ours ever committed herself in that way except Mrs. Beevor, and it was very painful to Lord Grinsell when she did so.
Her first husband was objectionable, which made it the greater wonder.
And severely she was punished for it.
They said Captain Beevor dragged her about by the hair, and held up loaded pistols at her."
"Oh, if she took the wrong man!" said Mrs. Cadwallader, who was in a decidedly wicked mood.
"Marriage is always bad then, first or second.
Priority is a poor recommendation in a husband if he has got no other.
I would rather have a good second husband than an indifferent first."
"My dear, your clever tongue runs away with you," said Lady Chettam.
"I am sure you would be the last woman to marry again prematurely, if our dear Rector were taken away."
"Oh, I make no vows; it might be a necessary economy.
It is lawful to marry again, I suppose; else we might as well be Hindoos instead of Christians.
Of course if a woman accepts the wrong man, she must take the consequences, and one who does it twice over deserves her fate.
But if she can marry blood, beauty, and bravery—the sooner the better."
"I think the subject of our conversation is very ill-chosen," said Sir James, with a look of disgust.
"Suppose we change it."
"Not on my account, Sir James," said Dorothea, determined not to lose the opportunity of freeing herself from certain oblique references to excellent matches.
"If you are speaking on my behalf, I can assure you that no question can be more indifferent and impersonal to me than second marriage.
It is no more to me than if you talked of women going fox-hunting: whether it is admirable in them or not, I shall not follow them.
Pray let Mrs. Cadwallader amuse herself on that subject as much as on any other."
"My dear Mrs. Casaubon," said Lady Chettam, in her stateliest way, "you do not, I hope, think there was any allusion to you in my mentioning Mrs. Beevor.
It was only an instance that occurred to me.
She was step-daughter to Lord Grinsell: he married Mrs. Teveroy for his second wife.
There could be no possible allusion to you."
"Oh no," said Celia.
"Nobody chose the subject; it all came out of Dodo's cap.
Mrs. Cadwallader only said what was quite true.
A woman could not be married in a widow's cap, James."
"Hush, my dear!" said Mrs. Cadwallader. "I will not offend again.