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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/12485-h.zip b/12485-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..5784f3d --- /dev/null +++ b/12485-h.zip diff --git a/12485-h/12485-h.htm b/12485-h/12485-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..9908487 --- /dev/null +++ b/12485-h/12485-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,16274 @@ +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd"> +<html> +<head> +<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" /> +<title>The Three Brides</title> + <style type="text/css"> +/*<![CDATA[ XML blockout */ +<!-- + P { margin-top: .75em; + text-align: justify; + margin-bottom: .75em; + } + H1, H2, H3, H4 { + text-align: center; /* all headings aligned centered */ + margin-top: 2em; + margin-bottom: 2em; + } + BODY{margin-left: 10%; + margin-right: 10%; + } + .blkquot {margin-left: 4em; margin-right: 4em;} /* block indent */ + // --> + /* XML end ]]>*/ + </style> +</head> +<body> +<h2> +<a href="#startoftext">The Three Brides, by Charlotte M. Yonge</a> +</h2> +<pre> +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Three Brides, by Charlotte M. Yonge + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Three Brides + +Author: Charlotte M. Yonge + +Release Date: June 1, 2004 [eBook #12485] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE THREE BRIDES*** +</pre> +<p><a name="startoftext"></a></p> +<p>Transcribed by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk</p> +<h1>THE THREE BRIDES</h1> +<h2>CHAPTER I<br /> +The Model And Her Copies</h2> +<blockquote><p>There is sure another Flood toward, that so many couples +are coming to the Ark.—As You Like It</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Ah! it is a pitiable case!”</p> +<p>“What case, boys?”</p> +<p>“Yours, mother, with such an influx of daughters-in-law.”</p> +<p>“I suspect the daughters-in-law think themselves more to be +pitied.”</p> +<p>“As too many suns in one sphere.”</p> +<p>“As daughters-in-law at all.”</p> +<p>“There’s a ready cure for that. Eh, Charlie?”</p> +<p>“The sight of the mother-in-law.”</p> +<p>“Safe up on the shelf? Ha, you flattering boys!”</p> +<p>“Well, each of the three bridegrooms has severally told us +that his bride was a strong likeness of the mother, so she will have +the advantage of three mirrors!”</p> +<p>“Ay, and each married solely for her benefit. I wonder +which is the truest!”</p> +<p>“Come, Baby Charles, don’t <i>you</i> take to being cynical +and satirical,” said the mother. “It would be more +to the purpose to consider of the bringing them home. Let me see, +Raymond and his Cecil will be at Holford’s Gate at 5.30. +They must have the carriage in full state. I suppose Brewer knows.”</p> +<p>“Trust the ringers for scenting it out.”</p> +<p>“Julius and Rosamond by the down train at Willansborough, at +4.50. One of you must drive old Snapdragon in the van for them. +They will not mind when they understand; but there’s that poor +wife of Miles’s, I wish she could have come a few days earlier. +Her friend, Mrs. Johnson, is to drop her by the express at Backsworth, +at 3.30.”</p> +<p>“Inconvenient woman!”</p> +<p>“I imagine that she cannot help it; Mrs. Johnson is going far +north, and was very good in staying with her at Southampton till she +could move. Poor little thing! alone in a strange country! +I’ll tell you what! One of you must run down by train, meet +her, and either bring her home in a fly, or wait to be picked up by +Raymond’s train. Take her Miles’s letter.”</p> +<p>The two young men glanced at one another in dismay, and the elder +said, “Wouldn’t nurse do better?”</p> +<p>“No, no, Frank,” said the younger, catching a distressed +look on their mother’s face, “I’ll look up Miles’s +little African. I’ve rather a curiosity that way. +Only don’t let them start the bells under the impression that +we are a pair of the victims. If so, I shall bolt.”</p> +<p>“Julius must be the nearest bolting,” said Frank. +“How he accomplished it passes my comprehension. I shall +not believe in it till I see him. There, then, I’ll give +orders. Barouche for the squire, van for the rector, and the rattling +fly for the sailor’s wife. So wags the course of human life,” +chanted Frank Charnock, as he strolled out of the room.</p> +<p>“Thanks, Charlie,” whispered his mother. “I +am grieved for that poor young thing. I wish I could go myself. +And, Charlie, would you cast an eye round, and see how things look in +their rooms? You have always been my daughter.”</p> +<p>“Ah! my vocation is gone! Three in one day! I wonder +which is the best of the lot. I bet upon Miles’s Cape Gooseberry.—Tired, +mother darling? Shall I send in nurse? I must be off, if +I am to catch the 12.30 train.”</p> +<p>He bent to kiss the face, which was too delicately shaped and tinted +to look old enough to be in expectation of three daughters-in-law. +No, prostrate as she was upon pillows, Mrs. Charnock Poynsett did not +look as if she had attained fifty years. She was lady of Compton +Poynsett in her own right; and had been so early married and widowed, +as to have been the most efficient parental influence her five sons +had ever known; and their beautiful young mother had been the object +of their adoration from the nursery upwards, so that she laughed at +people who talked of the trouble and anxiety of rearing sons.</p> +<p>They had all taken their cue from their senior, who had always been +more to his mother than all the world besides. For several years, +he being as old of his age as she was young, Mr. and Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, +with scarcely eighteen years between their ages, had often been taken +by strangers for husband and wife rather than son and mother. +And though she knew she ought to wish for his marriage, she could not +but be secretly relieved that there were no symptoms of any such went +impending.</p> +<p>At last, during the first spring after Raymond Charnock Poynsett, +Esquire, had been elected member for the little borough of Willansborough, +his mother, while riding with her two youngest boys, met with an accident +so severe, that in two years she had never quitted the morning-room, +whither she had at first been carried. She was daily lifted to +a couch, but she could endure no further motion, though her general +health had become good, and her cheerfulness made her room pleasant +to her sons when the rest of the house was very dreary to them.</p> +<p>Raymond, always the home son, would never have absented himself but +for his parliamentary duties, and vibrated between London and home, +until, when his mother had settled into a condition that seemed likely +to be permanent, and his two youngest brothers were at home, reading +each for his examination, the one for a Government clerkship, the other +for the army, he yielded to the general recommendation, and set out +for a journey on the Continent.</p> +<p>A few weeks later came the electrifying news of his engagement to +his second cousin, Cecil Charnock. It was precisely the most obvious +and suitable of connections. She was the only child of the head +of the family of which his father had been a cadet, and there were complications +of inheritance thus happily disposed of. Mrs. Poynsett had not +seen her since her earliest childhood; but she was known to have been +educated with elaborate care, and had been taken to the Continent as +the completion of her education, and there Raymond had met her, and +sped so rapidly with his wooing, that he had been married at Venice +just four weeks previously.</p> +<p>Somewhat less recent was the wedding of the second son Commander +Miles Charnock. (The younger sons bore their patronymic alone.) +His ship had been stationed at the Cape and there, on a hunting expedition +up the country, he had been detained by a severe illness at a settler’s +house; and this had resulted in his marrying the eldest daughter, Anne +Fraser. She had spent some months at Simon’s Bay while his +ship was there, and when he found himself under orders for the eastern +coast of Africa, she would fain have awaited him at Glen Fraser; but +he preferred sending her home to fulfil the mission of daughterhood +to his own mother.</p> +<p>The passage had been long and unfavourable, and the consequences +to her had been so serious that when she landed she could not travel +until after a few days’ rest.</p> +<p>The marriage of the third son had been a much greater surprise. +Compton Poynsett was not a family living; but the patron, hearing of +Julius Charnock as a hard-working curate in a distant seaport, wrote +to offer it to him; and the same letter to Mrs. Poynsett to offer it +to him; and the same letter to Mrs Poynsett which conveyed this gratifying +intelligence, also informed her of his having proposed to the daughter +of the commanding officer of the regiment stationed at the town where +lay his present charge. Her father enjoyed the barren honours +of the Earldom of Rathforlane, an unimprovable estate in a remote corner +of Ireland, burthened with successive families of numerous daughters, +so that he was forced to continue in the service, and the marriage had +been hastened by the embarkation of the regiment for India only two +days later. The Rectory had, however, been found in such a state +of dilapidation, that demolition was the only cure; and thus the Reverend +Julius and Lady Rosamond Charnock were to begin their married life in +the family home.</p> +<p>The two youngest sons, Francis and Charles, stood on the other side +of a gap made by the loss of two infants, and were only twenty-one and +nineteen. Frank had passed through Oxford with credit, and had +been promised a Government office; while Charles was intended for the +army; and both had been reading with a tutor who lived at Willansborough, +and was continually employed in cramming, being reported of as the best +‘coach’ in the country. Charlie, however, had passed +a week previously, and was to repair to Sandhurst in another fortnight.</p> +<p>At half-past four there was a light tap at Mrs. Poynsett’s +door, and Charlie announced, “Here’s the first, mother!” +as he brought in a gray-cloaked figure; and Mrs. Poynsett took a trembling +hand, and bestowed a kiss on a cheek which had languor and exhaustion +in the very touch.</p> +<p>“She was tired to death, mother,” said Charlie, “so +we did not wait for the train.”</p> +<p>“Quite right!” and as the newcomer sank into the chair +he offered—“My dear, you are sadly knocked up! You +were hardly fit to come.”</p> +<p>“Thank you, I am quite well,” answered the fagged timid +voice.</p> +<p>“Hark!” as the crash of a peal of bells came up. +“Dear child, you will like to rest before any fresh introductions. +You shall go to your room and have some tea there.”</p> +<p>“Thank you.”</p> +<p>“Charlie, call Susan.—She is my boys’ old nurse, +now mine. Only tell me you have good accounts from my boy Miles.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes;” and the hand tightly clasped the closely-written +letter for which the mother’s eyes felt hungry. “He +sent you his love, and he will write to you next time. He was +so busy, his first lieutenant was down in fever.”</p> +<p>“Where was he?”</p> +<p>“Off Zanzibar—otherwise the crew was healthy—the +12th of August,” she answered, squeezing out the sentences as +if constrained by the mother’s anxious gaze.</p> +<p>“And he was quite well when you parted with him?”</p> +<p>“Quite.”</p> +<p>“Ah! you nursed my boy, and we must nurse you for him.”</p> +<p>“Thank you, I am quite well.” But she bit her lip, +and spoke constrainedly, as if too shy and reserved to give way to the +rush of emotion; but the coldness pained Mrs. Poynsett, whose expansiveness +was easily checked; and a brief silence was followed by Charlie’s +return to report that he could not find nurse, and thought she was out +with the other servants, watching for the arrival; in another moment, +the approaching cheers caused him to rush out; and after many more noises, +showing the excitement of the multitude and the advance of the bridal +pair, during which Mrs. Poynsett lay with deepening colour and clasped +hands, her nostrils dilating with anxiety and suppressed eagerness, +there entered a tall, dark, sunburnt man bringing on his arm a little, +trim, upright, girlish figure; and bending down, he exclaimed, “There, +mother, I’ve brought her—here’s your daughter!”</p> +<p>Two little gloved hands were put into hers, and a kiss exchanged, +while Raymond anxiously inquired for his mother’s health; and +she broke in by saying, “And here is Anne—Miles’s +Anne, just arrived.”</p> +<p>“Ah, I did not see you in the dark,” said Raymond. +“There, Cecil, is a sister for you—you never had one.”</p> +<p>Cecil was readier with greeting hand and cheek than was Anne, but +at the same moment the tea equipage was brought in, and Cecil, quite +naturally, and as a matter of course, began to preside over the low +table, while Raymond took his accustomed chair on the further side of +his mother’s sofa, where he could lean over the arm and study +her countenance, while she fondled the hand that he had hung over the +back. He was describing the welcome at the station, and all through +the village—the triumphal arches and shouts.</p> +<p>“But how they <i>did</i> miss you, mother,” said Charlie. +“Old Gurnet wrung my hand in tears as he said, ‘Yes, sir, +’tis very fine, but it beats the heart out of it that madam bain’t +here to see.’”</p> +<p>“Good old Gurnet!” responded Raymond. “They +are famously loyal. The J. C. P. crowned all above all the Cs +and Rs, I was happy to see.”</p> +<p>“J. was for Julius—not Julia,” said the mother.</p> +<p>“No; J. H. C. and R. C. had a separate device of roses all +to themselves. Hark! is that a cheer beginning again? Had +we not better go into the drawing-room, mother? it will be so many for +you all together.”</p> +<p>“Oh no, I must see you all.”</p> +<p>The brothers hurried out with their welcome; and in another minute, +a plump soft cheek was pressed to the mother’s, devouring kisses +were hailed on her, and a fuller sweeter tone than had yet been heard +answered the welcome.</p> +<p>“Thank you. So kind! Here’s Julius! +I’ll not be in your way.”</p> +<p>“Dearest mother, how is it with you?” as her son embraced +her. “Rose has been longing to be with you.”</p> +<p>“And we’ve all come together! How delicious!” +cried Rosamond, enfolding Anne in her embrace; “I didn’t +know you were come!—See, Julius!”</p> +<p>But as Julius turned, a startled look came over Anne’s face; +and she turned so white, that Rosamond exclaimed, “My dear—what—she’s +faint!” And while Cecil stood looking puzzled, Rosamond +had her arm round the trembling form, and disappeared with her, guided +and assisted by Nurse Susan.</p> +<p>“Isn’t she—?” exclaimed Julius, in a voice +of triumph that made all smile.</p> +<p>“Full of sweet kindness,” said Mrs. Poynsett; “but +I have only seen and heard her yet, my dear Julius. Susan will +take her to her room—my old one.”</p> +<p>“Oh, thank you, mother,” said Julius, “but I hardly +like that; it seems like your giving it up.”</p> +<p>“On the contrary, it proves that I do not give it up, since +I put in temporary lodgers like you.—Now Cecil is housed as you +preferred, Raymond—in the wainscot-rooms.”</p> +<p>“And where have you put that poor Mrs. Miles?” asked +Raymond. “She looks quite knocked up.”</p> +<p>“Yes, she has been very ill on the voyage, and waited at Southampton +to gather strength for the journey.—I am so grateful to your good +Rose, Julius.—Why, where is the boy? Vanished in her wake, +I declare!”</p> +<p>“His venerable head is quite turned,” said Frank. +“I had to get inside alone, and let them drive home outside together +to avoid separation.”</p> +<p>Raymond repeated his question as to the quarters of Miles’s +wife.</p> +<p>“I had the old schoolroom and the bedroom adjoining newly fitted +up,” answered Mrs. Poynsett. “Jenny Bowater was here +yesterday, and gave the finishing touches. She tells me the rooms +look very nice.—Cecil, my dear, you must excuse deficiencies; +I shall look to you in future.”</p> +<p>“I hope to manage well,” said Cecil. “Had +I not better go up now? Will you show me the way, Raymond?”</p> +<p>The mother and her two younger sons remained.</p> +<p>“Haven’t I brought you home a splendid article?” +was Frank’s exclamation. “Julius has got the best +of it.”</p> +<p>“I back my Cape Gooseberry,” returned Charles. +“She has eyes and hair and skin that my Lady can’t match, +and is a fine figure of a woman besides.”</p> +<p>“Much you know of Rosamond’s eyes!”</p> +<p>“Or you either, boxed up in the van.”</p> +<p>“Any way, they have made roast meat of his Reverence’s +heart! The other two take it much more easily.”</p> +<p>“She’s a mere chicken,” said Charlie. “Who +would have thought of Raymond being caught by a callow nestling?”</p> +<p>“And so uncommonly cool,” added Frank.</p> +<p>“It would take much to transform Raymond,” interposed +the mother. “Now, boys, away with you; I must have a little +quiet, to repair myself for company after dinner.”</p> +<p>Charlie settled her cushions with womanly skill, and followed his +brother. “Well, Frank, which is the White Cat? Ah, +I thought so—she’s yet to come.”</p> +<p>“Not one is fit to hold a candle to <i>her</i>. You saw +that as plain as I did, Charlie; Eleonora beats them all.”</p> +<p>“Ah, you’re not the youngest brother, remember. +It was he who brought her home at last. Come, you need not knock +me down; I shall never see any one to surpass the mother, and I’ll +have no one till I do.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER II<br /> +The Population of Compton Poynsett</h2> +<blockquote><p>He wanted a wife his braw hoose to keep,<br /> +But favour wi’ wooin’ was fashous to seek.—Laird o’ +Cockpen</p> +</blockquote> +<p>In the bright lamplight of the dining-table, the new population first +fully beheld one another, and understood one another’s looks.</p> +<p>There was much family resemblance between the five brothers. +All were well-grown well-made men, strong and agile, the countenance +pleasing, rather square of mould, eyebrows straight and thick, nose +well cut and short, chin firm and resolute-looking, and the complexion +very dark in Raymond, Frank, and the absent Miles. Frank’s +eyes were soft, brown, rather pensive, and absent in expression; but +Raymond’s were much deeper and darker, and had a steadfast gravity, +that made him be viewed as formidable, especially as he had lost all +the youthful glow of colouring that mantled in his brother’s olive +cheek; and he had a short, thick, curly brown beard, while Frank had +only attained to a black moustache, that might almost have been drawn +on his lip with charcoal.</p> +<p>Charlie was an exception—fair, blue-eyed, rosy, and with a +soft feminine contour of visage, which had often drawn on him reproaches +for not being really the daughter all his mother’s friends desired +for her.</p> +<p>And Julius, with the outlines of the others, was Albino, with transparent +skin mantling with colour that contrasted with his snowy hair, eyebrows, +and the lashes, veiling eyes of a curious coral hue, really not unpleasing +under their thick white fringes, but most inconveniently short of sight, +although capable of much work; in fact, he was a curiously perfect pink-and-white +edition of his dark and bronzed brother the sailor.</p> +<p>The dark eyes came from the father’s side; Cecil had them, +and very observing orbs they seemed to be, travelling about from one +face to another, and into every corner of the room, scrutinizing every +picture or piece of plate, and trying to see into the conservatory, +which had a glass door opening from one end of the room. She was +the youngest of the brides, and her features and form seemed hardly +developed, nor had she attained the air of a matron; her fashionable +dress of crisp white worked muslin with blue trimmings, and blue ribbons +in her brown hair, only gave her the air of a young girl at her first +party, in spite of her freedom from all shyness as she sat at the head +of the table in contented self-possession, her little slender figure +as upright as a perfect spine could make it.</p> +<p>Very different was the bride on Raymond’s right hand. +She was of middle height, soft, round, and plump, carrying her head +a little tenderly on one side with a delightful <i>dégagée</i> +kind of ease, and air of vivacious indolence. Her complexion was +creamy and colourless, her nose rather <i>retroussé</i>, her +lips full and parting in a delicious roguish smile, answering to the +sleepily twinkling eyes, whose irides seemed to shade so imperceptibly +into the palest gray, that there was no telling where the pupils ended, +especially as the lids were habitually half closed, as if weighed down +by the black length of their borders. The habit of arching up +one or other of the eyebrows, in surprise or interrogation, gave a drollery +to the otherwise nonchalant sweetness of the countenance. The +mass of raven black hair was only adorned by a crimson ribbon, beneath +which it had been thrust into a net, with a long thing that had once +been a curl on the shoulder of the white tumbled bodice worn over a +gray skirt which looked as if it had done solitary duty for the five +weeks since the marriage, and was but slightly relieved by a crimson +sash.</p> +<p>Rosamond made some apology when she saw Cecil’s dainty equipment. +“Dressed, you correct little thing! You put me to shame; +but I had no notion which box my evening things are in, and it would +have been serious to irritate the whole concern.”</p> +<p>“And she was some time with Anne,” added Julius.</p> +<p>“Ah! with my good will Anne should not have been here!” +rejoined Rosamond. “Didn’t I meet old Mrs. Nurse at +your threshold, with an invitation from Mrs. Poynsett to dine with her +in her room, and didn’t we find the bird flown at the first stroke +of the gong?”</p> +<p>“Oh, I am very well!” repeated Anne.</p> +<p>Yet she was far more colourless than Julius, for her complexion was +not only faded by sickness, but was naturally of the whitest blonde +tint; the simple coils of her hair “lint white,” and her +eyes of the lightest tint of pure blue. The features were of Scottish +type, all the more so from being exaggerated by recent illness; but +they were handsome enough to show that she must have been a bonnie lassie +when her good looks were unimpaired. Her figure far surpassed +in height that of both the other ladies, and was very slender, bending +with languor and fatigue in spite of her strenuous attempts to straighten +it. She was clad in a perfectly plain, almost quaker-looking light +dove-coloured silk dress, fitting closely, and unrelieved by any ribbon +or ornament of any description, so that her whole appearance suggested +nothing but the words “washed out.”</p> +<p>It was clear that to let her alone was merciful, and there was no +lack of mutual communications among the rest. Frank and Charlie +gave their account of the condition of the game.</p> +<p>“Do you let your tenants shoot rabbits?” exclaimed Cecil, +as if scandalized. “We never do at Dunstone.”</p> +<p>“It prevents an immense amount of discontent and ill-will and +underhand work,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“My father never will listen to any nonsense about rabbits,” +proceeded Cecil. “If you once begin there is no end to it, +they are sure to encroach. He just sends them a basket of game +at the beginning and end of the season.”</p> +<p>“By the bye,” said Raymond, “I hope ours have all +been sent out as usual.”</p> +<p>“I can answer for a splendid one at our wedding breakfast,” +said Rosamond. “The mess-man who came to help was lost in +admiration. Did you breakfast on ortolans, Cecil?”</p> +<p>“Or on nightingales’ tongues?” added Charlie.</p> +<p>“You might as well say fatted dormice and snails,” said +Frank. “One would think the event had been eighteen hundred +years ago.”</p> +<p>“Poor Frank! he’s stuffed so hard that it is bursting +out at all his pores!” exclaimed Charlie.</p> +<p>“Ah! you have the advantage of your elder, Master Charles!” +said Raymond, with a paternal sound of approbation.</p> +<p>“Till next time,” said Frank. “Now, thank +goodness, mine is once for all!”</p> +<p>The conversation drifted away to Venice and the homeward journey, +which Raymond and Cecil seemed to have spent in unremitting sight-seeing. +The quantities of mountains, cathedrals, and pictures they had inspected +was quite appalling.