an offer to place them in France at her own cost for the completion of their education. Captain Chesney and Jane were too sensible of the advantages of such an offer to decline it, and Laura and Clarice were sent to France. When Lady Oakburn chose to do a thing, she did it well and liberally, and the small select Protestant school chosen, situate in the vicinity of Neuilly, was one eligible in all respects. The young ladies were well treated, well instructed, well cared for; and Laura and Clarice remained there for three years—Laura being nineteen, Clarice eighteen, when they returned.
They returned to a less comfortable home than the one they had quitted in France; for the embarrassments of Captain Chesney’s house—then situated, as you may remember, in the neighbourhood of Plymouth—were at that time reaching their acme. The petty debts perpetually being pressed for, the straitened comforts of the ménage, the almost entire deprivation, through poverty, of the society and amusement so longed for at their age, tried their patience and tried their tempers. Jane bore all meekly for the sake of her father; Lucy was too young to feel it; but on Laura and Clarice it fell heavily.
Clarice was the first to break through the yoke. For two years she made the best of it; was in fact obliged to make the best of it, for what else could she do?—but shortly after her twentieth birthday had passed, she suddenly announced her intention of going out as governess. And had she announced her intention of going round the country in a caravan to dance at fairs, it could not have been received with more indignant displeasure by her family.
Not by one of them only, but by all. Captain Chesney did not condescend to reason with her, he raved at her and forbade her. Jane reasoned; Laura ridiculed; but Clarice held to her own will. That she had a strong will of her own, that contention proved; a will as strong and obstinate as Captain Chesney’s. It was in complete opposition to the high notions, the long-cherished pride of the well-born family, that one of its daughters should lower herself to the position of a dependent—a governess—a servant, it might be said, to the caprices of strangers less well born than she was. Clarice declared that she would be doing, as she believed, a right thing; her only motive was to help her family: first, by relieving them of her cost and maintenance; secondly, by applying part of her salary, if she should prove fortunate in getting a good one, to assist in the financial department at home.
That Clarice was sufficiently sincere in avowing this to be her motive, there was no reason to doubt, for she believed it to be the chief one. But had she been capable of strictly analysing her own mind and feelings, it would perhaps have been found that she was also swayed at least in an equal degree by the desire of getting into a home where there would be less of discomfort. Be this as it might, Clarice quitted her home in quite as much disobedience and defiance as Laura was destined subsequently to quit it. There had been a few weeks spent in disputes and useless opposition, Clarice on one side, the whole family on the other; it ended in one violent bitter quarrel, and then Clarice left.
It might have been better had Lady Oakburn not interfered in it. She only added fuel to the flame. Kindness might have availed with Clarice; anger did not. And Lady Oakburn did not spare her anger, or her reproaches. It is true, that when she found these reproaches useless—that they only rendered Clarice more bent upon her plan, she changed her tactics and offered the young lady a home with her, rather than she should persist in what, according to their notions, reflected so much disgrace on the family. But it was then too late. Perhaps at no time would any one of the girls have been willing to accept a home with their domineering old aunt, and Clarice, in her high spirit, resented her present anger and interference too greatly to do aught save send back the offer with something that to the indignant countess looked like scorn. In the last angry scene, the one that occurred just before Clarice left, she affirmed that no disgrace, through her, should ever be cast upon the family of Chesney; for she would change her name at once, and never betray her family to strangers. In her mad imprudence she took a vow so to act. In this mood she quitted her home; and Lady Oakburn immediately turned her anger upon Captain Chesney: he ought to have kept her in with cords, had it been necessary, she said, and not have suffered her to go away from home. It was next to impossible for Lady Oakburn not to vent her anger upon somebody; but in this case the captain was undeserving of it, for Clarice quitted the house in secret, and none knew of her departure until she had gone.
Opposition was over then. Lady Oakburn retreated into her pride, taking no further heed of the matter or of Clarice; Captain Chesnoy virtually did the same, and forbade the name of his offending daughter ever to be mentioned. In vain Jane pleaded that Clarice might be sought out; might at least be seen after, and one more effort made to induce her to hear reason, and return to her home. Captain Chesney would not listen, and quarrelled