The Well in the Desert | Page 3

do--had grown into a very ordinary, commonplace woman. Her hair, indeed, was glossy and luxuriant, and had deepened from its early flaxen into the darkest shade to which it was possible for flaxen to change; her eyes were dark, with a sad, tired, wistful look in them--a look
"Of a dumb creature who had been beaten once, And never since was easy with the world."
Her face was white and thin, her figure tall, slender, angular, and rather awkward. None had ever cared to amend her awkwardness; it signified to nobody whether she looked well or ill. In a word, she signified to nobody. The tears might burn under her eyelids, or overflow and fall,--she would never be asked what was the matter; she might fail under her burdens and faint in the midst of them,--and if it occurred to any one to prevent material injury to her, that was the very utmost she could expect. Not that the Lady Alianora was unkind to her stepdaughter: that is, not actively unkind. She simply ignored her existence. Philippa was provided, as a matter of course, with necessary clothes, just as the men who served in the hall were provided with livery; but anything not absolutely necessary had never been given to her in her life. There were no loving words, no looks of pleasure, no affectionate caresses, lavished upon her. If the Lady Joan lost her temper (no rare occurrence), or the Lady Alesia her appetite, or the Lady Mary her sleep, the whole household was disturbed; but what Philippa suffered never disturbed nor concerned any one but herself. To these, her half-sisters, she formed a kind of humble companion, a superior maid-of-all-work. All day long she heard and obeyed the commands of the three young ladies; all day long she was bidden, "Come here", "Go there", "Do this", "Fetch that." And Philippa came, and went, and fetched, and did as she was told. Just now she was off duty. Their Ladyships were gone out hawking with the Earl and Countess, and would not, in all probability, return for some hours.
And what was Philippa doing, as she sat gazing dreamily from the casement of her turret-chamber--hers, only because nobody else liked the room? Her eyes were fixed earnestly on one little spot of ground, a few feet from the castle gate; and her soul was wandering backward nineteen years, recalling the one scene which stood out vividly, the earliest of memory's pictures--a picture without text to explain it--before which, and after which, came blanks with no recollection to fill them. She saw herself lifted underneath a woman's veil--clasped earnestly in a woman's arms,--gazing in baby wonder up into a woman's face--a wan white face, with dark, expressive, fervent eyes, in which a whole volume of agony and love was written. She never knew who that woman was. Indeed, she sometimes wondered whether it were really a remembrance, or only a picture drawn by her own imagination. But there it was always, deep down in the heart's recesses, only waiting to be called on, and to come. Whoever this mysterious woman were, it was some one who had loved her-- her, Philippa, whom no one ever loved. For Alina, who had died in her childhood, she scarcely recollected at all. And at the very core of the unseen, unknown heart of this quiet, undemonstrative girl, there lay one intense, earnest, passionate longing for love. If but one of her father's hawks or hounds would have looked brighter at her coming, she thought it would have satisfied her. For she had learned, long years ere this, that to her father himself, or to the Lady Alianora, or to her half-brothers and sisters, she must never look for any shadow of love. The "mother-want about the world," which pressed on her so heavily, they would never fill. The dull, blank uniformity of simple apathy was all she ever received from any of them.
Her very place was filled. The Lady Joan was the eldest daughter of the house--not Mistress Philippa. For the pleasure of the Countess had been fulfilled, and Mistress Philippa the girl was called. And when Joan was married and went away from the castle (in a splendid litter hung with crimson velvet), her sister Alesia stepped into her place as a matter of course. Philippa did not, indeed, see the drawbacks to Joan's lot. They were not apparent on the surface. That the stately young noble who rode on a beautiful Barbary horse beside the litter, actually hated the girl whom he had been forced to marry, did not enter into her calculations: but as Joan cared very little for that herself, it was the less necessary that Philippa should do so. And Philippa only missed Joan from the house by the fact that