</p> +<p>“How hard you must have worked!” exclaimed Rosamond. +“Had you never a day’s rest out of the thirty?”</p> +<p>“Had we, Cecil? I believe not,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“Sundays?” gasped Anne’s low voice at his elbow.</p> +<p>“Indeed,” triumphantly returned Cecil, “between +English service and High Mass, and Benediction, and the public gardens, +and listening to the band, we had not a single blank Sunday.”</p> +<p>Anne started and looked aghast; and Raymond said, “The opportunity +was not to be wasted, and Cecil enjoyed everything with unwearied vigour.”</p> +<p>“Why, what else should we have done? It would have been +very dull and stupid to have stayed in together,” said Cecil, +with a world of innocent wonder in her eyes. Then turning to her +neighbour, “Surely, Julius, you went about and saw things!”</p> +<p>“The sea at Filey Bridge, and the Church Congress at Leeds,” +he answered, smiling.</p> +<p>“Very shocking, is it not, Cecil?” said Rosamond, with +mock gravity; “but he must be forgiven, for he was tired to death! +I used to think, for my part, that lovers were a sort of mild lunatics, +never to be troubled or trusted with any earthly thing; but that’s +one of the things modern times have changed! As he was to be going, +all the clerical staff of St. Awdry’s must needs have their holiday +and leave him to do their work; indeed, one was sent off here. +For six weeks I never saw him, except when he used to rush in to say +he couldn’t stay; and when at last we were safe in the coupé, +he fairly went to sleep before we got to the first station.—Hush! +you <i>know</i> you did! And no wonder, for he had been up two +nights with some sort of infidel who was supposed to be dying. +Then that first week at Filey, he used to bring out his poetry books +as the proper sort of thing, and try to read them to me on the sands: +but by the time he had got to the bottom of a page, I used to hear the +words dragging out slower and slower—</p> +<blockquote><p>Whereon the—lily—maid—of—Astolat<br /> +Lay—smiling—like—a—star-fish—fast—asleep.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Wherewith Rosamond dropped her head and closed her eyes; while the +brothers shouted with mirth, except Frank, whose countenance was ‘of +one hurt on a vulnerable side.’</p> +<p>“Disrespect to Elaine? Eh, Frank?” said Charlie; +“how many pegs has Julius gone down in your estimation?”</p> +<p>Frank would not commit himself, but he was evidently at the era of +sensitiveness on the poetical side. Cecil spoke for him. +“How very provoking! What did you do to him, Rosamond?”</p> +<p>“I kept off the sand-flies! I can’t say but I was +glad of a little rest, for I had been packing up for the whole family +for ten days past, with interludes of rushing out into the town; for +whatever we had not forgotten, the shops had not sent home! Oh! +what a paradise of quiet it was under the rocks at Filey—wasn’t +it, Julius?”</p> +<p>“We will go there again next time we have a chance,” +said Julius, looking blissful.</p> +<p>“I would never go again to the same place,” cried Cecil. +“That’s not the way to acquire new ideas.”</p> +<p>“We are too old to acquire new ideas, my dear,” drawled +Rosamond, sleepily.</p> +<p>“What did you go to the Church Congress for!” asked Charlie.</p> +<p>“I hope Julius was awake by that time,” said Frank.</p> +<p>“Not if we are to have all the new ideas tried on us,” +said Raymond, dryly.</p> +<p>“I went to a Congress once!” exclaimed Cecil.</p> +<p>“Indeed!” said her husband, surprised.</p> +<p>“Yes. We thought we ought to encourage them. It +was the Congress of Sunday-school managers for our archdeaconry.”</p> +<p>“Did you acquire any new ideas?” asked Frank; while Rosamond’s +very eyelashes seemed to curl with suppressed diversion.</p> +<p>“Oh yes. We explained our system of tickets, and the +Arch-deacon said it was a very good one, and ought to be adopted everywhere.”</p> +<p>This mode of acquisition of new ideas was quite too much for Julius +and Charlie, who both exploded; but Frank retained composure enough +to ask, “Did you explain it in person?”</p> +<p>“No. We made Mr. Venn.”</p> +<p>“The schoolmaster?” said Julius.</p> +<p>“No. He is <i>our</i> clergyman, and he always does as +<i>we</i> tell him; and <i>so</i> Dunstone is quite the model parish +of the archdeaconry.”</p> +<p>Julius could not help making an odd little bend of the head, half +deferential, half satirical; and Raymond said, “Cecil, I believe +it rests with you to make the move.” An ingenuous girlish +blush mantled on her cheek as she looked towards Rosamond and moved.</p> +<p>The drawing-room adjoined the dining-room, and likewise had a glass +door leading into the conservatory; but this, like the other windows, +was concealed by the pale-blue damask curtains that descended from cornices +gilded like the legs of the substantial chairs and sofas. There +was, however, no lack of modern light cane and basket seats round the +fire, and it looked cheery and comfortable. Rosamond put an arm +round Anne’s waist—“Poor tired dear, come and lie +on the sofa.”</p> +<p>“Oh no, I couldn’t. The gentlemen will come in.”</p> +<p>“All brothers! What, will you only be satisfied with +an easy-chair! A charming room, and a charming fire!”</p> +<p>“Not so nice as a library,” said Cecil, stabbing the +fire with the poker as a sort of act of possession. “We +always sit in the library at Dunstone. State rooms are horrid.”</p> +<p>“This only wants to be littered down,” said Rosamond. +“That’s my first task in fresh quarters, banishing some +things and upsetting the rest, and strewing our own about judiciously. +There are the inevitable wax-flowers. I have regular blarney about +their being so lovely, that it would just go to my heart to expose them +to the boys.”</p> +<p>“You have always been on the move,” said Cecil, who was +standing by the table examining the ornaments.</p> +<p>“You may say so! there are not many of Her Majesty’s +garrisons that I have not had experience of, except my native country +that I wasn’t born in. It was very mean of them never once +to send us to Ireland.”</p> +<p>“Where were you born?” said Cecil, neither of the two +catching at the bull which perhaps Rosamond had allowed to escape by +way of trying them.</p> +<p>“At Plymouth. Dick and I were both born at Plymouth, +and Maurice at Scutari; then we were in the West Indies; the next two +were born all up and down in Jamaica and all the rest of the Islands—Tom +and Terry—dear boys, I’ve got the charge of them now they +are left at school. Three more are Canadians; and little Nora +is the only Irish-born one amongst us.”</p> +<p>“I thought you said you had never been in Ireland.”</p> +<p>“Never quartered there, but on visits at Rathforlane,” +said Rosamond. “Our ten years at home we have been up and +down the world, till at last you see I’ve ended where I began—at +Plymouth.”</p> +<p>“Oh, what a lovely Florentine mosaic!” exclaimed Cecil, +who had taken but slight interest in this itinerary. “It +is just like a weight at Dunstone.” Then opening a miniature-case, +“Who is this—Mrs. Poynsett when she was young?”</p> +<p>“Most likely,” said Rosamond. “It is like +her now, and very like Charlie.”</p> +<p>“Yes. Charles is quite unlike the family.”</p> +<p>“What family?” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“The Charnocks, of course. Raymond is a perfect Charnock!”</p> +<p>“A vast advantage,” murmured Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Of course,” said Cecil, taking it quite seriously. +“No one else could be the same thing to us. Papa said there +was not a match in the whole world that could have gratified him so +much.”</p> +<p>“How old are you, Cecil?” quoth Rosamond, with a ripple +in her voice.</p> +<p>“Oh, his age was no matter. I don’t like young +men. That’s not the drawback; no, it is that horrid Poynsett +at the end of the name.”</p> +<p>“You see you had better have waived your objections to youth, +and taken a younger son.”</p> +<p>“I couldn’t,” said this naive young person. +“Besides, there is much more of a field for me here than at Dunstone +since papa’s marriage.”</p> +<p>Whatever Rosamond had on the tip of her tongue was averted by the +entrance of the three younger brothers. Julius seated himself +beside her in the cushioned fireside corner; and Cecil asked where Raymond +was.</p> +<p>“Just stepped in to see my mother,” said Frank. +“This room opens into hers. Will you come to them?”</p> +<p>“Not yet,” said Cecil. “I want you to tell +me about the neighbourhood.”</p> +<p>“Just what I want,” said Rosamond. “Whenever +I ask, Julius always says there’s Dr. Easterby.”</p> +<p>Frank and Charlie burst out laughing.</p> +<p>“Dr. Easterby is one of the greatest men in the English Church,” +said Julius.</p> +<p>“Precisely! But what is the regiment at Backsworth?” +and as Charlie named it, “Oh, what fun! That’s where +Laurie Cookson exchanged. He will be sure to send us cards for +everything.”</p> +<p>“At Dunstone we never used to go to garrison gaieties,” +said Cecil, gravely.</p> +<p>“Oh! I’m a military pariah,” said Rosamond, +hastily.</p> +<p>“Who are the land-owners?” continued Cecil. “There +was a place I saw from the line, but Raymond didn’t hear when +I asked whose it was. Close to the station, I mean.”</p> +<p>“That is Sirenwood,” said Charles. “Sir Harry +Vivian’s. He is just come back there with his two daughters.”</p> +<p>“I thought Emily Vivian was dead,” said Julius. +“You don’t mean <i>that</i> women!”</p> +<p>“<i>That</i> woman?” laughed his wife. “What +has she done to be a <i>that</i> woman?”</p> +<p>“Offended his Reverence,” said Frank, in that sort of +jocose tone which betrays annoyance.</p> +<p>“A heartless mischievous woman!” said Julius.</p> +<p>Rosamond cocked up her left eyebrow with an ineffably droll look, +which encouraged Charlie to say, “Such fierceness can only be +prompted by personal experience. Look out, Rosamond!”</p> +<p>“Come ’fess, Julius,” said she, merrily. +“’Fess and make it up.”</p> +<p>“I—I have nothing to confess,” said Julius, seriously.</p> +<p>“Hasn’t he indeed?” said she, looking at the brothers.</p> +<p>“Oh! don’t ask us,” said Charlie. “His +youthful indiscretions were over long before our eyes had risen above +the horizon!”</p> +<p>“Do you mean that they have really come home to live here?” +demanded Julius, with singular indifference to the personal insinuations.</p> +<p>“I am sorry it is so painful to you,” said I Frank, somewhat +ironically; “but Sir Harry thinks it right to return and end his +days among his own people.”</p> +<p>“Is he ill, then?”</p> +<p>“I can’t gratify you so far,” returned Frank; “he +is a fine old fellow of sixty-five. Just what humbugging papers +call a regular specimen of an old English gentleman,” he added +to Cecil.</p> +<p>“Humbugging indeed, I should hope,” muttered Julius. +“The old English gentleman has reason to complain!”</p> +<p>“There’s the charity of the clergy!” exclaimed +Frank. “No forgiveness for a man who has spent a little +in his youth!”</p> +<p>“As an essential of the old English gentleman?” asked +Julius.</p> +<p>“At any rate, the poor old fellow has been punished enough,” +said Charlie.</p> +<p>“But what is it? Tell me all about it,” said Cecil. +“I am sure my father would not wish me to associate with dissipated +people.”</p> +<p>“Ah! Cecil,” said Rosamond. “You’ll +have to take refuge with the military, after all!”</p> +<p>“It is just this,” said Charlie. “Sir Harry +and his only son were always extravagant, one as bad as the other—weren’t +they, Julius? Phil Bowater told me all about it, and how Tom Vivian +lost fifteen thousand pounds one Derby Day, and was found dead in his +chambers the next morning, they said from an over-dose of chloroform +for neuralgia. Then the estate was so dipped that Sir Harry had +to give up the estate to his creditors, and live on an allowance abroad +or at watering-places till now, when he has managed to come home. +That is to say, the house is really leased to Lady Tyrrell, and he is +in a measure her guest—very queer it must be for him in his own +house.”</p> +<p>“Is Lady Tyrrell <i>that</i> woman?” asked Rosamond.</p> +<p>“I conclude so,” said Charlie. “She was the +eldest daughter, and married Lord Tyrrell, who died about two years +ago. She has no children, so she has taken the family in charge, +patches up Sir Harry’s affairs with her jointure, and chaperons +her sister.”</p> +<p>“What is she like?”</p> +<p>“Ask Frank,” said Charlie, slyly.</p> +<p>“No!” said Frank, with dignity. “I shall +say no more, I only excite prejudice.”</p> +<p>“You are right, Frank,” said Julius, who had evidently +recovered from the shock. “It is not fair to judge people +now from what they were eleven years ago. They have had some terrible +lessons, and may be much changed.”</p> +<p>“Ay,” said Frank; “and they have been living in +an atmosphere congenial to you, at Rockpier, and are hand and glove +with all the St. Chrysostom folk there. What do you say to that, +Julius? I can tell you they are enchanted with your curate!”</p> +<p>“They are not in this parish.”</p> +<p>“No, but they turn up here—the ladies, at least—at +all the services at odd times that Bindon has begun with.”</p> +<p>“Ah! by the bye, is Herbert Bowater come?”</p> +<p>“Yes, the whole family came over to his installation in Mrs. +Hornblower’s lodgings.”</p> +<p>“I saw him this morning, poor old Herbs,” added Frank, +“looking uncommonly as if he felt himself in a strait waistcoat.”</p> +<p>“What, are there two curates?” demanded Cecil, in a tone +of reprobation.</p> +<p>Julius made a gesture of assent, with a certain humorous air of deprecation, +which, however, was lost upon her.</p> +<p>“We never let Mr. Venn have one,” continued Cecil, “except +one winter when he was ill, and then not a young one. Papa says +idle young clergymen are not to be encouraged.”</p> +<p>“I am entirely of Mr. Charnock’s opinion. But if +I have exceeded the Dunstone standard, it was not willingly. Herbert +Bowater is the son of some old friends of my mother’s, who wanted +to keep their son near home, and made it their request that I would +give him a title.”</p> +<p>“And the Bowaters are the great feature in the neighbourhood,” +added Frank. “Herbert tells me there are wonderful designs +for entertaining the brides.”</p> +<p>“What do they consist of?” asked Rosamond.</p> +<p>“All the component parts of a family,” said Frank. +“The eldest daughter is a sort of sheet-anchor to my mother, as +well as her own. The eldest son is at home now. He is in +the army.”</p> +<p>“In the Light Dragoons?” asked Rosamond. “Oh! +then I knew him at Edinburgh! A man with yellow whiskers, and +the next thing to a stutter.”</p> +<p>“I declare, Julius, she is as good as any army list,” +exclaimed Charlie.</p> +<p>“There’s praise!” cried Frank. “The +army list is his one book! What a piece of luck to have you to +coach him up in it!”</p> +<p>“I dare say Rosamond can tell me lots of wrinkles for my outfit,” +said Charles.</p> +<p>“I should hope so, having rigged out Dick for the line, and +Maurice for the artillery!”</p> +<p>Charlie came and leant on the mantel-shelf, and commenced a conversation +<i>sotto voce</i> on the subject nearest his heart; while Cecil continued +her catechism.</p> +<p>“Are the Bowaters intellectual?”</p> +<p>“Jenny is very well read,” said Julius, “a very +sensible person.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Frank; “she was the only person here +that so much as tried to read Browning. But if Cecil wants intellect, +she had better take to the Duncombes, the queerest firm I ever fell +in with. He makes the turf a regular profession, actually gets +a livelihood out of his betting-book; and she is in the strong-minded +line—woman’s rights, and all the rest of it.”</p> +<p>“We never had such people at Dunstone,” said Cecil. +“Papa always said that the evil of being in parliament was the +having to be civil to everybody.”</p> +<p>Just then Raymond came back with intelligence that his mother was +about to go to bed, and to call his wife to wish her good night. +All went in succession to do the same.</p> +<p>“My dear,” she said to Anne, “I hoped you were +in bed.”</p> +<p>“I thought I would wait for family worship.”</p> +<p>“I am afraid we don’t have prayers at night, my dear. +We must resume them in the morning, now Raymond and Julius are come.”</p> +<p>Poor Anne looked all the whiter, and only mumbled out a few answers +to the kind counsels lavished upon her. Mrs. Poynsett was left +to think over her daughters-in-law.</p> +<p>Lady Rosamond did not occupy her much. There was evidently +plenty of good strong love between her and her husband; and though her +training might not have been the best for a clergyman’s wife, +there was substance enough in both to shake down together in time.</p> +<p>But it was Raymond who made her uneasy—Raymond, who ever since +his father’s death had been more than all her other sons to her. +She had armed herself against the pang of not being first with him, +and now she was full of vague anxiety at the sense that she still held +her old position. Had he not sat all the evening in his own place +by her sofa, as if it were the very kernel of home and of repose? +And whenever a sense of duty prompted her to suggest fetching his wife, +had he not lingered, and gone on talking? It was indeed of Cecil; +but how would she have liked his father, at the honeymoon’s end, +to prefer talking of her to talking with her? “She has been +most carefully brought up, and is very intelligent and industrious,” +said Raymond. His mother could not help wondering whether a Roman +son might not thus have described a highly accomplished Greek slave, +just brought home for his mother’s use.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER III<br /> +Parish Explorations</h2> +<blockquote><p> A cry more tuneable<br /> +Was never holla’d to, nor cheer’d with horn,<br /> +In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly:<br /> +Judge, when you hear.—But, soft; what nymphs are these?<br /> +Midsummer Night’s Dream</p> +</blockquote> +<p>It was quite true that Cecil Charnock Poynsett was a very intelligent +industrious creature, very carefully brought up—nay, if possible, +a little too much so. “A little wholesome neglect” +had been lacking.</p> +<p>The only child of her parents who had lived to see a second birthday +was sure to be the centre of solicitude. She had not been spoilt +in the usual acceptation of the word, for she had no liberty, fewer +indulgences and luxuries than many children, and never was permitted +to be naughty; but then she was quite aware that each dainty or each +pleasure was granted or withheld from a careful consideration of her +welfare, and that nothing came by chance with her. And on her +rare ebullitions of self-will, mamma, governess, nurse, nay even papa, +were all in sorrowful commotion till their princess had been brought +to a sense of the enormity of her fault.</p> +<p>She lost her mother at fourteen, but the same anxious training was +carried on by her father; and after three years he married her mother’s +most intimate friend, avowedly that the perfect system might be continued. +Cecil’s gaieties as a come-out young lady were selected on the +same judicious principles as her childish diversions; and if ever the +Dunstone family favoured an entertainment not to their taste, it was +after a debate on the need of condescension and good-nature. She +had, however, never had a season in London—a place her father +hated; but she was taken abroad as soon as she was deemed old enough +thoroughly to appreciate what she was to see there; and in Switzerland +her Cousin Raymond, who had at different times visited Dunstone, overtook +the party, and ere long made his proposals. He was the very man +to whom two or three centuries ago Mr. Charnock would have betrothed +the heiress in her infancy; and Cecil had never liked any one so well, +feeling that her destiny came to a proper culmination in bestowing her +hand on the most eligible Charnock, an M.P., and just a step above her +father in rank and influence.</p> +<p>Her step-mother was under orders to spend the winter in Italy and +the wedding had therefore taken place in Venice, so that Cecil might +finish her journey as a wife. She had been very happy and fully +occupied; Raymond, being younger and stronger than her parents, was +more competent to escort her to every height or depth to which she wished +to go, hunted up information for her, and was her most obedient servant, +only resisting any prolongation of the journey beyond the legitimate +four weeks; nor indeed had Cecil been desirous of deferring her introduction +to her new sphere.</p> +<p>There she stood, her hair and pretty Parisian winter dress arranged +to perfection, contemplating with approval the sitting-room that had +been appropriated to her, the October sunshine lighting up the many-tinted +trees around the smooth-shaven dewy lawn, and a bright fire on the hearth, +shelves and chiffoniers awaiting her property, and piles of parcels, +suggestive of wedding presents, awaiting her hand. She was standing +at the table, turning out her travelling-bag with the comfortable sensation +that it was not to be immediately re-packed, and had just disinterred +a whole library of note-books, when her husband opened the door. +“I believe Jenkins is waiting for your appearance to bring in +the urn, my dear.”</p> +<p>“I’m coming; but surely there ought to be a bell or gong +to assemble the family.”</p> +<p>“It might disturb my mother. What sleep she gets is in +the morning. I never go to her till eleven o’clock, unless +I am going out for the day.”</p> +<p>“And what will she want me to do for her?” asked Cecil, +glancing at her empty shelves.</p> +<p>“A woman’s tact will soon find out. All I wish +is that she should be your first object.”</p> +<p>It was a much larger <i>all</i> than could be realized by the son +whose happiest moments had been spent in devotion to her, and who thought +the motherless girl must rejoice doubly in such a mother.</p> +<p>“But I am free till eleven,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Free always, I hope,” he returned, with a shade of vexation. +Therewith they descended the broad stairs into the panelled hall, where +a great fire was blazing on the hearth, and Rosamond and the two young +brothers were standing chatting merrily before it.</p> +<p>Julius, she said, had his primary sermon heavy on his mind, and had +risen before day to attack it; and she sped away to summon him from +Mrs. Poynsett’s beautiful old dressing-room, where he sat writing +amid all the old associations. Anne was discovered hanging over +the dining-room fire, looking whiter and more exhausted than the night +before, having indeed been the first to come down-stairs. She +was rebuked for fatiguing herself, and again murmured something about +family worship.</p> +<p>“We must begin to-morrow,” said Raymond. “We +have got a chaplain now.”</p> +<p>Julius, however, on entering excused himself, saying that after Sunday +he should be at Matins at nine o’clock; whereupon Anne looked +at him in mute astonishment.</p> +<p>Raymond, feeling that he ought to cultivate the solitary sister-in-law, +began asking about Miles; but unlike the typical colonist, she was very +silent, and her replies were monosyllabic, till Rosamond created a diversion +by talking to Frank; and then Raymond elicited that Glen Fraser was +far up the country—King Williamstown nearer than any other town. +They had sent thither for a doctor for Miles, and he stayed one night, +but said that mother’s treatment was quite right; and as it was +thirty miles off he did not come again. Thirty miles! what sort +of roads? Not bad for wagons. It only took two days to get +there if the river was not in flood. Had she not been married +there? Yes, they all rode in thither for the purpose. Was +it the nearest church, then? There was one only nine miles off, +to which papa went when there was service—one Sunday in three, +“for he is an Episcopalian, you know.”</p> +<p>“And not your mother?” asked Cecil.</p> +<p>“I don’t think she was at home,” said Anne.</p> +<p>“Then had you a Presbyterian Kirk?” asked Cecil, remembering +that in Scotland gentle blood and Anglicanism did not go together as +uniformly as she believed them to do in England.</p> +<p>“There was one at Schneyder’s Kloof, but that was Dutch.”</p> +<p>“Then did you go nowhere?” asked Cecil.</p> +<p>“There was Mr. Pilgrim’s.”</p> +<p>“A clergyman?”</p> +<p>“No, a settler. He used to pray and expound every Sunday.”</p> +<p>“What does he call himself?” said Cecil, growing more +severe.</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” said Anne. “He gathers +together a little flock of all denominations, who only care to hear +the word.”</p> +<p>“Such a voice in the wilderness as often does good service,” +said Julius, with a perception that the side with which he least agreed +best deserved support.</p> +<p>He and Rosamond were bent on a tour of parochial inspection, as were +Raymond and Cecil on a more domestic one, beginning with the gardens.</p> +<p>Cecil was the first lady down-stairs, all in claret colour trimmed +with gray fur, with a little fur and velvet cap upon her head.</p> +<p>“There! it is a clear morning, and you can see the view,” +said Raymond, opening the hall door.</p> +<p>“Very prettily undulating ground,” she said, standing +on the steps, and looking over a somewhat rapid slope scattered with +trees to the opposite side of the valley, where a park with a red mansion +in the midst gleamed out among woods of green, red, orange, and brown +tints. “How you are shut in! That great Spanish chestnut +must be a perfect block when its leaves are out. My father would +never let it stand so near the house.”</p> +<p>“It is too near, but it was planted at the birth of my mother’s +brother.”</p> +<p>“Who died?”</p> +<p>“Yes, at seven years old. It was her first grief.”</p> +<p>“Then it would vex her if you cut it.”</p> +<p>Raymond laughed. “It is hers, not mine.”</p> +<p>“I forgot.” There was a good deal in the tone; +but she added, “What is that place opposite?”</p> +<p>“Sirenwood. It belongs to Sir Harry Vivian; but he does +not live there.”</p> +<p>“Yes, he does,” said Cecil. “Your brothers +say he has come back with his two daughters.”</p> +<p>“There is only one unmarried.”</p> +<p>“There is a widow come to keep house for him—Lady Tyrrell.”</p> +<p>“Very likely,” said Raymond; “my mother only writes +with difficulty, so I hear little when I am from home.”</p> +<p>“Is it true that they are horrid people, very dissipated, and +not fit for me to associate with?”</p> +<p>“That is putting it strongly,” said Raymond, quietly. +“They are not likely to be very desirable acquaintances for you, +but there is no reason you should not associate with them on ordinary +terms of courtesy.”</p> +<p>“Ah! I understand—as member’s wife.”</p> +<p>“I don’t see what that has to do with it,” said +Raymond. “Ah! Rosamond!” as she came down in +a Galway cloak over her black velveteen, “on the way to view your +domain?”</p> +<p>“Yes, and yours,” she said, nodding to Cecil. “You +appreciate such English apple-pie order. It looks as if you never +suffered a stray leaf to dance without an old woman to hunt it down. +And what’s that red house smiling across the valley?”</p> +<p>“Sirenwood,” repeated Raymond; then to Julius he said, +“Did you know it was inhabited again?”</p> +<p>“Frank said so,” answered Julius, without further remark, +giving his arm to his wife, who clasped both hands on it; while the +other couple looked on as if doubtful whether this were a trying duty +incumbent on them.</p> +<p>“What is it all about?” said Rosamond, as they walked +down the avenue of walnuts leading to the iron gates in the opposite +direction from Sirenwood. “Which of you was <i>that woman</i>’<i>s</i> +victim? Was it a sailor love of Miles’s? I hope not! +That poor little African might not stand a gay ghost cropping up again.”</p> +<p>“Miles is far removed from the conventional sailor.”</p> +<p>“Then it is reduced to the grave Raymond.”</p> +<p>“I wish I had betrayed nothing.”</p> +<p>“Now you may as well proceed to betray the rest, instead of +leaving me to exercise my fancy.”</p> +<p>“It is no secret, only such things are best not brought up +again. Camilla Vivian was poor Raymond’s <i>grande passion</i>, +and you may imagine what a grief that was to my mother, especially as +the poor brother was then living—one of the most fascinating, +dangerous men I ever saw; and the whole tone of the place was ultra +gay and thoughtless, the most reckless extravagance. However, +he was set upon it, and my mother was forced to consent to the engagement. +She seemed equally devoted to him, till she met Lord Tyrrell at some +country house, and then a quarrel was picked, either by her mother or +herself, about my mother retaining the headship of her own house. +It was a palpable excuse, but it served to break the affair off, and +Raymond was cruelly cut up. My mother made herself everything +to him from that moment, gave up all her former habits to be with him, +sent the little boys to school, and fairly dragged him through the trouble!”</p> +<p>“How long ago was it?”</p> +<p>“Ten years—yes, ten years. So far as ceasing to +care a straw for a heartless woman like that, he has got over it, no +doubt; but it has made a graver man of him for life, and I doubt whether, +but for my mother’s accident, he ever would have married.”</p> +<p>“Did you marry for your mother’s sake, Julius, or only +tell her so?”</p> +<p>“For shame, my Lady Mischief!”</p> +<p>“And do you think the fair Camilla returned with plans that +she finds disconcerted?”</p> +<p>“How can I tell? I have not seen her since I was a lad +of eighteen.—Ah! how d’ye do, Betty?” in a tone of +relief; “you’ve not seen my wife.”</p> +<p>This was the first of a long series of introductions. Compton +Poynsett was a straggling village, with the church, schools, and Rectory, +ten minutes’ walk from the park gates. It had not been neglected, +so that Julius had not the doubtful satisfaction of coming like a missionary +or reformer. The church, though not exactly as with his present +lights he would have made it, was in respectable order, and contained +hardly anything obnoxious to his taste; the schools were well built, +properly officered, and the children under such discipline that Rosamond +declared she could no more meddle with them than with her father’s +regiment.</p> +<p>The Rectory was at that moment level with the ground, and Julius +explaining the plans, when up came the senior curate. Mr. Bindon, +whom she, as well as Julius, greeted as an old friend, was the typical +modern priest, full of his work, and caring for nothing besides, except +a Swiss mountain once a year; a slight, spare, small, sallow man, but +with an enormous power of untiring energy.</p> +<p>Scarcely had Rosamond shaken hands with him, standing where her drawing-room +rug was to be in future days, when a merry whistle came near, and over +the wall from the churchyard leapt first a black retriever, secondly +a Skye terrier, thirdly a bull ditto, fourthly a young man, or rather +an enormous boy, who for a moment stood amazed and disconcerted at the +unexpectedly worshipful society into which he had jumped!</p> +<p>“Ha! Herbert! is that you?” laughed Julius.</p> +<p>“I beg your pardon!” he breathlessly exclaimed. +“I was just taking the short cut! I had no idea—Here, +Mungo, you ruffian!” as the Skye was investigating Lady Rosamond’s +boot.</p> +<p>“Oh, I like him of all things! I am glad to welcome you +to our future house!” as she held out her hand to the Reverend +Herbert Bowater, the junior curate, a deacon of a fortnight’s +standing, whose round open happy blue eyes, ruddy cheeks, merry lips, +and curly light hair, did not seem in keeping with the rigidly straight +collar and waistcoat, and the long black coat, at present plentifully +streaked with green tree-moss, while his boots and trousers looked as +if they had partaken of the mud-bath which his dogs had evidently been +wallowing in.</p> +<p>“Off! off!” were his words, as he shook hands with his +rectoress. “Get away, Rollo!” with an energetic shove +of the foot to the big dog, who was about to shake his dripping coat +for the ladies’ special benefit. “I saw you arrive +last evening,” he said, in the conversational tone of a gentlemanly +school-boy; “didn’t you find it very cold?”</p> +<p>“Not very. I did not see you, though.”</p> +<p>“He was organizing the cheers,” said Mr. Bindon. +“You shone in that, Bowater. They kept such good time.”</p> +<p>“You were very good to cheer us at all,” said Julius, +“coming in the wake of the Squire as we did.”</p> +<p>“The best of it was,” said the junior, “that Charlie +was so awfully afraid that he and poor Miles’s wife would be taken +for the Squire, that he dashed in on his way to warn me to choke them +off. If she hadn’t been ill, I must have set the boys on +for a lark! How is she, though?” he asked in a really kind +tone.</p> +<p>“She looks very ill, poor thing,” said Julius.</p> +<p>Here the bull terrier became assiduous in his attentions to Rosamond; +and between his master’s calls and apologies, and her caresses +and excuses, not much more was heard, till Julius asked with mock gravity, +“And are these all you’ve brought over, Herbert?”</p> +<p>“Yes, all; I’d half a mind to bring the two greyhounds, +but my father thought they would get into trouble in the preserves, +and there isn’t room at Mrs. Hornblower’s place,” +he answered, with apologetic simplicity.</p> +<p>“What a pity Durham has been reduced!” said Mr. Bindon, +dryly. “It would have been the right preferment for Bowater. +The Bishop was obliged by statute to keep a pack of hounds.”</p> +<p>“But, sir,” expostulated the deacon, turning to the Rector, +colouring all over his honest rosy face, “you don’t object! +You know, of course, I’ve given up sport,” he added ruefully; +“but only just as companions!—Ain’t you, Rollo?” +he added, almost with tears in his eyes, and a hand on the smooth black +head, belonging to such a wise benignant face, that Rosamond was tempted +to pronounce the dog the more clerical looking of the two.</p> +<p>“You are very welcome,” said Julius, laughing, “provided +you can manage with the old women’s cats. I should find +such companions rather awkward in pastoral visits.”</p> +<p>“I’ll teach them, sir! You may depend on it! +We did have a little flare-up yesterday, but I showed them the sense +of it. You might teach those dogs anything!—Ha! what then, +Tartar! Halloo, Mungo! Rats, rats, rats!”</p> +<p>A prodigious scratching and snorting was audible in what had been +a cellar of the quondam Rectory; and Rollo, becoming excited, dashed +up to the scene of action, with a deep bass war-cry, while, to Rosamond’s +great amusement, “rats” was no less a peal to Rector and +senior; and for the next quarter of an hour the three clergymen moved +bricks, poked with their sticks, and cheered on the chase till the church +clock struck one, the masons began to return from dinner, and the sounds +of the bell at the Hall recalled the party to order.</p> +<p>“There, Rose! Our first day!” said Julius, aghast.</p> +<p>“You’d better come to lunch at my rooms,” said +the young curate, eagerly. “Do! Mother has brought +the jolliest hamper! Game-pie, and preserved magnum-bonums, and +pears off the old jargonelle.—Come, Lady Rosamond, do.—Come +along, Bindon! There’s such a dish of damson-cheese! +Do!”</p> +<p>That “<i>do</i>,” between insinuation and heartiness, +was so boyish, that it was quite irresistible to the lady, who consented +eagerly, while Julius wrote a word or two on a card, which he despatched +to the Hall by the first child he encountered. In a few minutes +they reached the nice clean bay-windowed room over the village shop, +comically like an undergraduate’s, in spite of the mother’s +and sister’s recent touches.</p> +<p>There ensued a resolute quieting of the dogs, and a vigorous exertion +of hospitality, necessitating some striding up and down stairs, and +much shouting to Mrs. Hornblower and her little niece, who rejoiced +in the peculiar name of Dilemma; while Rosamond petted Tartar upon her +lap, and the two elder clergymen, each with an elbow against the window-frame +and a knee on the seat, held council, based on the Rector’s old +knowledge of the territory and the curate’s recent observations +during his five weeks’ sojourn.</p> +<p>The plans to be put in force next week were arranged during the meal, +and the junior observed that he would walk home to-night and back on +Saturday evening, since after that he should be tied pretty fast.</p> +<p>And he started with Julius and Rosamond on their further progress, +soon, however, tumbling over another stone wall with all his dogs, and +being only heard hallooing to them as they yelped after the larks.</p> +<p>“That is a delicious boy!” said Rosamond, laughing merrily. +“A nice fellow—but we mustn’t make it a custom to +be always going in to partake of his hampers, or we shall prey inordinately +on Mrs. Bowater’s preserves.”</p> +<p>“He was just like the hero of</p> +<blockquote><p>“Oh, I have a plum-cake,<br /> +And a rare feast I’ll make.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>I do like a boy with a sweet tooth!”</p> +<p>“Like him! Of course I do. The Bowaters are like +one’s own kindred! I only hope I shall not spoil him.”</p> +<p>“Hasn’t his mother done that for you?”</p> +<p>“I wish he had spent a year or two at Cuddesdon! I ought +to have seen him before consenting to give him a title at once, but +his father and Jenny wished it so much. Ah! come in here. +Bindon said Lucy Martin was a case for a lady.”</p> +<p>Rosamond’s hearty good-nature was much more at ease among ailing +old women than prim school-children, and she gave great satisfaction +in the cottages.</p> +<p>Julius did not of course come as a stranger, and had a general impression +as to names and families; but he had been absent, except on short visits, +for five years, so that Rosamond declared that this was a staple of +his conversation: “Then it was Tom Deane—no, it was John +Deane that married Blake’s son—no, it was Blake’s +daughter that died who is living in the next house.”</p> +<p>They finished with a long and miry lane, lying along the valley, +and leading to the cottages of a little clan, the chief of whom seemed +to be a large-boned lively-eyed old dame, who, after minute inquiries +after “the Lady Poynsett,” went on, “And be it true, +Master Julius, as that young gentleman of Squire Bowater’s is +one of your passons?”</p> +<p>Julius admitted the fact.</p> +<p>“And be ye going to put he up in the pulpit to preach to we? +’Pon my word of honour, says I to Sally when her telled I, we +shall have little Dick out of the infant-school next!”</p> +<p>“We’re all young, Betty! Can’t you put up +with any one that is not older than yourself! I’m afraid +he would hardly be able to get up the pulpit stair.”</p> +<p>The Rector’s reply delighted Betty; but she returned to the +charge. “No, no, sir, I be coming to hear ye next Sunday. +Sally have turned my black bonnet a purpose. It be one of the +Lady Poynsett’s, as her gave I when my old gentleman was took +two years after the Squire—when bonnets was bonnets, you know, +ma’am. Now tell me true, be ye to preach morning or arternoon, +sir?”</p> +<p>“In the morning, I hope, Betty.”</p> +<p>“Then I’ll be there, Master Julius, to the third seat +from the front; but it ain’t becoming for a woman of my age, seventy-nine +come Christmas, to sit under a slip of a lad as hasn’t got the +taste of the birch off his back.”</p> +<p>“That’s too bad, Betty,” broke in Rosamond, speaking +out of conviction. “Mr. Bowater isn’t so young as +he looks, and he was too good a boy ever to need the birch.”</p> +<p>“All the wuss for he,” retorted the undaunted Betty. +“Spare the rod, and spile the child.”</p> +<p>The village wit was left triumphant, and Julius proposed to return +by a cross-road leading into the plantations. Suddenly a scud +of rain mixed with whirling yellow leaves sent them hurrying into a +cart-shed, where, with a sudden start, they found themselves rushing +in on some one. Who was it? A girl—a young lady. +That was evident, as Rosamond panted out, “I beg your pardon!” +and the next moment there was the exclamation, “Mr. Julius Charnock! +You don’t remember me? Eleonora Vivian!”</p> +<p>“Miss Vivian! you have the advantage of me,” said Julius, +a little stiffly. “Let me introduce my wife.”</p> +<p>The hands met, and Rosamond perceived in the failing light a very +fine-looking maiden, with a superbly carried head and neck, simply dressed +in gray cloth. “Are you sheltering here, or are you sketching?” +she asked, seeing some paper and drawing materials.</p> +<p>“I was giving a lesson. See,” exhibiting some bold +outlines on large paper. “Does not my pupil do me credit?”</p> +<p>“Very spirited,” said Rosamond. “Where is +she?”</p> +<p>“<i>He</i> is gone to fetch me his grandmother’s umbrella. +He is the little Gurth of these parts.”</p> +<p>“Of whom you are making a Giotto?” asked Julius, thawing +a little.</p> +<p>“Exactly; I found him drawing on a barn-door with such zeal +and spirit, that I could not help offering him some lessons. Only +see, does he not get on? I wish I could get him to the school +of design.”</p> +<p>“May I ask what becomes of his pigs?” demanded Julius.</p> +<p>“Don’t you hear?” as sundry grunts and squeals +of those eminently conversational animals were audible through the walls. +“They are driven home to this rick-yard, so here I meet the boy.”</p> +<p>“Who is he?” asked the Rector.</p> +<p>“I only know that he answers to the name of Joe. And +here he comes,” as a boy about ten years old came lumbering up +in big boots, with a heavy plaid shawl on one arm, and an immense green +umbrella in the other.</p> +<p>“Thank you, Joe. Make your bow to the lady and gentleman.”</p> +<p>This was a pull of the flaxen forelock; for Joe was a slender, pretty, +fair boy, of that delicately-complexioned English type which is not +roughened till after many years of exposure.</p> +<p>“That’s right, my man,” said Julius, kindly. +“What is your name?”</p> +<p>“Please, sir, Joshua Reynolds.”</p> +<p>“Instinct,” whispered Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Or influence of a name,” returned Miss Vivian.</p> +<p>“Are you one of Dan Reynolds’s boys, or Tim’s?” +proceeded</p> +<p>“No, I bides with granny.”</p> +<p>Julius made no further attempt at disentangling the pedigree but +inquired about his employments. Did he go to school?</p> +<p>“When there ain’t nothing to be done.”</p> +<p>“And what can be done by such a mite?” asked Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Tell the lady,” said the Rector; “what work can +you do?”</p> +<p>“Bird-starving.”</p> +<p>“Well!”</p> +<p>“And stoon-picking, and cow-herding, and odd jobs up at Farmer +Light’s; but they won’t take I on for a carter-boy not yet +’cause I bean’t not so lusty as some on ’em.”</p> +<p>“Have you learnt to read?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, very nicely,” interposed Miss Vivian.</p> +<p>“Did you teach him?” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“No! He could read well before I came to the place. +I have only been at home six weeks, you know, and I did not know I was +poaching on your manor,” she added <i>sotto voce</i> to Julius, +who could not but answer with warm thanks.</p> +<p>It was discovered that the rain had set in for the night, and an +amicable contest ensued between the ladies as to shawl and umbrella, +each declaring her dress unspoilable, till it ended in Eleonora having +the shawl, and both agreeing to share the umbrella as far as the Sirenwood +lodge.</p> +<p>However, the umbrella refused to open, and had to be given to the +boy, who set his teeth into an extraordinary grin, and so dealt with +the brazen gear as to expand a magnificent green vault, with a lesser +leathern arctic zone round the pole; but when he had handed it to Miss +Vivian, and she had linked her arm in Lady Rosamond’s, it proved +too mighty for her, tugged like a restive horse, and would fairly have +run away with her, but for Rosamond’s holding her fast.</p> +<p>“Lost!” they cried. “Two ladies carried away +by an umbrella!”</p> +<p>“Here, Julius, no one can grapple with it but you,” called +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“I really think it’s alive!” panted Eleonora, drawn +up to her tip-toes before she could hand it to Julius, who, with both +clinging to his arm, conducted them at last to the lodge, where Julius +could only come in as far as it would let him, since it could neither +be let down nor left to itself to fly to unknown regions.</p> +<p>A keeper with a more manageable article undertook to convey Miss +Vivian home across the park; and with a pleasant farewell, husband and +wife plodded their way home, along paths the mud of which could not +be seen, only heard and felt; and when Rosamond, in the light of the +hall, discovered the extent of the splashes, she had to leave Julius +still contending with the umbrella; and when, in spite of the united +efforts of the butler and footman, it still refused to come down, it +was consigned to an empty coach-house, with orders that little Joe should +have a shilling to bring it down and fetch it home in the morning!</p> +<h2>CHAPTER IV<br /> +Shades In Sunshine</h2> +<blockquote><p>My friends would be angered,<br /> + My minnie be mad.—Scots Song</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Whom do you think we met, mother?” said Julius, coming +into her room, so soon as he had made his evening toilette, and finding +there only his two younger brothers. “No other than Miss +Vivian.”</p> +<p>“Ah! then,” broke in Charlie, “you saw what Jenkins +calls the perfect picture of a woman.”</p> +<p>“She is very handsome,” soberly returned Julius. +“Rose is quite delighted with her. Do you know anything +of her?”</p> +<p>“Jenny Bowater was very fond of poor Emily,” rejoined +the mother. “I believe that she had a very good governess, +but I wish she were in better hands now.”</p> +<p>“I cannot think why there should be a universal prejudice for +the sake of one early offence!” exclaimed Frank.</p> +<p>“Oh, indeed!” said Julius, amazed at such a tone to his +mother.</p> +<p>“I only meant—mother, I beg your pardon—but you +are only going by hearsay,” answered Frank, in some confusion.</p> +<p>“Then you have not seen her?” said Julius.</p> +<p>“I! I’m the last person she is likely to seek, +if you mean Camilla.”</p> +<p>“She inquired a great deal after you, mother,” interposed +Frank, “and said she longed to call, only she did not know if +you could see her. I do hope you will, when she calls on Cecil. +I am sure you would think differently. Promise me, mother!”</p> +<p>“If she asks for me, I will, my boy,” said Mrs. Poynsett, +“but let me look! You aren’t dressed for dinner! +What will Mistress Cecil say to you! Ah! it is time you had ladies +about the house again.”</p> +<p>The two youths retreated; and Julius remained, looking anxiously +and expressively at his mother.</p> +<p>“I am afraid so,” she said; “but I had almost rather +he were honestly smitten with the young one than that he believed in +Camilla.”</p> +<p>“I should think no one could long do that,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“I don’t know. He met them when he was nursing +that poor young Scotsman at Rockpier, and got fascinated. He has +never been quite the same since that time!” said the mother anxiously. +“I don’t blame him, poor fellow!” she added eagerly, +“or mean that he has been a bit less satisfactory—oh no! +Indeed, it may be my fault for expressing my objection too’ plainly; +he has always been reserved with me since, and I never lost the confidence +of one of my boys before!”</p> +<p>That Julius knew full well, for he—as the next eldest at home—had +been the recipient of all his mother’s perplexities at the time +of Raymond’s courtship. Mrs. Poynsett had not been a woman +of intimate female friends. Her sons had served the purpose, and +this was perhaps one great element in her almost unbounded influence +with them. Julius was deeply concerned to see her eyes glistening +with tears as she spoke of the cloud that had risen between her and +Frank.</p> +<p>“There is great hope that this younger one may be worthy,” +he said. “She has had a very different bringing up from +her sister, and I did not tell you what I found her doing. She +was teaching a little pig-herd boy to draw.”</p> +<p>“Ah! I heard Lady Tyrrell was taking to the education +of the people line.”</p> +<p>“I want to know who the boy is,” said Julius. “He +called himself Reynolds, and said he lived with granny, but was not +a son of Daniel’s or Timothy’s. He seemed about ten +years old.”</p> +<p>“Reynolds? Then I know who he must be. Don’t +you remember a pretty-looking girl we had in the nursery in Charlie’s +time? His ‘Fan-fan’ he used to call her.”</p> +<p>“Ah, yes, I remember; she was a Reynolds, for both the little +boys could be excited to fury if we assumed that she was a fox. +You don’t mean that she went wrong?”</p> +<p>“Not till after she had left us, and seemed to be doing well +in another place; but unfortunately she was allowed to have a holiday +in the race week, and a day at the course seems to have done the mischief. +Susan can tell you all about it, if you want to know. She was +as broken-hearted as if Fanny had been her own child—much more +than the old mother herself, I fear.”</p> +<p>“What has become of the girl?”</p> +<p>“Gone from bad to worse. Alas! I heard a report +that she had been seen with some of the people who appear on the race-course +with those gambling shooting-galleries, or something of that sort.”</p> +<p>“Ah! those miserable races! They are the bane of the +country. I wish no one would go near them.”</p> +<p>“They are a very pleasant county gathering.”</p> +<p>“To you, mother, and such as you; but you could have your county +meeting without doing quite so much harm. If Raymond would only +withdraw his subscription.”</p> +<p>“It would be as much as his seat is worth! Those races +are the one great event of Wil’sbro’ and Backsworth, the +harvest of all the tradespeople. Besides, you know what is said +of their expedience as far as horses are concerned.”</p> +<p>“I would sacrifice the breed of horses to prevent the evils,” +said Julius.</p> +<p>“<i>You</i> would, but—My boy, I suppose this is the +right view for a clergyman, but it will never do to force it here. +You will lose all influence if you are over-strained.”</p> +<p>“Was St. Chrysostom over-strained about the hippodrome?” +said Julius, thoughtfully.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett looked at him as he leant upon the chimney-piece. +Here was another son gone, in a different way, beyond her reach. +She had seen comparatively little of him since his University days; +and though always a good and conscientious person, there had been nothing +to draw her out of secular modes of thought; nor had she any connection +with the clerical world, so that she had not, as it were, gone along +with the tone of mind that she had perceived in him.</p> +<p>He did not return to the subject, and they were soon joined by his +elder brother. At the first opportunity after dinner, Frank got +Rosamond up into a corner with a would-be indifferent “So you +met Miss Vivian. What did you think of her?”</p> +<p>Rosamond’s intuition saw what she was required to think, and +being experienced in raving brothers, she praised the fine face and +figure so as to find the way to his heart.</p> +<p>“I am so glad you met her in that way. Even Julius must +be convinced. Was not he delighted?”</p> +<p>“I think she grew upon him.”</p> +<p>“And now neither of you will be warped. It is so very +strange in my mother, generally the kindest, most open-hearted woman +in the world, to distrust and bear a grudge against them all for the +son’s dissipation—just as if that affected the ladies of +a family!”</p> +<p>“I did not think it was entirely on his account,” said +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Old stories of flirtation!” said Frank, scornfully; +“but what are they to be cast up against a woman in her widowhood? +It is so utterly unlike mother, I can’t understand it.”</p> +<p>“Would not the natural conclusion be that she knew more, and +had her reasons?”</p> +<p>“I tell you, Rosamond, I know them infinitely better than she +does. She never saw them since Lady Tyrrell’s marriage, +when Eleonora was a mere child; now I saw a great deal of them at Rockpier +last year. There was poor Jamie Armstrong sent down to spend the +winter on the south coast; and as none of his own people could be with +him, we—his Oxford friends, I mean—took turns to come to +him; and as I had just gone up for my degree, I had the most time. +The Vivians had been living there ever since they went on poor Emily’s +account. They did not like to leave the place where she died you +see; and Lady Tyrrell had joined them after her husband’s death. +Such a pleasant house! no regular gaieties, of course, but a few friends +in a quiet way—music and charades, and so forth. Every one +knew everybody there; not a bit of our stiff county ways, but meeting +all day long in the most sociable manner.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, I know the style of place.”</p> +<p>“One gets better acquainted in a week than one does in seven +years in a place like this,” proceeded Frank. “And +you may tell Julius to ask any of the clerics if Lenore was not a perfect +darling with the Vicar and his wife, and her sister too; and Rockpier +is a regular tip-top place for Church, you know. I’m sure +it was enough to make a fellow good for life, just to see Eleonora walking +up the aisle with that sweet face of hers, looking more like heaven +than earth.”</p> +<p>Rosamond made reply enough to set him off again. “Lady +Tyrrell would have been content to stay there for ever, she told me, +but she thought it too confined a range for Eleonora; there was no formation +of character, though I don’t see how it could have formed better; +but Lady Tyrrell is a thoroughly careful motherly sister, and thought +it right she should see a little of the world. So they broke up +from Rockpier, and spent a year abroad; and now Lady Tyrrell is making +great sacrifices to enable her father to come and live at home again. +I must say it would be more neighbourly to welcome them a little more +kindly!”</p> +<p>“I should think such agreeable people were sure to win their +way.”</p> +<p>“Ah! you don’t know how impervious our style of old squire +and squiress can be! If even mother is not superior to the old +prejudice, who will be? And it is <i>very</i> hard on a fellow; +for three parts of my time is taken up by this eternal cramming—I +should have no heart for it but for her—and I can’t be going +over to Sirenwood as I used to go to Rockpier, while my mother vexes +herself about it, in her state. If she were up and about I should +not mind, or she would know better; but what can they—Lenore, +I mean—think of me, but that I am as bad as the rest?”</p> +<p>“Do you mean that anything has passed between you?”</p> +<p>“No, not with Lenore. Her sister spoke to me, and said +it was not right when she had seen nothing but Rockpier; but she as +good as promised to stand my friend. And when I get to the office, +in two years, I shall have quite enough to begin upon, with what my +mother allows us.”</p> +<p>“Then you hope she will wait for that?”</p> +<p>“I feel sure of it—that is, if she is not annoyed by +this abominable usage from my family. Oh! Rosamond, you will help +us when you get into your own house, and you will get Julius to see +it in a proper light. Mother trusts to him almost as much as to +Raymond; but it is our misfortune to be so much younger that she can’t +believe us grown up.”</p> +<p>“O, Frank,” said Charlie, coming in, “here’s +Price come up about the puppies.—What, Rosamond, has he got hold +of you? What a blessing for me! but I pity you.”</p> +<p>Frank and Charlie went off together; and Julius was in the act of +begging Cecil to illuminate a notice of the services, to be framed and +put into the church porch, when Raymond came in from the other room +to make up a whist-table for his mother. Rosamond gladly responded; +but there was a slight accent of contempt in Cecil’s voice, as +she replied, “I never played a game at cards in my life.”</p> +<p>“They are a great resource to my mother,” said Raymond. +“Anne, you are too tired to play?—No, Julius, the pack is +not there; look in the drawer of the chiffonier.”</p> +<p>Julius handed the list he had been jotting down to Cecil, and followed +his brother, with his hands full of cards, unconscious of the expression +of dismay, almost horror, with which Anne was gazing after him.</p> +<p>“Oh! let us be resolute!” she cried, as soon as the door +was shut. “Do not let us touch the evil thing!”</p> +<p>“Cards?” said Cecil. “If Mrs. Poynsett cannot +be amused without them, I suppose we shall have to learn. I always +heard she was such an intellectual woman.”</p> +<p>“But we ought to resist sin, however painful it may be,” +said Anne, gathering strength; “nay, even if a minister sets the +example of defection.”</p> +<p>“You think it wicked,” said Cecil. “Oh no, +it is stupid and silly, and an absurd waste of time, but no more.”</p> +<p>“Yes, it is,” said Anne. “Cards are the bane +of thousands.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, gambling and all that; but to play in the evening +to amuse an invalid can have no harm in it.”</p> +<p>“An invalid and aged woman ought to have her mind set upon +better things,” said Anne. “I shall not withdraw my +testimony, and I hope you will not.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” said Cecil. “You see +I am expected to attend to Mrs. Poynsett; and I have seen whist at Dunstone +when any dull old person came there. What a troublesome crooked +hand Julius writes—just like Greek! What’s all this? +So many services—four on Sunday, two every day, three on Wednesdays +and Fridays! We never had anything like this at Dunstone.”</p> +<p>“It is very superstitious,” said Anne.</p> +<p>“Very superfluous, I should say,” amended Cecil. +“I am sure my father would consent to nothing of the kind. +I shall speak to Raymond about it.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Anne; “it does seem terrible that a +minister should try to make up for worldly amusements by a quantity +of vain ceremonies.”</p> +<p>“I wish you would not call him a minister, it sounds like a +dissenter.”</p> +<p>“I think ministers their best name, except pastors.”</p> +<p>“Both are horrid alike,” said Cecil. “I shall +teach all the people to call Julius the Rector. That’s better +than Mr. Charnock—what Raymond ought to be.”</p> +<p>Anne was struck dumb at this fearful display of worldliness; and +Cecil betook herself to the piano, but the moment her husband appeared +she showed him the list.</p> +<p>“He has cut out plenty of work,” said Raymond, “but +three of them must want a field for their energies.”</p> +<p>“It is preposterous. I want you to speak to him about +it.”</p> +<p>“You are not expected to go to them all,” Raymond made +answer.</p> +<p>“Then there’s no sense in having them,” responded +Cecil. “Evening services are very bad for the people, bringing +them out late. You ought to tell him so.”</p> +<p>“He is Rector, and I am not,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“Mr. Venn did nothing without papa’s consent,” +exclaimed</p> +<p>“My dear Cecil, don’t let your loyalty make a Harry the +Eighth of your father,” said Raymond; “the clergyman ought +to be a free agent.”</p> +<p>“You don’t approve?”</p> +<p>“I don’t approve or disapprove. It is not a matter +I know anything about.”</p> +<p>“But I assure you it has been all thought over at Dunstone.”</p> +<p>“Come, my mother wants to go to bed, and you are keeping her +waiting.”</p> +<p>Cecil was silenced for the moment, but not daunted; for was it not +the foremost duty of the lady of the manor to keep the clergyman in +order, more especially when he was her own husband’s younger brother? +so she met her brother-in-law with “Julius, when I undertook that +notice, I had no notion you were going to have so many services.”</p> +<p>“Is there more than you have time to paint? Then Bindon +can do it, or Jenny Bowater.”</p> +<p>“No! it is not time or trouble; but I do not think such a number +of services desirable.”</p> +<p>“Indeed!” said he, looking amused.</p> +<p>“Yes. An over number of services frequented by no one +only brings the Church into contempt. I heard papa say so. +We only had regular Sunday and Saint’s Day services, and I am +sure Dunstone was quite as religious a place as there is any need to +be.”</p> +<p>“I am glad to hear it,” said Julius, an odd look flickering +about his face; “but as I am afraid Compton is not as religious +a place as there is need to be, I must try, by your leave, all means +of making it so. Good night.”</p> +<p>He was gone, and Cecil was not sure that he had not presumed to laugh +at her.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER V<br /> +A Sunday of Excitement</h2> +<blockquote><p>Strangers in court do take her for the queen.—Shakespeare</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The first Sunday of Julius Charnock’s ministry was spent in +an unexpected manner. In the darkness of the autumn morning there +was a knock at the door, and a low hurried call in Anne’s voice +at the bedroom door: “Rosamond! Julius, pray look out! +Isn’t there a great fire somewhere?”</p> +<p>“Fire! Here?” cried Rosamond, springing up.</p> +<p>“No, not here. A great way off. You could beat +it back.”</p> +<p>Rosamond had by this time rushed to the window which looked out the +wrong way, found her dressing-gown, and scrambled into it in the dark +ere joining Anne in the gallery, from the end window of which the lurid +light in the sky, with an occasional flame leaping up, was plainly visible. +When Julius joined them he declared it to be at Willansborough, and +set off to call up the coachman and despatch the fire-engine, his wife +calling after him to send for the soldiers at Backsworth.</p> +<p>Frank and Charlie came rushing down in gratified excitement, declaring +that it was tremendous—the church at least—and exulting +in the attainment of their life-long ambition, the riding out on the +fire-engine. Servants bustled about, exclaiming, tramping, or +whisking on the stairs; and Raymond presently appeared to ask whether +his mother were ill, and, when reassured on that score, hurrying to +ascertain whether she were alarmed, before he started for the scene +of action.</p> +<p>“Let me come and stay with her,” said Rosamond, a striking +figure, in a scarlet dressing-gown, with a thick plait of black hair +hanging down to her waist on either side.</p> +<p>“Thank you, it will be very kind,” said Raymond, running +down before her, and meeting Susan waddling out in a fringe of curl-papers, +for some mysterious instinct or echo had conveyed to her and her mistress +that there was fire somewhere—perhaps at home. Mrs. Poynsett +was not a nervous woman, and from the time she saw her eldest son come +in, all fright was over, and she could have borne to hear that the house +over her head was burning, in the perfect trust that he would save her +from all peril; nor had he any difficulty in committing her to Rosamond, +when he hurried away to finish dressing and repair to the spot.</p> +<p>Nothing could be seen from her room, but the little ante-room between +it and the drawing-room had an excellent view, as the ground fell away +from it, and there was an opening among the trees.</p> +<p>“We must get you there!” exclaimed Rosamond, in her excitement, +helping her into some garments, and then running out as she heard a +step—“Here, Julius, help me;” and without more ado, +the mother was transported between them to the broad low couch under +the window, and there bestowed in a nest of pillows, shawls, and rugs, +that seemed to grow up under Rosamond’s touch.</p> +<p>Then following Julius out into the hall as he met his brother, Rosamond +clung to him, entreating, “Please, please don’t run into +any dangerous places.”</p> +<p>“Never fear, dearest; I am not likely.”</p> +<p>“Don’t let him, pray!” she said, turning to Raymond. +“Make him remember how blind he is.”</p> +<p>“I’ll take good care of him, Rosamond,” said the +elder brother kindly; “I’m used to it.”</p> +<p>“And send for the ---th,” she added. “There +is nothing like soldiers at a fire.”</p> +<p>“The glare must have given notice,” said Julius, “but +we’ll send if needful. Let go, you foolish girl; I’m +not leading a forlorn hope.”</p> +<p>Did Raymond, as he mounted his horse, turning from the contact of +the white and black heads, admire the reasonableness of the Cecil who +had never shown any fears for his safety, nor any tendency to run about +the passages in her <i>robe de chambre</i>, though she was now dressing +with all speed?</p> +<p>The women-folk had to depend on their own eyes for intelligence, +for every male, not only of the household but of the village, between +the ages of five and seventy, started for Wil’sbro’, and +a good many females followed their example, including the cook and her +suite.</p> +<p>However, Susan remained, to find her mistress flown, and in her fright, +give Lady Rosamond as round a scolding as if she had been Charlie, for +her rashness in attempting a transit, which Dr. Hayter had pronounced +to be as much as her mistress’s life was worth. Having thus +relieved her mind, and finding that Mrs. Poynsett was really very comfortable, +or else too eager and anxious to find out if she was not, the good woman +applied herself to the making of coffee.</p> +<p>Anne and Cecil had found their way to the leads, and were thence +summoned to partake of this hasty meal, after which they proposed going +to look from the brow of the hill; and Mrs. Poynsett insisted that Rosamond +should not stay behind on her account; and, glad to appease the restlessness +of anxiety, out went the ladies, to find the best view of the town,—usually +a white object in the distance, but now blurred by smoke thick and black +in the daylight, and now and then reddened by bursts of flame.</p> +<p>Anne had been reassured as to the need of beating out the fire and +trampling down a place to isolate it, as in the bush-fires of her experience; +and Rosamond related the achievements of the regiment in quenching many +a conflagration in inflammable colonial cities.</p> +<p>It occurred to her that the best place whence to see it was the tower +of the church, which, placed upon a little knoll, was standing out in +full relief against the lurid light. She found the key at the +sexton’s, and led the way up the broken stone stair to the trap-door, +where they emerged on the leads, and, in spite of the cold wind and +furious flapping of the flag above their heads, stood absorbed in the +interest of the sight.</p> +<p>There was a black mass in the open space, whence rose fitful clouds +of smoke, the remnants of the fire, which had there done its worst; +and beyond was a smoky undefined outline, with tongues of flame darting +up, then volumes of dense white smoke, denoting a rush of water from +the engines. Black beings flitted about like ants round a disturbed +nest; Rosamond hoped she detected some scarlet among them, and Cecil +lamented over not having brought her opera-glass. Even without +this, it was possible to make out two long lines of men between the +fire and the river, and at times they fancied they heard the shouting, +but the wind generally carried it away. The cold was bitter, and +they had to hold together and keep a tight grip upon their garments +against the gusts that seemed to rock the tower; but they could not +bear to turn away, though the clock beneath pealed out hour after hour; +for still, as the flames were subdued in one place they broke out in +another; but gradually smoke became predominant, and then grew thinner, +and as some of the black specks began to straggle into the road as if +returning to Compton, the desire to hear became more pressing than that +to see, and the three ladies began to descend—a slow and weary +process, cutting them off from the view, and lasting so long, that the +road was no longer deserted when they finally emerged into the churchyard.</p> +<p>Young Mr. Bowater, grimed, dusty, hatless, and his hair on end, and +Rollo following with his feathery tail singed, hurried up at once. +“I’m not fit to touch, Lady Rosamond,” as he showed +a black hand, and bowed to the others.</p> +<p>“Where’s Ju—where’s my husband?” exclaimed +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Just behind, riding home with Raymond and the rest of them. +Wasn’t it a magnificent flare-up? But there was no loss +of life; and this dog was of as much use as two men—carried whatever +I told him.”</p> +<p>“Good old man! You’ve suffered too!” said +Rosamond. “Pah! you’re like a singed horse; but never +mind, you’re a hero.”</p> +<p>“And where is Mr. Charnock Poynsett?” said Cecil, retreating +from the dog, which her sisters-in-law were vehemently patting.</p> +<p>“He was arranging with the mayor. Church, paper-mills, +and town-hall got the worst of it. It was well he came down; old +Briggs, the mayor, lost his head, and Fuller never had one. Every +one gave contrary orders till he came down, and then, didn’t we +work!”</p> +<p>The curate stretched his stalwart limbs, as if they were becoming +sensible of the strain they had undergone.</p> +<p>“Did you say the church was burnt?” asked Cecil.</p> +<p>“Yes; and a very good thing too! Hideous place, where +you couldn’t do right if you died for it! The fire began +there—stoves no doubt—and there it would have stopped if +any one had had any sense; but there they would run and gape, and the +more I tried to get them to form a chain and drench the warehouses, +the more they wouldn’t do it. And when the flame once got +hold of the paper—did you see it?—it was not a thing to +forget. I verily believe the whole town would have gone if the +Charnocks hadn’t come and got a little discipline into the asses. +It was just life and death work, fighting the fire to hinder it from +getting across Water Lane, and then it would have been all up with High +Street. The tongues broke out like live things ready to lick up +everything; and it was like killing dragons to go at them with the hose +and buckets. I declare my arms are fit to drop out of their sockets. +And the Rector devoted himself to carrying out bed-ridden old women. +I forgot to tell you, Lady Rosamond, he has broken his—There now, +I never meant to frighten you—broken his spectacles.”</p> +<p>“You did it on purpose,” she said, laughing at her own +start.</p> +<p>“No, indeed, I did not.”</p> +<p>“And is it quite out now?”</p> +<p>“Yes; when the Backsworth engines and the soldiers came up, +it was like the Prussians at Waterloo.”</p> +<p>“Oh, then it was done,” said Rosamond. “Take +care! my grandfather was in the Light Division.”</p> +<p>“And my uncle in the Guards,” said the curate. +But before the Waterloo controversy could be pursued, four or five figures +on horseback came round the knoll, and Raymond and Julius sprang off +their horses, introducing the three officers who followed their example.</p> +<p>One was Rosamond’s old acquaintance, the Colonel, a friend +of her father; but she had little attention to spare for them till she +had surveyed her husband, who looked nothing worse than exceedingly +dusty, and at fault without his spectacles.</p> +<p>Inquiries were made for Frank and Charlie. They were walking +home. They had worked gallantly. The flames were extinguished, +but the engines must go on playing on them for some time longer. +No lives lost, and very few casualties, but the paper-mills were entirely +destroyed, and about twenty tenements, so that great distress was to +be apprehended.</p> +<p>Such intelligence was being communicated as the party stood together +in a group, when there was a light tinkling of bells, and two ladies +in a light open carriage, drawn by two spirited ponies, dashed round +the knoll; and at the moment something must have gone wrong with them, +for there was a start, a pull, a call of “Raymond! Raymond!”</p> +<p>Throwing his bridle to Herbert Bowater, he sprang to the horses’ +heads.</p> +<p>“Mr. Poynsett! Thank you! I beg your pardon,” +said the lady, recovering herself; and Rosamond instantly perceived +that she must be Lady Tyrrell, for she was young-looking, very handsome, +and in slight mourning; and her companion was Miss Vivian. Julius, +holding his surviving glass to his eye, likewise stepped forward. +“Thank you, it was so stupid,” the lady ran on. “Is +not there something wrong with the traces? I don’t know +how they got themselves harnessed, but there was no keeping at home.”</p> +<p>“I think all is right,” said Raymond, gravely, making +the examination over to a servant. “Let me introduce my +wife, Lady Tyrrell.”</p> +<p>The lady held out her hand. “I hope we shall be excellent +neighbours.—My sister.—You remember little Lena,” +she added to the brothers. “She stole a march on us, I find. +I heard of your encounter on Friday. It was too bad of you not +to come in and let us send you home; I hope you did not get very wet, +Lady Rosamond.—Ah! Mr. Strangeways, I did not know you were +there,” she proceeded, as the youngest of the officers accosted +her; “come over and see us. You’re better provided +now; but come to luncheon any day. I am sure to be at home at +half-past one; and I want so much to hear of your mother and sisters.” +And with a universal bow and smile she nourished her whip, her ponies +jangled their bells, and the ladies vanished.</p> +<p>“Stunning pair that!” was young Strangeways’ exclamation.</p> +<p>“Most beautiful!” murmured Cecil, in a low voice, as +if she was quite dazzled. “You never said she was like that,” +she added reproachfully to Julius.</p> +<p>“Our encounter was in the dark,” he answered.</p> +<p>“Oh, I did not mean the young one, but Lady Tyrrell. +She is just like a gem we saw at Firenze—which was it?”</p> +<p>“Where?” said Raymond, bewildered.</p> +<p>“Firenze—Florence,” she said, deigning to translate; +and finding her own reply. “Ah, yes, the Medusa!” +then, as more than one exclaimed in indignant dismay, she said, “No, +not the Gorgon, but the beautiful winged head, with only two serpents +on the brow and one coiled round the neck, and the pensive melancholy +face.”</p> +<p>“I know,” said Julius, shortly; while the other gentlemen +entered into an argument, some defending the beauty of the younger sister, +some of the elder; and it lasted till they entered the park, where all +were glad to partake of their well-earned meal, most of the gentlemen +having been at work since dawn without sustenance, except a pull at +the beer served out to the firemen.</p> +<p>Cecil was not at all shy, and was pleased to take her place as representative +lady of the house; but somehow, though every one was civil and attentive +to her, she found herself effaced by the more full-blown Rosamond, accustomed +to the same world as the guests; and she could not help feeling the +same sense of depression as when she had to yield the head of her father’s +table to her step-mother.</p> +<p>Nor could she have that going to church for the first time in state +with her bridegroom she had professed to dread, but had really anticipated +with complacency; for though Julius had bidden the bells to be rung +for afternoon service, Raymond was obliged to go back to Wil’sbro’ +to make arrangements for the burnt-out families, and she had to go as +lonely as Anne herself.</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell and her sister were both at Compton Church, and overtook +the three sisters-in-law as they were waiting to be joined by the Rector.</p> +<p>“We shall have to take shelter with you,” said Lady Tyrrell, +“poor burnt-out beings that we are.”</p> +<p>“Do you belong to Wil’sbro’?” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Yes; St. Nicholas is an immense straggling parish, going four +miles along the river. I don’t know how we shall ever be +able to go back again to poor old Mr. Fuller. You’ll never +get rid of us from Compton.”</p> +<p>“I suppose they will set about rebuilding the church at once,” +said Cecil. “Of course they will form a committee, and put +my husband on it.”</p> +<p>“In the chair, no doubt,” said Lady Tyrrell, in a tone +that sounded to Rosamond sarcastic, but which evidently gratified Cecil. +“But we will have a committee of our own, and you will have to +preside, and patronize our bazaar. Of course you know all about +them.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes!” said Cecil, eagerly. “We have one +every year for the Infirmary, only my father did not approve of my selling +at a stall.”</p> +<p>“Ah! quite right then, but you are a married woman now, and +that is quite a different thing. The stall of the three brides. +What an attraction! I shall come and talk about it when I make +my call in full form! Good-bye again.”</p> +<p>Cecil’s balance was more than restored by this entire recognition +to be prime lady-patroness of everything. To add to her satisfaction, +when her husband came home to dinner, bringing with him both the curates, +she found there was to be a meeting on Tuesday in the Assembly-room, +of both sexes, to consider of the relief of the work-people, and that +he would be glad to take her to it. Moreover, as it was to be +strictly local, Rosamond was not needed there, though Raymond was not +equally clear as to the Rector, since he believed that the St. Nicholas +parishioners meant to ask the loan of Compton Poynsett Church for one +service on a Sunday.</p> +<p>“Then I shall keep out of the way,” said Julius. +“I do not want to have the request made to me in public.”</p> +<p>“You do not mean to refuse?” said Cecil, with a sort +of self-identification with her constituents.</p> +<p>“The people are welcome to attend as many of our services as +they like; but there is no hour that I could give the church up to Mr. +Fuller on a Sunday.”</p> +<p>“Nor would the use of St. Nicholas be very edifying for our +people,” added Mr. Bindon.</p> +<p>His junior clenched it by saying with a laugh, “I should think +not! Fancy old Fuller’s rusty black gown up in our pulpit!”</p> +<p>“I rejoice to say that is burnt,” rejoined Mr. Bindon.</p> +<p>“What bet will you take that a new one will be the first thing +subscribed for?” said the deacon, bringing a certain grave look +on the faces of both the elder clergy, and a horror-stricken one upon +Anne’s; while Cecil pronounced her inevitable dictum, that at +Dunstone Mr. Venn always preached in a gown, and “we” should +never let him think of anything nonsensical.</p> +<p>Rosamond was provoked into a display of her solitary bit of ecclesiastical +knowledge—“A friar’s gown, the most Popish vestment +in the church.”</p> +<p>Cecil, thoroughly angered, flushed up to the eyes and bit her lips, +unable to find a reply, while all the gentlemen laughed. Frank +asked if it were really so, and Mr. Bindon made the well-known explanation +that the Geneva gown was neither more nor less than the monk’s +frock.</p> +<p>“I shall write and ask Mr. Venn,” gasped Cecil; but her +husband stifled the sound by saying, “I saw little Pettitt, Julius, +this afternoon, overwhelmed with gratitude to you for all the care you +took of his old mother, and all his waxen busts.”</p> +<p>“Ah! by the bye!” said Charlie, “I did meet the +Rector staggering out, with the fascinating lady with the long eyelashes +in one arm, and the moustached hero in the other.”</p> +<p>“There was no pacifying the old lady without,” said Julius. +“I had just coaxed her to the door, when she fell to wringing +her hands. Ah! those lovely models, that were worth thirty shillings +each, with natural hair—that they should be destroyed! If +the heat or the water did but come near them, Adolphus would never get +over it. I could only pacify her by promising to go back for these +idols of his heart as soon as she was safe; and after all, I had to +dash at them through the glass, and that was the end of my spectacles.”</p> +<p>“Where was Pettitt himself?”</p> +<p>“Well employed, poor little fellow, saving the people in those +three cottages of his. No one supposed his shop in danger, but +the fire took a sudden freak and came down Long Street; and though the +house is standing, it had to be emptied and deluged with water to save +it. I never knew Pettitt had a mother till I found her mounting +guard, like one distracted, over her son’s bottles of perfumery.”</p> +<p>“And dyes?” murmured Raymond under his breath; but Frank +caught the sound, and said, “Ah, Julius! don’t I remember +his inveigling you into coming out with scarlet hair?”</p> +<p>“I don’t think I’ve seen him since,” said +Julius, laughing. “I believe he couldn’t resist such +an opportunity of practising his art. And for my part, I must +say for myself, that it was in our first holidays, and Raymond and Miles +had been black and blue the whole half-year from having fought my battles +whenever I was called either ‘Bunny’ or ‘Grandfather.’ +So when he assured me he could turn my hair to as sweet a raven-black +as Master Poynsett’s, I thought it would be pleasing to all, forgetting +that he could not dye my eyes, and that their effect would have been +some degrees more comical.”</p> +<p>“For shame, Julius!” said Rosamond. “Don’t +you know that one afternoon, when Nora had cried for forty minutes over +her sum, she declared that she wanted to make her eyes as beautiful +as Mr. Charnock’s. Well, what was the effect?”</p> +<p>“Startling,” said Raymond. “He came down +in shades of every kind of crimson and scarlet. A fearful object, +with his pink-and-white face glowing under it.”</p> +<p>“And what I had to undergo from Susan!” added Julius. +“She washed me, and soaped me, and rubbed me, till I felt as if +all the threshing-machines in the county were about my head, lecturing +me all the time on the profanity of flying against Scripture by trying +to alter one’s hair from what Providence had made it. Nothing +would do; her soap only turned it into shades of lemon and primrose. +I was fain to let her shave my head as if I had a brain fever; and I +was so horribly ashamed for years after, that I don’t think I +have set foot in Long Street since till to-day.”</p> +<p>“Pettitt is a queer little fellow,” said Herbert. +“The most truculent little Radical to hear him talk, and yet staunch +in his votes, for he can’t go against those whose hair he has +cut off from time immemorial.”</p> +<p>“I hope he has not lost much,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“His tenements are down, but they were insured; and as to his +stock, he says he owes its safety entirely to you, Julius. I think +he would present you with both his models as a testimonial, if you could +only take them,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>Cecil had neither spoken nor laughed through all this. She +was nursing her wrath; and after marching out of the dining-room, lay +in wait to intercept her husband, and when she had claimed his attention, +began, “Rosamond ought not to be allowed to say such things.”</p> +<p>“What things?”</p> +<p>“Speaking in that improper way about a gown.”</p> +<p>“She seems to have said what was the fact.”</p> +<p>“It can’t be! It is preposterous! I never +heard it before.”</p> +<p>“Nor I; but Bindon evidently is up in those matters.”</p> +<p>“It was only to support Rosamond; and I am quite sure she said +it out of mere opposition to me. You ought to speak to Julius.”</p> +<p>“About what?” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“Her laughing whenever I mention Dunstone, and tell them the +proper way of doing things.”</p> +<p>“There may be different opinions about the proper way of doing +things.” Then as she opened her eyes in wonder and rebuke, +he continued, in his elder-brotherly tone of kindness, “You know +I told you already that you had better not interfere in matters concerning +his church and parish.”</p> +<p>“We always managed things at Dunstone.”</p> +<p>Hang Dunstone! was with some difficulty suppressed; but in an extra +gentle voice Raymond said, “Your father did what he thought his +duty, but I do not think it mine, nor yours, to direct Julius in clerical +matters. It can only lead to disputes, and I will not have them.”</p> +<p>“It is Rosamond. I’m sure I don’t dispute.”</p> +<p>“Listen, Cecil!” he said. “I can see that +your position may be trying, in these close quarters with a younger +brother’s wife with more age and rank than yourself.”</p> +<p>“That is nothing. An Irish earl, and a Charnock of Dunstone!”</p> +<p>“Dunstone will be more respected if you keep it in the background,” +he said, holding in stronger words with great difficulty. “Once +for all, you have your own place and duties, and Rosamond has hers. +If you meddle in them, nothing but annoyance can come of it; and remember, +I cannot be appealed to in questions between you and her. Julius +and I have gone on these nine-and-twenty years without a cloud between +us, and I’m sure you would not wish to bring one now.”</p> +<p>Wherewith he left her bewildered. She did not perceive that +he was too impartial for a lover, but she had a general sense that she +had come into a rebellious world, where Dunstone and Dunstone’s +daughter were of no account, and her most cherished notions disputed. +What was the lady of the manor to do but to superintend the church, +parsonage, and parish generally? Not her duty? She had never +heard of such a thing, nor did she credit it. Papa would come +home, make these degenerate Charnocks hear reason, and set all to rights.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VI<br /> +Wedding Visits</h2> +<p>Young Mrs. Charnock Poynsett had plenty of elasticity, and her rebuffs +were less present to her mind in the morning than to that of her husband, +who had been really concerned to have to inflict an expostulation; and +he was doubly kind, almost deferential, giving the admiration and attention +he felt incumbent on him to the tasteful arrangements of her wedding +presents in her own sitting-room.</p> +<p>“And this clock I am going to have in the drawing-room, and +these Salviati glasses. Then, when I have moved out the piano, +I shall put the sofa in its place, and my own little table, with my +pretty Florentine ornaments.”</p> +<p>Raymond again looked annoyed. “Have you spoken to my +mother?” he said.</p> +<p>“No; she never goes there.”</p> +<p>“Not now, but if ever she can bear any move it will be her +first change, and I should not like to interfere with her arrangements.”</p> +<p>“She could never have been a musician, to let the piano stand +against the wall. I shall never be able to play.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps that might be contrived,” said Raymond, kindly. +“<i>Here</i> you know is your own domain, where you can do as +you please.”</p> +<p>“Yes; but I am expected to play in the evening. Look +at all those things. I had kept the choicest for the drawing-room, +and it is such a pity to hide them all up here.”</p> +<p>Raymond felt for the mortification, and was unwilling to cross her +again, so he said, “I will ask whether my mother would object +to having the piano moved.”</p> +<p>“This morning?”</p> +<p>“After eleven o’clock—I never disturb her sooner; +but you shall hear before I go to Backsworth.”</p> +<p>“An hour lost,” thought Cecil; but she was too well bred +to grumble, and she had her great work to carry on of copying and illustrating +her journal.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett readily consented. “Oh yes, my dear, let +her do whatever she likes. Don’t let me be a bugbear. +A girl is never at home till she has had her will of the furniture. +I think she will find that moving out the piano betrays the fading of +the rest of the paper, but that is her affair. She is free to +do just as she likes. I dare say the place does look antediluvian +to young eyes.”</p> +<p>So Raymond was the bearer of his mother’s full permission; +and Cecil presided with great energy over the alterations, which she +carried out by the aid of the younger servants, to the great disgust +of their seniors. She expected the acclamations of her contemporaries; +but it happened that the first of them to cross the room was Julius, +on his way to his mother’s room after luncheon, and he, having +on a pair of make-shift glasses, till the right kind could be procured +from London, was unprepared for obstacles in familiar regions, stumbled +over an ottoman, and upset a table with the breakage of a vase.</p> +<p>He apologized, with much regret; but the younger brothers made an +outcry. “What has come to the place? Here’s +the table all over everything!”</p> +<p>“And where are the bronzes?”</p> +<p>“And the humming-birds? Miles’s birds, that he +brought home after his first voyage.”</p> +<p>“And the clock with the two jolly little Cupids? Don’t +you remember Miles and Will Bowater dressing them up for men-of-war’s +men? Mother could not bring herself to have them undressed for +a year, and all the time the clock struck nohow!”</p> +<p>“This is an anatomical study instead of a clock,” lamented +Frank. “I say, Cecil, do you like your friends to sit in +their bones, like Sydney Smith?”</p> +<p>“I never saw such a stupid old set of conservatives!” +broke in Rosamond, feeling for Cecil’s mortification. “In +an unprejudiced eye the room looks infinitely better, quite revivified! +You ought to be much obliged to Cecil for letting you see all her beautiful +things.”</p> +<p>“Why don’t you favour us with yours?” said Charlie.</p> +<p>“I know better! Mine aren’t fit to wipe the shoes +of Cecil’s! When I get into the Rectory you’ll see +how hideous they are!” said Rosamond, with the merriest complacency. +“Couvre-pieds to set your teeth on edge, from the non-commissioned +officers’ wives; and the awfullest banner-screen you ever saw, +worked by the drum-major’s own hands, with Her Majesty’s +arms on one side, and the De Courcy ones on the other, and glass eyes +like stuffed birds’ to the lion and unicorn. We nearly expired +from suppressed laughter under the presentation.”</p> +<p>Then she went round, extorting from the lads admiration for Cecil’s +really beautiful properties, and winning gratitude for her own cordial +praise, though it was not the artistic appreciation they deserved. +Indeed, Cecil yielded to the general vote for the restoration of the +humming-birds, allowing that, though she did not like stuffed birds +in a drawing-room, she would not have banished them if she had known +their history.</p> +<p>This lasted till Charlie spied a carriage coming up the drive, which +could be seen a long way off, so that there was the opportunity for +a general <i>sauve qui peut</i>. Cecil represented that Rosamond +ought to stay and receive her bridal visits; but she was unpersuadable. +“Oh no! I leave all that for you! My time will come +when I get into the Rectory. We are going in the dog-cart to the +other end of the parish.—What’s its name—Squattlesea +Marsh, Julius?”</p> +<p>“Squattlesford!” said Charlie. “If Julius +means to drive you, look out for your neck!”</p> +<p>“No, it’s the other way, I’m going to drive Julius!—Come +along, or we shall be caught!”</p> +<p>Cecil stood her ground, as did Anne, who was too weary and indifferent +to retreat, and Frank, who had taken another view of the carriage as +it came nearer.</p> +<p>“I must apologize for having brought nothing but my father’s +card,” said Lady Tyrrell, entering with her sister, and shaking +hands: “there’s no such thing as dragging him out for a +morning call.”</p> +<p>“And Mr. Charnock Poynsett is not at home,” replied Cecil. +“He found so much county business waiting for him, that he had +to go to Backsworth.”</p> +<p>“It is the better opportunity for a little private caucus with +you,” returned Lady Tyrrell, “before the meeting to-morrow. +I rather fancy the gentlemen have one of their own.”</p> +<p>“Some are to dine here to-night,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“We ladies had better be prepared with our proposals,” +said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>At the same time Frank drew near Miss Vivian with a large book, saying, +“These are the photographs you wished to see.”</p> +<p>He placed the book on the ottoman, and would thus have secured a +sort of <i>tête-à-tête</i>; but Eleonora did not +choose to leave Mrs Miles Charnock out, and handed her each photograph +in turn, but could only elicit a cold languid “Thank you.” +To Anne’s untrained eye these triumphs of architecture were only +so many dull representations of ‘Roman Catholic churches,’ +and she would much rather have listened to the charitable plans of the +other two ladies, for the houseless factory women of Wil’sbro’.</p> +<p>The bazaar, Lady Tyrrell said, must be first started by the Member’s +wife; and there should be an innermost committee, of not more than three, +to dispose of stalls and make arrangements.</p> +<p>“You must be one,” said Cecil. “I know no +one yet.”</p> +<p>“You will, long before it comes off. In fact, I am as +great a stranger as yourself. Ah! there’s an opportunity!” +as the bell pealed. “The Bowaters, very likely; I saw their +Noah’s ark as I passed the Poynsett Arms, with the horses taken +out. I wonder how many are coming—worthy folks!”</p> +<p>Which evidently meant insufferable bores.</p> +<p>“Is there not a daughter?” asked Cecil.</p> +<p>“You need not use the singular, though, by the bye, most of +them are married.”</p> +<p>“Oh, pray stay!” entreated Cecil, as there were signs +of leave-taking.</p> +<p>“I should do you no good. You’ll soon learn that +I am a sort of Loki among the Asagötter.”</p> +<p>Cecil laughed, but had time to resume her somewhat prim dignity before +the lengthened disembarkation was over, and after all, produced only +four persons; but then none were small—Mrs. Bowater was a harsh +matron, Mr. Bowater a big comely squire, the daughters both tall, one +with an honest open face much like Herbert’s, only with rather +less youth and more intelligence, the other a bright dark glowing gipsy-faced +young girl.</p> +<p>Eleonora Vivian, hitherto gravely stiff and reserved, to poor Frank’s +evident chagrin, at once flashed into animation, and met the elder Miss +Bowater with outstretched hands, receiving a warm kiss. At the +same time Mr. Bowater despatched Frank to see whether his mother could +admit a visitor; and Lady Tyrrell observed, “Ah! I was about +to make the same petition; but I will cede to older friends, for so +I suppose I must call you, Mr. Bowater—though my acquaintance +is of long standing enough!”</p> +<p>And she put on a most charming smile, which Mr. Bowater received +with something inarticulate that might be regarded as a polite form +of ‘fudge,’ which made Cecil think him a horribly rude old +man, and evidently discomposed his wife very much.</p> +<p>Frank brought back his mother’s welcome to the Squire; but +by this time Eleonora and Miss Bowater had drawn together into a window, +in so close and earnest a conversation that he could not break into +it, and with almost visible reluctance began to talk to the younger +sister, who on her side was desirous of joining in the bazaar discussion, +which had been started again in full force; until there was a fresh +influx of visitors, when Lady Tyrrell decidedly took leave with her +sister, and Frank escorted them to their carriage, and returned no more.</p> +<p>In the new shuffling of partners, the elder Miss Bowater found herself +close to Anne, and at once inquired warmly for Miles, with knowledge +and interest in naval affairs derived from a sailor brother, Miles’s +chief friend and messmate in his training and earlier voyages. +There was something in Joanna Bowater’s manner that always unlocked +hearts, and Anne was soon speaking without her fence of repellant stiffness +and reserve. Certainly Miles was loved by his mother and brothers +more than he could be by an old playfellow and sisterly friend, and +yet there was something in Joanna’s tone that gave Anne a sense +of fellow-feeling, as if she had met a countrywoman in this land of +strangers; and she even told how Miles had thought it right to send +her home, thinking that she might be a comfort to his mother. +“And not knowing all that was going to happen!” said poor +Anne, with an irrepressible sigh, both for her own blighted hopes, and +for the whirl into which her sore heart had fallen.</p> +<p>“I think you will be,” said Joanna, brightly; “though +it must be strange coming on so many. Dear Mrs. Poynsett is so +kind!”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Anne, coldly.</p> +<p>“Ah! you don’t know her yet. And Lady Rosamond! +She is delightful!”</p> +<p>“Have you seen her!”</p> +<p>“We met them just now in the village, but my brother is enchanted. +And do you know what was Julius’s first introduction to her? +It was at a great school-feast, where they had the regimental children +as well as the town ones. A poor little boy went off in an epileptic +fit, and Julius found her holding him, with her own hand in his mouth +to hinder the locking of the teeth. He said her fingers were bitten +almost to the bone, but she made quite light of it.”</p> +<p>“That was nice!” said Anne; but then, with a startled +glance, and in an undertone, she added, “Are they Christians?”</p> +<p>Joanna Bowater paused for a moment between dismay and desire for +consideration, and in that moment her father called to her, “Jenny, +do you remember the dimensions of those cottages in Queckett’s +Lane?” and she had to come and serve for his memory, while he +was indoctrinating a younger squire with the duties of a landlord.</p> +<p>Meanwhile Mrs. Bowater was, for the tenth time, consulting her old +friend upon Mrs. Hornblower’s capabilities of taking care of Herbert, +and betraying a little disappointment that his first sermon had not +yet been heard; and when his voice was complimented, she hoped Julius +would spare it—too much exertion could not be good for so young +a man, and though dear Herbert looked so strong, no one would believe +how much sleep he required. Then she observed, “We found +Camilla Vivian—Lady Tyrrell I mean—calling. Have you +seen her?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Well, she really seems improved!”</p> +<p>“Mr. Bowater has been telling me she is handsomer than ever!”</p> +<p>“Oh yes! That’s all gentlemen think of; but I meant +in other ways. She seems full of the rebuilding of St. Nicholas, +and to be making great friends with your new daughter. You don’t +think,” lowering her voice, “that Raymond would have any +objection to meeting her?”</p> +<p>“Certainly not!”</p> +<p>“I did not suppose he would, but I thought I would just ask +you. It would be rather marked not to invite him for the 3rd, +you know; and Jenny was always so fond of poor Emily, kept up a correspondence +with her to the last. It was the first time she had met the little +one since they came back. Not that she is little now, she is very +tall and quite handsome <i>even</i> by the side of Edith. We just +saw Lady Rosamond—a sweet face—and Herbert perfectly raves +about her!”</p> +<p>“She is a most unselfish warm-hearted creature!” said +Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“I am so glad! And Miles’s wife, I hope she will +come. Poor thing, she looks very poorly.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I am very anxious about her. If she is not better +in a day or two, I shall insist on her having advice.”</p> +<p>“Poor dear, I don’t wonder! But she had better +come to Strawyers; Jenny will cheer her if any one can, and we shall +have a nice lively party, I hope! She will only mope the more +if she never goes out.”</p> +<p>“I am afraid she is hardly equal to it; besides, poor child,” +added Mrs. Poynsett, “she seems to have been strictly brought +up, and to think our ways rather shocking; and Miles wrote to me not +to press her to go into society till he comes home.”</p> +<p>“Ah! well, I call that a mistake!” puffed out good-humoured +Mrs. Bowater. “Very bad for the poor girl’s spirits. +By the bye, I hope Julius does not object to Herbert’s dancing—not +at a public ball, you know, but at home—for if he did, I would +try to arrange something else, it would be so hard for the poor boy +to have to look on.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, I don’t think he could,” said +the mother, considering.</p> +<p>“You see, we thought of a dinner-party for as many as possible. +Frank and Charlie won’t mind dining in the schoolroom, I know, +and having the rest for a dance in the evening; but if Julius did think +it unclerical—Jenny says he won’t, and papa laughs, and +says, ‘Poh! poh! Julius is no fool;’ but people are +so much more particular than they used to be, and I would not get the +dear boy into a scrape for the world.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett undertook to ascertain his opinions on this knotty +point, and to let her know if they were adverse; and then she begged +for a visit from Jenny, whose brother had no accommodation for her in +his lodgings. She could not be spared till after the entertainment +on the 3rd, nor till a visit from her married sister was over; but afterwards, +her mother was delighted that she should come and look after Herbert, +who seemed as much on the maternal mind as if he had not batted his +way through Eton, and boated it through Oxford.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett obtained her word with Julius in good time that evening. +He laughed a little. “Poor Herbs! when will people understand +that it is the spirit of the thing, the pursuit, not the individual +chance participation in any particular amusement, that is unclerical, +as they are pleased to call it?”</p> +<p>“What do you think of Herbert?”</p> +<p>“A boy, and a very nice boy; but if he doesn’t get his +healthful play somehow, he will burst out like a closed boiler some +day.”</p> +<p>“A muscular Christian on your hands?”</p> +<p>“Not theoretically, for he has been well taught; but it’s +a great animal that needs to work off its steam, and if I had known +it, I would not have undertaken the problem of letting him do that, +without setting up bad habits, or scandalizing the parish and Bindon—who +is young the other way, and has no toleration. We had this morning’s +service in a state of siege from all the dogs. Herbert thought +he had shut them safely up, but they were all at his heels in the churchyard; +and though he rated them home, and shut all the doors, we heard them +whining and scratching at each in turn.”</p> +<p>“I thought I should have died of it,” said Rosamond, +entering. “His face grew red enough to set his surplice +on fire, and Mr. Bindon glared at him, and he missed his verse in the +Psalm; for there was the bull terrier, crouching and looking abject +at the vestry-door, just restrained by his eye from coming further.”</p> +<p>“What shall you do about it, Julius?” asked his mother, +much amused.</p> +<p>“Oh, that will remedy itself. All dogs learn to understand +the bell.”</p> +<p>And then the others began to drop in, and were told of the invitation +that was coming.</p> +<p>“I say, Rosamond,” cried Charlie, “can brothers +and sisters-in-law dance together?”</p> +<p>“That depends on how the brothers-in-law dance,” returned +Rosamond. “Some one, for pity’s sake, play a waltz!—Come +along Charlie! the hall is a sweet place for it!—Whistle, Julius!—Frank, +whistle!”</p> +<p>And away she whirled. Frank, holding out his hands, was to +his surprise accepted by Cecil, and disappeared with her into the hall. +Julius stood by the mantelpiece, with the first shadow on his brow his +mother had seen since his arrival. Presently he spoke in a defensive +apologetic tone: “She has always been used to this style of thing.”</p> +<p>“Most naturally,” said the mother.</p> +<p>“Not that they ever did more than their position required, +and Lady Rathforlane is a truly careful mother. Of course some +things might startle you stay-at-home people; but in all essentials—”</p> +<p>“I see what you mean.”</p> +<p>“And what seems like rattle is habit.”</p> +<p>“Simple <i>gaieté de cœur</i>!”</p> +<p>“So it is better to acquiesce till it subsides of itself. +You see it is hard, after such a life of change and variety, to settle +down into a country parsonage.”</p> +<p>“What are you saying there?” said Rosamond, tripping +in out of breath.</p> +<p>“That I don’t know how you are to put up with a pink-eyed +parson, and a hum-drum life,” said Julius, holding out a caressing +hand.</p> +<p>“Now that’s hard,” pleaded she; “only because +I took a frolic with Baby Charles! I say, Julius, shall we give +it up altogether and stay at home like good children? I believe +that is what would suit the told Rabbit much better than his kid gloves,”—and +her sweet face looked up at him with a meek candid gaze.</p> +<p>“No,” he said, “that would not do. The Bowaters +are our oldest friends. But, Rosie, as you <i>are</i> a clergyman’s +wife, could you not give up round dances?”</p> +<p>“Oh no, no! That’s too bad. I’d rather +never go to a dance at all, than sit still, or be elbowed about in the +square dances. You never told me you expected that!”—and +her tones were of a child petulant at injustice.</p> +<p>“Suppose,” he said, as a delightful solution, “you +only gratified Frank and Charlie by waltzing with them.”</p> +<p>She burst into a ringing laugh. “My brothers-in-law! +How very ridiculous! Suppose you included the curates?”</p> +<p>“You know what I mean,” he said gravely.</p> +<p>“Oh, bother the parson’s wife! Haven’t I +seen them figuring away by scores? Did we ever have a regimental +ball that they were not the keenest after?”</p> +<p>“So they get themselves talked of!” said Julius, as Anne’s +quiet entrance broke up the dialogue.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett had listened, glad there was no appeal to her, conscious +that she did not understand the merits of the case, and while she doubted +whether her eldest son had love enough, somewhat afraid lest his brother +had not rather too much for the good of his lawful supremacy.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VII<br /> +Unfruitful Suggestions</h2> +<p>“Raymond! Can you spare me a moment before you go into +your mother’s room?”</p> +<p>It was Rosamond who, to his surprise, as he was about to go down-stairs, +met him and drew him into her apartment—his mother’s own +dressing-room, which he had not entered since the accident.</p> +<p>“Is anything the matter?” he said, thinking that Julius +might have spared him from complaints of Cecil.</p> +<p>“Oh no! only one never can speak to you, and Julius told me +that you could tell me about Mrs. Poynsett. I can’t help +thinking she could be moved more than she is.” Then, as +he was beginning to speak, “Do you know that, the morning of the +fire, I carried her with only one of the maids to the couch under the +tent-room window? Susan was frightened out of her wits, but she +was not a bit the worse for it.”</p> +<p>“Ah! that was excitement.”</p> +<p>“But if it did not hurt her then, why should it hurt her again? +There’s old General M’Kinnon, my father’s old friend, +who runs about everywhere in a wheeled-chair with a leg-rest; and I +can’t think why she should not do the same.”</p> +<p>Raymond smiled kindly on her, but rather sadly; perhaps he was recollecting +his morning’s talk about the occupancy of the drawing-room. +“You know it is her spine,” he said.</p> +<p>“So it is with him. His horse rolled over him at Sebastopol, +and he has never walked since. I wanted to write to Mary M’Kinnon; +but Julius said I had better talk to you, because he was only at home +for a fortnight, when she was at the worst, and you knew more about +it.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Raymond, understanding more than the Irish +tongue fully expressed. “I never saw a woman sit better +than she did, and she looked as young and light in the saddle as you +could, till that day, when, after the rains, the bank where the bridle-path +to Squattles End was built up, gave way with the horse’s feet, +and down she went twenty feet, and was under the horse when Miles and +I got down to her! We brought her on a mattress to that room, +not knowing whether she were alive; and she has never moved out of it! +It was agony to her to be touched.”</p> +<p>“Yes but it can’t be that now. Was not that three +years ago?”</p> +<p>“Not so much. Two and a half. We had Hayter down +to see her, and he said perfect rest was the only chance for her.”</p> +<p>“And has not he seen her lately?”</p> +<p>“He died last winter; and old Worth, who comes in once a week +to look at her, is not fit for more than a little watching and attention. +I dare say we all have learnt to acquiesce too much in her present state, +and that more might be done. You see she has never had a lady’s +care, except now and then Jenny Bowater’s.”</p> +<p>“I do feel sure she could bear more now,” said Rosamond, +eagerly. “It would be such a thing if she could only be +moved about that down-stairs floor.”</p> +<p>“And be with us at meals and in the evening,” said Raymond, +his face lightening up. “Thank you, Rosamond!”</p> +<p>“I’ll write to Mary M’Kinnon to-morrow, to ask +about the chair,” cried Rosamond; and Raymond, hearing the door-bell, +hurried down, to find his wife standing alone over the drawing-room +fire, not very complacent.</p> +<p>“Where have you been, Raymond?”</p> +<p>“I was talking to Rosamond. She has seen a chair on which +it might be possible to move my mother about on this floor.”</p> +<p>“I thought—” Cecil flushed. She was on the +point of saying she thought Rosamond was not to interfere in her department +any more than she in Rosamond’s; but she kept it back, and changed +it into “Surely the doctor and nurses must know best.”</p> +<p>“A fresh eye often makes a difference,” said Raymond. +“To have her among us again—!” but he was cut short +by the announcement of Mr. and Miss Fuller.</p> +<p>“Poor Mr. Fuller,” as every one called him, was the incumbent +of St. Nicholas, Willansborough, a college living always passed by the +knowing old bachelor fellows, and as regularly proving a delusion to +the first junior in haste for a wife. Twenty-five years ago Mr. +Fuller had married upon this, which, as Mr. Bindon said, was rather +a reason for not marrying—a town with few gentry, and a petty +unthriving manufacture, needing an enormous amount of energy to work +it properly, and getting—Mr. Fuller, with force yearly decreasing +under the pressure of a sickly wife, ill-educated, unsatisfactory sons, +and unhealthy, aimless daughters. Of late some assistance had +been obtained, but only from Mr. Driver, the ‘coach’ or +cramming tutor, who was directing the studies of Frank and half a dozen +more youths, and his aid was strictly limited to a share in the Sunday +services.</p> +<p>The eldest daughter accompanied the Vicar. Her mother had not +health (or perhaps clothes) for a dinner-party, and it was the first +time she had ever been in the house. Very shy and in much awe +she was! Cecil viewed her as a constituent, and was elaborately +civil and patronizing, doing the honours of all the photographs and +illustrations on which she could lay hands, and only eliciting alternately +‘Very nice,’ and ‘How sweet!’ A little +more was made of the alarms of the fire, and the preparations for clearing +the house, and there was a further thaw about the bazaar. It would +be such a relief from plain work, and she could get some lovely patterns +from her cousin who had a missionary basket; but as to the burnt-out +families, the little knowledge or interest she seemed to have about +them was rather astounding, unless, as Rosamond suspected, she thought +it ‘shop,’ and uninteresting to the great ladies of Compton-Poynsett +Hall.</p> +<p>Meanwhile, her father made the apprehended request for the loan of +Compton Church during the intervals of services, and when the Rector +explained how brief those intervals would be, looked astonished, and +dryly complimented him on his energy and his staff, somewhat as if the +new broom were at the bottom of these congratulations.</p> +<p>The schools were to be used for services until a temporary iron church +could be obtained, for which Julius, to make up for his churlishness +in withholding his own church, made the handsomer donation, and held +out hopes of buying it afterwards for the use of Squattles End. +Then, having Mr. Fuller’s ear to himself, he ventured to say, +though cautiously, as to one who had been a clergyman before he was +born, “I wish it were possible to dispense with this bazaar.”</p> +<p>Mr. Fuller shrugged his shoulders. “If every one subscribed +in the style of this family.”</p> +<p>“They would be more likely to do so, without the appeal to +secondary motives.”</p> +<p>“Try them,” said the elder man.</p> +<p>“Exactly what I want to do. I would put up the four walls, +begin with what you get from the insurance, a weekly offertory, and +add improvements as means came in. This is not visionary. +I have seen proof of its success.”</p> +<p>“It may serve in new-fashioned city missions, but in an old-established +place like this it would create nothing but offence. When you +have been in Orders as long as I have, you will find that there is nothing +for it but to let people do what they will, not what one thinks best.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Fuller,” said Julius, eagerly, “will you try +an experiment? Drop this bazaar, and I promise you our collection +every Sunday evening for the year, giving notice of it to my people, +and to such of yours as may be present.”</p> +<p>“I do not despise your offer,” said Mr. Fuller, laying +his hand upon his arm. “You mean it kindly, and if I were +in your place, or had only my own feelings to consider, I might attempt +it. But it would be only mischievous to interfere with the bazaar. +Lady Tyrrell—all the ladies, in fact—have set their minds +on it, and if I objected there would instantly be a party cry against +me, and that is the one thing I have always avoided.”</p> +<p>His tone of superior wisdom, meek and depressed as he always was, +tried the Rector’s patience enough to make his forehead burn and +bring out his white eyebrows in strong relief. “How about +a blessing on the work?” he asked, suppressing so much that he +hardly knew this was spoken aloud.</p> +<p>Again Mr. Fuller smiled. He had been a bit of a humorist when +he was an Oxford don. “Speak of that to Briggs,” he +said, “and he would answer, ‘Cash for me, and the blessing +may take care of itself.’ As to the ladies—why, they +deafen you about blessings on their humble efforts, and the widow’s +mite.”</p> +<p>“Simply meaning that they want their amusement a little—”</p> +<p>“Buttered over,” said Mr. Fuller, supplying the word. +“Though you are hard on them, Charnock—I don’t know +about the fine ladies; but there are quiet folk who will work their +fingers to the bone, and can do nothing else.”</p> +<p>“That’s true,” said Julius; “and one would +gladly find a safe outlet for their diligence.”</p> +<p>“You do not trust to it for bringing the blessing,” said +Mr. Fuller in a tone that Julius liked even less than the mere hopeless +faint-heartedness, for in it there was sarcasm on faith in aught but +£ <i>s. d.</i></p> +<p>The two brothers held another discussion on this matter later that +night, on the stairs, as they were on their way to their rooms.</p> +<p>“Won’t you come to this meeting to-morrow, Julius?” +asked Raymond.</p> +<p>“I don’t see that I should be of any use, unless—”</p> +<p>“Unless what?”</p> +<p>“Unless you would make what seems to me the right proposal, +and I could be any support in it.”</p> +<p>“What’s that?”</p> +<p>“To use the insurance to put up the mere shells and plain indispensable +fittings of the church and town-hall, then make the drainage of Water +Lane and Hall Street the first object for the rates, while the church +is done by subscription and voluntary effort.”</p> +<p>“You put the drainage first—even before the church?” +said Raymond, smiling, with an elder brother’s satisfaction in +such an amount of common sense.</p> +<p>“Of course I do,” said Julius. “An altar +and four walls and chairs are all that ought to be sought for. +Little good can be done to people’s souls while their bodies are +in the feverish discomfort of foul air and water. This is an opportunity +not to be wasted, while all the houses are down, town-hall and all.”</p> +<p>“The very thing I told Briggs and the others this morning,” +said Raymond; “but I could not get a hearing; they said there +never had been any illness worth mentioning, and in fact scouted the +whole matter, as people always do.”</p> +<p>“Yes, they take it as a personal insult when you mention the +odorous—or odious, savours sweet,” said Julius. “I +heard a good deal of that when we had the spell of cholera at St. Awdry’s.”</p> +<p>“I shall work on at it, and I trust to get it done in time,” +said Raymond; “but it will not be at once. The subject is +too new to them, and the irritation it produces must subside before +they will hear reason. Besides, the first thing is to employ and +feed these paper-makers.”</p> +<p>“Of course.”</p> +<p>“That will pretty well absorb this first meeting. The +ladies will manage that, I think; and when this is provided for, I will +try what I can do at the committee; but there is no good in bringing +it forward at this great public affair, when every ass can put in his +word. Everything depends on whom they choose for the new mayor. +If Whitlock comes in, there is some chance of sense and reason being +heard. Good night.”</p> +<p>As Raymond said, the more immediate object of the meeting fixed for +the ensuing day, was to provide for the employment of the numerous women +thrown out of employment by the destruction of the paper-mills. +A subscription was in hand, but not adequate to the need; and moreover, +it was far more expedient to let them maintain themselves.</p> +<p>How this was to be done was the question. Cecil told her husband +that at Dunstone they made the women knit stockings; and he replied +by recommending the suppression of Dunstone. How strange it was +that what she had been used to consider as the source of honour should +be here held in what seemed to her disesteem!</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell’s ponies were tinkling up to the door of the hotel +where the meeting was to be held, and her gracious smile recalled Cecil’s +good-humour; Raymond saw them to their seats, and then had to go and +take the chair himself on the platform—first, however, introducing +his wife to such of the ladies present as he recollected.</p> +<p>She thought he wanted her to sit between melancholy white faced Mrs. +Fuller and a bony spinster in a poke-bonnet whom he called Miss Slater; +but Cecil, concluding that this last could have no vote, and that the +Vicarage was secure, felt free to indulge herself by getting back to +Lady Tyrrell, who had scarcely welcomed her before exclaiming, “Mrs. +Duncombe, I did not know you were returned.”</p> +<p>“I came back on the first news of your flare-up,” said +the newcomer. “I only came down this morning. I would +not have missed this meeting for anything. It is a true woman’s +question. A fair muster, I see,” looking round with her +eye-glass, and bowing to several on the platform, especially to Raymond, +who returned the bow rather stiffly.</p> +<p>“Ah! let me introduce you,” said Lady Tyrrell. +“Mrs. Raymond Charnock Poynsett.”</p> +<p>“I am very glad to see you embarked in the cause,” said +the lady, frankly holding out her hand. “May we often meet +in the same manner, though I honestly tell you I’m not of your +party; I should go dead against your husband if we only had a chance.”</p> +<p>“Come, you need not be so aggressive,” laughed Lady Tyrrell; +“you haven’t a vote yet. You are frightening Mrs. +Poynsett.” It was true. Even Cecil Charnock was born +too late to be one of the young ladies who, in the first decades of +the reformed Parliament, used to look on a Liberal as a <i>lusus naturæ</i>, +whom they hardly believed to be a gentleman. But a lady who would +openly accost the Member’s bride with a protest against his politics, +was a being beyond her experience, and the contemplation fairly distracted +her from her husband’s oratory.</p> +<p>She would have taken Miss Slater for the strong-minded female far +rather than this small slim person, with the complexion going with the +yellower species of red hair and chignon, not unlike a gold-pheasant’s, +while the thin aquiline nose made Cecil think of Queen Elizabeth. +The dress was a tight-fitting black silk, with a gorgeous many-coloured +gold-embroidered oriental mantle thrown loosely over it, and a Tyrolean +hat, about as large as the pheasant’s comb, tipped over her forehead, +with cords and tassels of gold; and she made little restless movements +and whispered remarks during the speeches.</p> +<p>There was to be a rate to renew the town-hall. The rebuilding +of the paper-mills and dwelling-houses was fairly covered by the insurance; +but the Vicar, in his diffident apologetic voice, stated that the church +had been insufficiently insured, and moreover, that many more sittings +were needed than the former building had contained. He then read +the list of subscriptions already promised, expressed hopes of more +coming in, invited ladies to take collecting cards, and added that he +was happy to announce that the ladies of the congregation had come forward +with all the beneficence of their sex, and raised a sum to supply a +new set of robes.</p> +<p>Here the chairman glanced at his wife, but she was absorbed in watching +Mrs. Duncombe’s restless hands; and the look was intercepted by +Lady Tyrrell’s eyes, which flashed back sympathetic amusement, +with just such a glance as used to pass between them in old times; but +the effect was to make the Member’s face grave and impassive, +and his eyes fix on the papers before him.</p> +<p>The next moment Cecil was ardently gazing at Mr. Fuller as he proceeded +to his hopes of the bazaar to be held under the most distinguished patronage, +and of which he spoke as if it were the subject of anticipations as +sanguine as any the poor man could ever appear to indulge in. +And there was, in fact, the greatest stamping and cheering there had +yet been, perhaps in compliment to the M.P.’s young bride—at +least, so Lady Tyrrell whispered, adding that everybody was trying to +see her.</p> +<p>Then Mr. Charnock Poynsett himself took up the exposition of the +third branch of the subject, the support of the poor families thrown +out of work at the beginning of winter. There could be no employment +at the paper-mills till they were repaired; and after the heavy losses, +they could not attempt to keep their people together by any payment. +It had been suggested that the readiest way of meeting the difficulty, +would be to employ the subscriptions already promised in laying in a +stock of material to be made up into garments, and then dispose of them +out to the women at their homes; and appointing a day once a week when +the work should be received, the pay given, and fresh material supplied, +by a party of volunteer ladies.</p> +<p>This was, in fact, what he had been instructed to propose by the +kindly souls who ordinarily formed the St. Nicholas <i>bureau de charité</i>, +who had instructed him to be their mouthpiece. There was due applause +as the mayor seconded his resolution; but in the midst a clear, rather +high-pitched voice rose up close to Cecil, saying, “Mr. Chairman, +allow me to ask what sale is anticipated for these garments?”</p> +<p>“I am told that there is a demand for them among the poor themselves,” +said Raymond, judiciously concealing how much he was taken aback by +this female interference.</p> +<p>“Allow me to differ. A permanent work society numbering +a few women otherwise unemployed may find a sufficient sale in the neighbourhood +under the patronage of charitable ladies; but when you throw in ninety-five +or one hundred pair of hands depending on their work for their livelihood, +the supply must necessarily soon go beyond any demand, even fictitious. +It will not do to think of these women like fancy knitters or embroiderers +whose work is skilled. Most of them can hardly mend their own +clothes, and the utmost that can be expected of them is the roughest +slop work.”</p> +<p>“Do you wish any expedient to be proposed?” asked the +chairman, in a sort of aside.</p> +<p>“Yes, I have one. I spent yesterday in collecting information.”</p> +<p>“Will Captain Duncombe move it?” suggested Raymond.</p> +<p>“Oh no! he is not here. No, it is no use to instruct +anybody; I will do it myself, if you please.”</p> +<p>And before the astonished eyes of the meeting, the gold-pheasant +hopped upon the platform, and with as much ease as if she had been Queen +Bess dragooning her parliament, she gave what even the astounded gentlemen +felt to be a sensible practical exposition of ways and means.</p> +<p>She had obtained the address of a warehouse ready to give such rough +work as the women could be expected to do; but as they were unaccustomed +to work at home, and were at present much crowded from the loss of so +many houses, and could besides be little depended on for working well +enough without superintendence, her plan was to hire a room, collect +the women, and divide the superintendence between the ladies; who should +give out the work, see that it was properly done, keep order, and the +like. She finished off in full order, by moving a resolution to +this effect.</p> +<p>There was a pause, and a little consultation among the gentlemen, +ending by Raymond’s absolutely telling Mr. Fuller that it was +a very sensible practical arrangement, and that it <i>must</i> be seconded; +which the Vicar accordingly did, and it was carried without opposition, +as in truth nothing so good had been thought of; and the next thing +was to name a committee of ladies, a treasurer and auditor of accounts. +There would be no work on Saturdays, so if the ladies would each undertake +half a day once a fortnight, the superintendence need not be a burthen.</p> +<p>Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Slater undertook the first start and preliminary +arrangements, then each would take her half day in rotation. Lady +Tyrrell and her sister undertook two, Cecil two more, and others were +found to fill up the vacant space. The chairman moved a vote of +thanks to the lady for her suggestion, which she acknowledged by a gracious +bow, not without triumph; and the meeting broke up.</p> +<p>Some one asked after Captain Duncombe as she descended into private +life. “There’s a wonderful filly that absorbs all +his attention. All Wil’sbro’ might burn as long as +Dark Hag thrives! When do I expect him? I don’t know; +it depends on Dark Hag,” she said in a tone of superior good-natured +irony, then gathered up the radiant mantle and tripped off along the +central street of the little old-fashioned country town, with gravelled +not paved side-walks.</p> +<p>“Isn’t she very superior?” said Cecil, when her +husband had put her on horseback.</p> +<p>“I suppose she is very clever.”</p> +<p>“And she spoke capitally.”</p> +<p>“If she were to speak. What would your father think of +her?”</p> +<p>But for the first time Cecil’s allegiance had experienced a +certain shock. Some sort of pedestal had hitherto been needful +to her existence; she was learning that Dunstone was an unrecognized +elevation in this new country, and she had seen a woman attain to a +pinnacle that almost dazzled her, by sheer resource and good sense.</p> +<p>All the discussion she afterwards heard did not tend to shake her +opinion; Raymond recounted the adventure at his mother’s kettle-drum, +telling of his own astonishment at the little lady’s assurance.</p> +<p>“I do not see why she should be censured,” said Cecil. +“You were all at a loss without her.”</p> +<p>“She should have got her husband to speak for her,” said +Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“He was not there.”</p> +<p>“Then she should have instructed some other gentleman,” +said Mrs. Poynsett. “A woman spoils all the effect of her +doings by putting herself out of her proper place.”</p> +<p>“Perfectly disgusting!” said Julius.</p> +<p>Cecil had decidedly not been disgusted, except by the present strong +language; and not being ready at repartee, she was pleased when Rosamond +exclaimed, “Ah! that’s just what men like, to get instructed +in private by us poor women, and then gain all the credit for originality.”</p> +<p>“It is the right way,” said the mother. “The +woman has much power of working usefully and gaining information, but +the one thing that is not required of her is to come forward in public.”</p> +<p>“Very convenient for the man!” laughed Rosamond.</p> +<p>“And scarcely fair,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Quite fair,” said Rosamond, turning round, so that Cecil +only now perceived that she had been speaking in jest. “Any +woman who is worth a sixpence had rather help her husband to shine than +shine herself.”</p> +<p>“Besides,” said Mrs. Poynsett, “the delicate edges +of true womanhood ought not to be frayed off by exposure in public.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Raymond. “The gain of an inferior +power of man in public would be far from compensated by the loss in +private of that which man can never supply.”</p> +<p>“Granted,” said Rosamond slyly though sleepily, “that +it always is an inferior power of man, which it does not seem to have +been in the actual case.”</p> +<p>“It was a point on which she had special knowledge and information,” +said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“And you were forced to thank her,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Yes, in common civility,” said Raymond; “but it +was as much as I could do to get it done, the position was a false one +altogether.”</p> +<p>“In fact, you were all jealous,” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>At which everybody laughed, which was her sole intention; but Cecil, +who had said so much less, really thought what Rosamond said in mere +play. Those extorted thanks seemed to her a victory of her sex +in a field she had never thought of; and though she had no desire to +emulate the lady, and felt that a daughter of Dunstone must remember +<i>noblesse oblige</i>, the focus of her enthusiasm was in an odd state +of shifting.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER VIII<br /> +Unsatisfactory</h2> +<p>On the evening of the party at Strawyers, Mrs. Poynsett lay on her +sofa, thinking, with a trying recurrence, of that unfortunate and excellent +German Dauphine, who was pronounced by the Duchess of Orleans to have +died of her own stupidity.</p> +<p>After a fortnight had brought no improvement, but rather the reverse, +to poor Anne’s wan looks and feeble languid deportment, Mrs. Poynsett +had insisted on her seeing the doctor; and had been assured by him that +there was nothing amiss, and that if Mrs Miles Charnock could only be +roused and occupied she would be perfectly well, but that her pining +and depression might so lower her tone as to have a serious effect on +her health.</p> +<p>There was no hope of her husband’s return for at least a year, +likely eighteen months. What was to be done with her? What +could be a more unpropitious fate than for a Colonial girl, used to +an active life of exertion and usefulness, and trained to all domestic +arts, to be set down in a great English household where there was really +nothing for her to do, and usefulness or superintendence would have +been interfering; besides, as Miles had thoughts of settling at the +Cape, English experience would serve her little.</p> +<p>She had not cultivation enough for any pursuit to interest her. +She was not musical, could not draw; and when Mrs. Poynsett had, by +way of experiment, asked her to read aloud an hour a day, and selected +the <i>Lives of the Lindsays</i>, as an unexceptionable and improving +book, full of Scottish history, and even with African interest, she +dutifully did her task as an attention to her invalid mother-in-law, +but in a droning husky tone, finding it apparently as severe a penance +as it was to her auditor.</p> +<p>The doctor’s chief prescription was horse exercise; but what +would a constitutional canter be to one accustomed to free rides through +the Bush? And she would generally be alone; for even if Charlie, +her nearest approach to an ally, had not been going away from home in +a few weeks, it could not be expected that he could often ride with +her.</p> +<p>It was plain that every one of the whole family was giving continual +shocks to Mr. Pilgrim’s disciple, even when they felt most innocent; +and though the mother was sometimes disposed to be angry, sometimes +to laugh at the little shudder and compression of the lips she began +to know, she perceived what an addition this must be to the unhappiness +of the poor lonely stranger.</p> +<p>“She must be set to some good work,” thought Mrs. Poynsett; +“Julius might let her go to his old women. She might get +on with them better than with the old women here. And there’s +Cecil’s working affair, it would be just the thing to give her +an object. I think I can get through this evening. I’ve +made Susan bring my desk, with all Miles’s letters from his first +voyage. Shall I suppress the ball?”</p> +<p>Therewith Cecil made her entrance, in glossy white satin and deep +lace, beautiful to behold, set off with rainbow glistening opals. +She made a quiet complacent show of herself, as one not vain of fine +clothes, but used to an affectionate family appreciation of her best +attire; and it was the most friendly childlike bit of intimacy that +had yet been attained between her and Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>And when she sat down to wait for the others, Mrs. Poynsett ventured +on telling her the prescription and her own perplexity, hoping for a +voluntary offer to employ Anne at Willansborough; but Cecil only pitied +her for having ‘no resources’; and when Mrs. Poynsett ventured +to suggest finding a niche for her in the work-room, the answer was—“Our +days are all disposed of.”</p> +<p>“You have two, I think?”</p> +<p>“True; but it would never do for me to give up one of my times. +If I seemed to slacken, every one else would.”</p> +<p>“What will you do when the Session begins?”</p> +<p>“I shall make some arrangement. I do not think Anne could +ever take my place; she would have no authority.”</p> +<p>Anne herself here entered, took her knitting, and sat down, apparently +unaware of the little pluming gesture by which Cecil unconsciously demanded +attention to her bridal satin. One white-gloved gentleman after +another dropped in, but none presumed on a remark; Jenkins announced +the carriages; but Rosamond had not appeared, and after an excursion +up-stairs, Julius returned, declaring that the first carriage must not +wait for her, they would come afterwards in the van, for there was something +amiss in the dress, she had not had it on since the wedding.</p> +<p>“And she came in so late,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“That was my fault,” he said. “We came through +the village to leave a message at the doctor’s;” and he +then insisted that the other pair should set off, taking Frank and Charlie, +and prevent dinner from being kept waiting; at which the boys made faces, +and declared that it was a dodge of his to join Jenny’s party +in the schoolroom, instead of the solemn dinner; but they were obliged +to submit; and it was not till twenty minutes later, that in glided +something white, with blue cashmere and swan’s-down over it, moving, +as usual, with languid grace.</p> +<p>“Poor Julius!” smiled Rosamond with her dawdling dignity. +“Every single thing turned out a misfit! As it is, there’s +a monstrous hole in my glove, which demands the benevolent fiction of +my having torn it by the way. There, one second for the effect!—Good-bye, +dear Mrs. Poynsett;—good-bye, Anne. Come, you monument of +patience and resignation!”</p> +<p>For one moment she had slipped back her little mantle, then drawn +it on, as, taking her husband’s arm, she left the room; but that +moment had set Anne’s cheeks aflame, and left Mrs. Poynsett in +a startled state of uncertainty, hoping her glance had been mistaken, +wondering what could have been <i>more</i> amiss, and feeling incapable +of entering on the subject with that severe young judge, of narrow experience.</p> +<p>Never had her eldest son failed to come and bid her good night on +his way to his own room: it was the great break in her long sleepless +hours, and she used to call it a reversal of the relations of those +days when he used to watch for her kiss on her way to bed. Nor +did he fail her now, but came and stood over her with his fragmentary +tidings.</p> +<p>“An immense party—oh yes, there was he persuading them +not to wait. Mr. Bowater took Rosamond in to dinner, Cecil went +with Sir Harry Vivian. Yes, Lady Tyrrell was there, wonderfully +handsome, but her expression strikes me as altered; there is the sort +of pathetic look that, as Cecil said, is like the melancholy Medusa—I +wonder if it is genuine. She seems greatly disposed to cultivate +Cecil—I wonder what she does it for.”</p> +<p>“Is Cecil attracted? I fancied she was.”</p> +<p>“Yes, a good deal; and I fear the Wil’sbro’ business +will throw them together. It is unlucky on Frank’s account +likewise. I see we shall have it all over again there.”</p> +<p>“I have great hope in his office taking him away. How +was it with them to-night?”</p> +<p>“What I should call arrant coquetry, such as even Camilla never +indulged in. The girl kept out of his way—was absolutely +chill and repelling half the evening—throwing herself at the officers +from Backsworth, till at last Frank obtained a waltz, and after that +they were perfectly inseparable.”</p> +<p>“If she coquets, she will soon disgust him! Did Cecil +enjoy herself?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes: Phil Bowater opened the ball with her, and she dances +very nicely—so quietly, Mrs. Bowater remarked it. As to +Rosamond, she was in her native element—<i>is</i> indeed, for +she would not hear of coming away when we did.”</p> +<p>“And Julius?”</p> +<p>“Standing in a doorway, with others of his kind, absently talking, +and watching Rosamond out of the tail of his eye. I say, mother,” +lowering his voice, “can’t you give Rosamond a hint about +her dress? Cecil says she can’t go out with her again like +<i>that</i>. Ah,” as he heard a sigh, “I should not +have worried you at night.”</p> +<p>“No, you have not. Tell Cecil I will see about it. +Rosamond will take it best from an old woman like me.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett was quite conscious that Cecil had more high breeding +and refinement than Rosamond, who was essentially the Irish Colonel’s +daughter, and that the cold temperament of the one irritated the warm +nature of the other. More than one flash had revealed Rosamond’s +contempt for Cecil’s assumptions and intolerance for her precision—besides, +she was five years older, and had not an ideal in Dunstone.</p> +<p>After revolving what form of remonstrance would be least offensive +during half the night and day, Mrs. Poynsett was not prepared for the +appearance, about noon, of her son Julius, when, coming to what she +termed the confidential side of her couch, he asked hesitatingly, and +colouring, “Mother, I want you to tell me, was there anything +amiss in Rose’s dress last night?”</p> +<p>“You did not perceive—”</p> +<p>“I’m not used to the style of thing. Is it not +the way with what you call full dress?”</p> +<p>“To a certain degree—” she began.</p> +<p>He caught her up. “And here has Cecil been putting my +poor Rose into a perfect agony! It is only woman’s censorious +nonsense, isn’t it, mother? Mere folly to think otherwise! +I knew you would set my mind at rest; and if you would tell Cecil that +you will not have Rosamond insulted, it would be as well.”</p> +<p>“Stay, Julius,” as he was walking off complacently, “I +grieve, but I must confess that I was going to speak to Rosamond myself.”</p> +<p>He looked very blank.</p> +<p>“Mind, I am certain that it is only an innocent following of +what she has been brought up to;” and as he signed a sort of hurt +acquiescence, as if trying to swallow the offence, she added, “When +do you go out again?”</p> +<p>“Not till Monday, when we dine at Colonel Ross’s. +He is an old friend of Lord Rathforlane.”</p> +<p>“Then I am inclined to let it cool. Sometimes advice +that has been resented does its work.”</p> +<p>“You don’t think the interference justifiable?”</p> +<p>“Not from that quarter.”</p> +<p>“And can it be needful to attend to it?”</p> +<p>“My dear Julius, it is not a style of dress I could ever have +worn, nor have let my daughters have worn, if I had had any.”</p> +<p>“Conclusive, that!” said Julius, getting up, more really +angered with his mother than he had been since his childhood.</p> +<p>However, he conquered himself by the time he had reached the door, +and came back to say, “I beg your pardon, mother, I know you would +not say so without need.”</p> +<p>“Thank you, my boy!” and he saw tears in her eyes, the +first time he was conscious of having brought them. As he bent +down to kiss her, she rallied, and cheerfully said, “I have no +doubt it will all come right—Rosamond is too nice not to feel +it at once.”</p> +<p>No such thing; Rosamond was still furious. If he disapproved, +she would submit to him; but he had seen nothing wrong, had he?</p> +<p>“My dear Rose, I told you I was no judge: you forget what my +eyes are; and my mother—”</p> +<p>“You have been to your mother?”</p> +<p>“My dear, what could I do?”</p> +<p>“And you think I am going to insult my own mother and sisters +to please any woman’s finical prudish notions’? Pray +what did Mrs. Poynsett say?”</p> +<p>The excuse of custom, pleaded by Mrs. Poynsett, only made Rosamond +fiercer. She wished she had never come where she was to hear that +her own mother was no judge of propriety, and her husband could not +trust her, but must needs run about asking everybody if she were fit +to be seen. Such a tempest Julius had never seen outside a back +street in the garrison town. There seemed to be nothing she would +not say, and his attempts at soothing only added to her violence. +Indeed, there was only one thing which would have satisfied her, and +that was, that she had been perfectly right, and the whole world barbarously +wrong; and she was wild with passion at perceiving that he had a confidence +in his own mother which he could not feel in hers.</p> +<p>Nor would he insist that Raymond should force Cecil to apologize. +“My dear,” he said, “don’t you know there are +things easier to ask than to obtain?”</p> +<p>To which Rosamond replied, in another gust, that she would never +again sit down to table with Cecil until she had apologized for the +insult, not to herself, she did not care about that, but to the mother +who had seen her dresses tried on: Julius must tell Raymond so, or take +her away to any cottage at once. She would not stay where people +blamed mamma and poisoned his mind against her! She believed he +cared for them more than for her!</p> +<p>Julius had sympathized far longer with her offended feeling than +another could have done; but he was driven to assert himself. +“Nonsense, Rose, you know better,” he said, in a voice of +displeasure; but she pouted forth, “I don’t know it. +You believe every one against me, and you won’t take my part against +that nasty little spiteful prig!”</p> +<p>“Cecil has behaved very ill to you,” said Julius, granting +her rather over much; “but she is a foolish conceited child, who +does not deserve that Raymond should be worried about her. I foresee +plenty of grievances from her; but, Rosie, we must and will not let +her come between us and Raymond. You don’t know what a brother +he has been to me—I hardly think I could have got through my first +year at school but for him; and I don’t think my sweet Rose could +wish to do me such an ill turn as to stir up a feud with such a brother +because his wife is provoking.”</p> +<p>The luncheon-bell began to sound, and she sobbed out, “There +then, go down, leave me alone! Go to them, since you are so fond +of them all!”</p> +<p>“I don’t think you could come down as you are,” +said Julius, gravely; “I will bring you something.”</p> +<p>“It would choke me—choke me!” she sobbed out.</p> +<p>Julius knew enough of the De Lancy temperament to be aware that words +carried them a long way, and he thought solitude would be so beneficial, +that he summoned resolution to leave her; but he had not the face to +appear alone, nor offer fictions to excuse her absence, so he took refuge +in his dressing-room, until he had seen Cecil and Anne ride away from +the hall door together.</p> +<p>For the two sisters-in-law had held a little indignation meeting, +and Rosamond’s misdemeanour had so far drawn them together, that +Cecil had offered to take Anne to see the working party, and let her +assist thereat.</p> +<p>The coast being clear, Julius went down, encountering nothing worse +than the old butler, who came in while he was cutting cold beef, and +to whom he said, “Lady Rosamond is rather knocked up; I am going +to take her something up-stairs.”</p> +<p>Jenkins received this as the result of a dance, but much wanted to +fetch a tray, which Julius refused, and set off with an ale-glass in +one hand, and in the other the plates with the beef and appliances, +Jenkins watching in jealous expectation of a catastrophe, having no +opinion of Mr. Julius’s powers as a waiter. He was disappointed. +The downfall was deferred till the goal was reached, and was then most +salutary, for Rosamond sprang to pick up the knife and fork, laughed +at his awkwardness, refused to partake without him, produced implements +from her travelling-bag, and was as merry as she had been miserable.</p> +<p>Not a word on the feud was uttered; and the pair walked down to the +village, where she was exemplary, going into all those more distasteful +parts of her duties there, which she sometimes shirked.</p> +<p>And on her return, finding her long-expected letter from Miss M’Kinnon +awaiting her, she forgot all offences in her ardour to indoctrinate +everybody with the hopes it gave of affording Mrs. Poynsett a change +of room, if not even greater variety. Unfortunately, this eagerness +was not met with a corresponding fervour. There was in the household +the acquiescence with long-established invalidism, that sometimes settles +down and makes a newcomer’s innovations unwelcome. Raymond +had spoken to the old doctor, who had been timid and discouraging; Susan +resented the implication that the utmost had not been done for her dear +mistress; and Mrs. Poynsett herself, though warmly grateful for Rosamond’s +affection, was not only nervously unwilling to try experiments, but +had an instinctive perception that there was one daughter-in-law to +whom her increased locomotion would scarcely be welcome, and by no means +wished to make this distaste evident to Raymond. Cecil would not +have been so strong against the risk and imprudence, if her wishes had +been the other way. Moreover, she had been warned off from interference +with the Rector’s wife in the village, and she did not relish +Rosamond’s making suggestions as to her province, as she considered +the house—above all, when she viewed that lady as in a state of +disgrace. It was nothing less than effrontery; and Cecil became +stiffer and colder than ever. She demanded of her mother-in-law +whether there had been any promise of amendment.</p> +<p>“Oh! Julius will see to all that,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“It is a woman’s question,” returned Cecil.</p> +<p>“Not entirely.”</p> +<p>“Fancy a clergyman’s wife! It Mrs. Venn had appeared +in that way at Dunstone!”</p> +<p>“You would have left it to Mr. Venn! My dear, the less +said the sooner mended.”</p> +<p>Cecil was silenced, but shocked, for she was far too young and inexperienced +to understand that indecorous customs complied with as a matter of course, +do not necessarily denote lack of innate modesty—far less, how +they could be confounded with home allegiance; and as to Anne, poor +Rosamond was, in her eyes, only too like the ladies who impeded Christiana +on her outset.</p> +<p>So her ladyship retreated into languid sleepy dignity towards both +her sisters-in-law; and on Monday evening showed herself, for a moment, +more <i>decolletée</i>, if possible, than before. Mrs. +Poynsett feared lest Julius were weak in this matter; but at night she +had a visit from him.</p> +<p>“Mother,” he said, “it will not happen again. +Say no more.”</p> +<p>“I am only too thankful.”</p> +<p>“What do you think settled it? No less than Lady Tyrrell’s +admiration.”</p> +<p>“What could she have said?”</p> +<p>“I can’t make out. Rose was far too indignant to +be comprehensible, when she told me on the way home; but there was something +about adopting the becoming, and a repetition of—of some insolent +praise.” And his mother felt his quiver of suppressed wrath. +“If Rose had been what that woman took her for, she would have +been delighted,” he continued; “but—”</p> +<p>“It was horrible to her!” said his mother. “And +to you. Yes, I knew it would right itself, and I am glad nothing +passed about it between us.”</p> +<p>“So am I; she quite separates you from Cecil and Anne, and +indeed all her anger is with Lady Tyrrell. She will have it there +was malice in inciting her to shock old friends and annoy you—a +sort of attempt to sympathize her into opposition.”</p> +<p>“Which had a contrary effect upon a generous nature.”</p> +<p>“Exactly! She thinks nothing too bad for that woman, +and declares she is a serpent.”</p> +<p>“That’s dear Rosamond’s anger; but I imagine that +when I occur to Camilla’s mind, it is as the obstructive old hag, +who once stood in her way; and so, without any formed designs, whatever +she says of me is coloured by that view.”</p> +<p>“Quite possible; and I am afraid the sister is just such another. +She seems quite to belong to Mrs. Duncombe’s set. I sat +next her at dinner, and tried to talk to her, but she would only listen +to that young Strangeways.”</p> +<p>“Strangeways! I wonder if that is Susan Lorimer’s +son?”</p> +<p>“Probably, for his Christian name is Lorimer.”</p> +<p>“I knew her rather well as a girl. She was old Lord Lorimer’s +youngest daughter, and we used to walk in the Square gardens together; +but I did not see much of her after I married; and after a good while, +she married a man who had made a great fortune by mining. I wonder +what her son is like?”</p> +<p>“He must be the man, for he is said to be the millionaire of +the regiment. Just the match that Lady Tyrrell would like.”</p> +<p>“Ah! that’s well,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“From your point of view,” said Julius, smiling.</p> +<p>“If he will only speak out before it has had time to go deep +with Frank!”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER IX<br /> +Cold Heart</h2> +<p>At that very moment the two sisters in question were driving home +in the opposite corners of the carriage in the dark.</p> +<p>“Really, Lenore,” was Lady Tyrrell saying, “you +are a very impracticable girl.”</p> +<p>There was a little low laugh in answer.</p> +<p>“What blast has come and frozen you up into ice?” the +elder sister added caressingly; but as she felt for Eleonora’s +hand in the dark, she obtained nothing but the cold handle of a fan. +“That’s just it!” she said, laughing; “hard +ivory, instead of flesh and blood.”</p> +<p>“I can’t help it!” was the answer.</p> +<p>“But why not? I’m sure you had admiration enough +to turn any girl’s head.”</p> +<p>No answer.</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell renewed her address still more tenderly—“Lenore, +darling, it is quite needful that you should understand your position.”</p> +<p>“I am afraid I understand it only too well,” came in +a smothered voice.</p> +<p>“It may be very painful, but it ought to be made clear before +you how you stand. You know that my father was ruined—there’s +no word for it but ruined.”</p> +<p>“Yes.”</p> +<p>“He had to give up the property to the creditors, and live +on an allowance.”</p> +<p>“I know that.”</p> +<p>“And, of course, I can’t bear speaking of it; but the +house is really let to me. I have taken it as I might any other +house to let.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” again assented Eleonora.</p> +<p>“And do you know why?”</p> +<p>“You said it was for the sake of the old home and my father!” +said the girl, with a bitter emphasis on the <i>said.</i></p> +<p>“So it was! It was to give you the chance of redeeming +it, and keeping it in the family. It is to be sold, you know, +as soon as you are of age, and can give your consent. I can’t +buy it. Mine is only a jointure, a life income, and you know that +you might as well think of Mary buying Golconda; but you—you—with +such beauty as yours—might easily make a connection that would +save it.”</p> +<p>There was only a choked sound.</p> +<p>“I know you feel the situation painfully, after having been +mistress so long.”</p> +<p>“Camilla, you <i>know</i> it is not that!”</p> +<p>“Ah, my dear, I can see farther than you avow. You can’t +marry till you are twenty-one, you know; but you might be very soon +engaged, and then we should see our way. It only depends on yourself. +Plenty of means, and no land to tie him down, ready to purchase and +to settle down. It would be the very thing; and I see you are +a thoroughly sensible girl, Lena.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! I am not even sensible enough to know who is +to be this purchaser.”</p> +<p>“Come, Lena, don’t be affected. Why! he was the +only poor creature you were moderately gracious to.”</p> +<p>“I! what do you mean?”</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell laughed again.</p> +<p>“Oh!” in a tone of relief, “I can explain all that +to you. All the Strangeways family were at Rockpier the winter +before you came, and I made great friends with Margaret Strangeways, +the eldest sister. I wanted very much to hear about her, for she +has had a great deal of illness and trouble, and I had not ventured +to write to her.”</p> +<p>“Oh! was that the girl young Debenham gave up because her mother +worried him so incessantly, and who went into a Sisterhood?”</p> +<p>“It was she who broke it off. She found he had been forced +into it by his family, and was really attached elsewhere. I never +knew the rights of it till I saw the brother to-night.”</p> +<p>“Very praiseworthy family confidence!”</p> +<p>“Camilla, you know I object to that tone.”</p> +<p>“So do most young ladies, my dear—at least by word.”</p> +<p>“And once for all, you need have no fancies about Mr. Lorimer +Strangeways. I am civil to him, of course, for Margaret’s +sake; and Lady Susan was very kind to me; but if there were nothing +else against him, he is entirely out of the question, for I know he +runs horses and bets on them.”</p> +<p>“So does everybody, more or less.”</p> +<p>“And you! you, Camilla, after what the turf has cost us, can +wish me to encourage a man connected with it.”</p> +<p>“My dear Lena, I know you had a great shock, which made the +more impression because you were such a child; but you might almost +as well forswear riding, as men who have run a few horses, or staked +a few thousands. Every young man of fortune has done so in his +turn, just by way of experiment—as a social duty as often as not.”</p> +<p>“Let them,” said Eleonora, “as long as I have nothing +to do with them.”</p> +<p>“What was that pretty French novel—<i>Sybille</i>, was +it?—where the child wanted to ride on nothing but swans? +You will be like her, and have to condescend to ordinary mortals.”</p> +<p>“She did not. She died. And, Camilla, I would far +rather die than marry a betting man.”</p> +<p>“A betting man, who regularly went in for it! You little +goose, to think that I would ask you to do that! As you say we +have had enough of that! But to renounce every man who has set +foot on a course, or staked a pair of gloves, is to renounce nine out +of ten of the world one lives in.”</p> +<p>“I do renounce them. Camilla, remember that my mind is +made up for ever, and that nothing shall ever induce me to marry a man +who meddles with the evils of races.”</p> +<p>“Meddles with the evils? I understand, my dear Lena.”</p> +<p>“A man who makes a bet,” repeated Eleonora.</p> +<p>“We shall see,” was her ladyship’s light answer, +in contrast to the grave tones; “no rules are without exceptions, +and I only ask for <i>one</i>.”</p> +<p>“I shall make none.”</p> +<p>“I confess I thought you were coming to your senses; you have +been acting so wisely and sensibly ever since you came home, about that +young Frank Charnock.”</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell heard a little rustle, but could not see that it was +the clasping of two hands over a throbbing heart. “I am +very glad you are reasonable enough to keep him at a distance. +Poor boy, it was all very well to be friendly with him when we met him +in a place like Rockpier, and you were both children; but you are quite +right not to let it go on. It would be mere madness.”</p> +<p>“For him, yes,” murmured the girl.</p> +<p>“And even more so for you. Why, if he had any property +worth speaking of, it would be a wretched thing to marry into that family! +I am sure I pity those three poor girls! Miles’s wife looks +perfectly miserable, poor thing, and the other two can’t conceal +the state of things. She is just the sort of woman who cannot +endure a daughter-in-law.”</p> +<p>“I thought I heard Lady Rosamond talking very affectionately +of her.”</p> +<p>“Very excitedly, as one who felt it her duty to stand up for +her out-of-doors, whatever she may do indoors. I saw victory in +those plump white shoulders, which must have cost a battle; but whatever +Lady Rosamond gains, will make it all the worse for the others. +No, Eleonora, I have known Mrs. Poynsett’s rancour for many years, +and I would wish no one a worse lot than to be her son’s <i>fiancée</i>, +except to be his wife.”</p> +<p>“She did not seem to object to these marriages.”</p> +<p>“The sons took her by surprise. Besides, Raymond’s +was the very <i>parti</i> mothers seek out for their sons. Depend +upon it, she sent him off with her blessing to court the unexceptionable +cousin with the family property. Poor Raymond, he is a dutiful +son, and he has done the deed; but, if I am not much mistaken the little +lady is made of something neither mother nor son is prepared for, and +he has not love enough to tame her with.”</p> +<p>“That may be seen at a glance. He can’t help it, +poor fellow; he would have had it if he could, like anything else that +is proper.”</p> +<p>There was a moment’s silence; then the exclamation, “Just +look there!”</p> +<p>One of the hats was nodding on the box in a perilous manner.</p> +<p>“It is <i>only</i> James,” said Lady Tyrrell; “as +long as it is not the coachman, it matters the less. There’s +no danger.”</p> +<p>“You will not keep him, though!”</p> +<p>“I don’t know. He is much the best looking and +handiest of the men; and your page, Master Joshua, is no great acquisition +yet.”</p> +<p>“I wish you would not call him mine; I wish you would send +him back to his grandmother. I can’t bear his being among +those men.”</p> +<p>“Very complimentary to my household! They are not a bit +worse than the company he came from! You don’t believe in +rural simplicity, eh?”</p> +<p>“I believe that taking that boy from his home makes us responsible.”</p> +<p>“And do I hinder you from catechizing him to your heart’s +content? or sending him to the school of design?”</p> +<p>Again Eleonora was silent. Perhaps the balancing of the footman’s +head occupied her mind. At any rate, no more was said till the +sisters had reached their home. Then, at the last moment, when +there was no time left for a reply, Eleonora cleared and steadied her +voice, and said, “Camilla, understand two things for truth’s +sake. First, I mean what I say. Nothing shall ever induce +me to marry a man who bets. Next, I never have forgotten Frank +Charnock for one moment. If I have been cold and distant to him, +it is because I will not draw him near me to be cruelly scorned and +disappointed!”</p> +<p>“I don’t mind the why, if the effect is the same,” +were Lady Tyrrell’s last words, as the door opened.</p> +<p>Eleonora’s little white feet sped quickly up the steps, and +with a hasty good night, she sped across the hall, but paused at the +door. “Papa must not be disappointed,” she whispered +to herself, and dashed her hand over her eyes; and at the moment the +lock turned, and a gray head appeared, with a mighty odour of smoke. +“Ah! I thought my little Lena would not pass me by! +Have you had a pleasant party, my dear? Was young Strangeways +there?”</p> +<p>She had nestled in his arms, and hoped to avoid notice by keeping +her head bent against him, as she hastily responded to his questions; +but he detected something.</p> +<p>“Eh? Camilla been lecturing? Is that it? +You’ve not been crying, little one? It is all right, you +know! You and I were jolly enough at Rockpier; but it was time +we were taken in hand, or you would have grown into a regular little +nun, among all those black coats.”</p> +<p>“I wish I were.”</p> +<p>“Nonsense! You don’t know life! You’ll +tell another story one of these days; and hark childie, when you’ve +married, and saved the old place, you’ll keep the old room for +the old man, and we’ll have our own way again.”</p> +<p>She could but kiss him, and hide her agitation in caresses, ere hurrying +up the stairs she reached her own rooms, a single bed-chamber opening +into a more spacious sitting-room, now partially lighted by the candles +on the toilette-table within.</p> +<p>She flung herself down on a chair beyond the line of light, and panted +out half aloud, “Oh! I am in the toils! Oh for help! +Oh for advice! Oh! if I knew the right! Am I unfair? am +I cold and hard and proud? Is she telling me true? No, I +know she is not—not the whole truth, and I don’t know what +is left out, or what is false! And I’m as bad—making +them think I give in and discard Frank! Oh! is that my pride—or +that it is too bad to encourage him now I know more? He’ll +soon scorn me, and leave off—whatever he ever thought of me. +She has taken me from all my friends—and she will take him away! +No one is left me but papa; and though she can’t hurt his love, +she has got his confidence away, and made him join against me! +But that one thing I’ll never, never do!”</p> +<p>She started up, and opened a locked purple photograph-album, with +‘In Memoriam’ inscribed on it—her hands trembling +so that she could hardly turn the key. She turned to the likeness +of a young man—a painful likeness of a handsome face, where the +hard verities of sun-painting had refused to veil the haggard trace +of early dissipation, though the eyes had still the fascinating smile +that had made her brother Tom, with his flashes of fitful good-nature, +the idol of his little sister’s girlhood. The deadly shock +of his sudden death had been her first sorrow; and those ghastly whispers +which she had heard from the servants in the nursery, and had never +forgotten, because of the hushed and mysterious manner, had but lately +started into full force and meaning, on the tongues of the plain-spoken +poor.</p> +<p>She gazed, and thought of the wrecked life that might have been so +rich in joys; nay, her tenderness for her father could not hide from +her how unlike his old age was from that of Mr. Bowater, or of any men +who had done their service to their generation in all noble exertion. +He had always indeed been her darling, her charge; but she had never +known what it was to look up to him with the fervent belief and enthusiasm +she had seen in other girls. To have him amused, loitering from +reading-room to parade or billiard-room, had been all that she aspired +to, and only lately had she unwillingly awakened to the sense how and +why this was—and why the family were aliens in their ancestral +home.</p> +<p>“And Camilla, who knew all—knew, and lived through the +full force of the blight and misery—would persuade me that it +all means nothing, and is a mere amusing trifle! Trifle, indeed, +that breaks hearts and leads to despair and self-destruction and dishonour! +No, no, no—nothing shall lead me to a gamester! though Frank may +be lost to me! He will be! he will be! We deserve that he +should be! I deserve it—if family sins fall on individuals—I +deserve it! It is better for him—better—better. +And yet, can he forget—any more than I—that sunny day—? +Oh! was she luring him on false pretences? What shall I do? +How will it be? Where is my counsellor? Emily, Emily, why +did you die?”</p> +<p>Emily’s portrait—calm, sweet, wasted, with grave trustful +eyes—was in the next page. The lonely girl turned to it, +and gazed, and drank in the soothing influence of the countenance that +had never failed to reply with motherly aid and counsel. It rested +the throbbing heart; and presently, with hands clasped and head bent, +Eleonora Vivian knelt in the little light closet she had fitted as an +oratory, and there poured out her perplexities and sorrows.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER X<br /> +A Truant</h2> +<blockquote><p>Since for your pleasure you came here,<br /> + You shall go back for mine.—COWPER</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“How like Dunstone you have made this room!” said Raymond, +entering his wife’s apartment with a compliment that he knew would +be appreciated.</p> +<p>Cecil turned round from her piano, to smile and say, “I wish +papa could see it.”</p> +<p>“I hope he will next spring; but he will hardly bring Mrs. +Charnock home this winter. I am afraid you are a good deal alone +here, Cecil. Is there no one you would like to ask?”</p> +<p>“The Venns,” suggested Cecil; “only we do not like +them to leave home when we are away; but perhaps they would come.”</p> +<p>Raymond could not look as if the proposal were a very pleasing one. +“Have you no young-lady friends?” he asked.</p> +<p>“We never thought it expedient to have intimacies in the neighbourhood,” +said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Well, we shall have Jenny Bowater here in a week or two.”</p> +<p>“I thought she was your mother’s friend.”</p> +<p>“So she is. She is quite young enough to be yours.”</p> +<p>“I do not see anything remarkable about her.”</p> +<p>“No, I suppose there is not; but she is a very sensible superior +person.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! In that commonplace family.”</p> +<p>“Poor Jenny has had an episode that removes her from the commonplace. +Did you ever hear of poor Archie Douglas?”</p> +<p>“Was not he a good-for-nothing relation of your mother?”</p> +<p>“Not that exactly. He was the son of a good-for-nothing, +I grant, whom a favourite cousin had unfortunately married, but he was +an excellent fellow himself; and when his father died, she had Mrs. +Douglas to live in that cottage by the Rectory, and sent the boy to +school with us; then she got him into Proudfoot’s office—the +solicitor at Backsworth, agent for everybody’s estates hereabouts. +Well, there arose an attachment between him and Jenny; the Bowaters +did not much like it, of course; but they are kind-hearted and good-natured, +and gave consent, provided Archie got on in his profession. It +was just at the time when poor Tom Vivian was exercising a great deal +more influence than was good among the young men in the neighbourhood; +and George Proudfoot was rather a joke for imitating him in every respect—from +the colour of his dog-cart to the curl of his dog’s tail. +I remember his laying a wager, and winning it too, that if he rode a +donkey with his face to the tail, Proudfoot would do the same; but then, +Vivian did everything with a grace and originality.”</p> +<p>“Like his sister.”</p> +<p>“And doubly dangerous. Every one liked him, and we were +all more together than was prudent. At last, two thousand pounds +of my mother’s money, which was passing through the Proudfoots’ +hands, disappeared; and at the same time poor Archie fled. No +one who knew him could have any reasonable doubt that he did but bear +the blame of some one else’s guilt, most likely that of George +Proudfoot; but he died a year or two back without a word, and no proof +has ever been found; and alas! the week after Archie sailed, we saw +his name in the list of sufferers in a vessel that was burnt. +His mother happily had died before all this, but there were plenty to +grieve bitterly for him; and poor Jenny has been the more like one of +ourselves in consequence. He had left a note for Jenny, and she +always trusted him; and we all of us believe that he was innocent.”</p> +<p>“I can’t think how a person can go about as usual, or +ever get over such a thing as that.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps she hasn’t,” said Raymond, with a little +colour on his brown cheek. “But I’m afraid I can’t +make those visits with you to-day. I am wanted to see the plans +for the new town-hall at Wil’sbro’. Will you pick +me up there?”</p> +<p>“There would be sure to be a dreadful long waiting, so I will +luncheon at Sirenwood instead; Lady Tyrrell asked me to come over any +day.”</p> +<p>“Alone? I think you had better wait for me.”</p> +<p>“I can take Frank.”</p> +<p>“I should prefer a regular invitation to us both.”</p> +<p>“She did not mean to make a formal affair.”</p> +<p>“Forms are a protection, and I do not wish for an intimacy +there, especially on Frank’s account.”</p> +<p>“It would be an excellent match for Frank.”</p> +<p>“Indeed, no; the estate is terribly involved, and there are +three daughters; besides which, the family would despise a younger son. +An attachment could only lead to unhappiness now, besides the positive +harm of unsettling him. His tutor tells me that as it is he is +very uneasy about his examination—his mind is evidently preoccupied. +No, no, Cecil, don’t make the intercourse unnecessarily close. +The Vivians have not behaved well to my mother, and it is not desirable +to begin a renewal. But you shall not lose your ride, Cecil; I’ll +ask one of the boys to go with you to the Beeches, and perhaps I shall +meet you there.”</p> +<p>“He talks of my lonely life,” said Cecil, to herself, +“and yet he wants to keep me from the only person who really understands +me, all for some rancorous old prejudice of Mrs. Poynsett’s. +It is very hard. There’s no one in the house to make a friend +of—Rosamond, a mere garrison belle; and Anne, <i>bornée</i> +and half a dissenter; and as soon as I try to make a friend, I am tyrannized +over, and this Miss Bowater thrust on me.”</p> +<p>She was pounding these sentiments into a sonata with great energy, +when her door re-opened, and Raymond again appeared. “I +am looking for two books of Mudie’s. Do you know where they +can be? I can’t make up the number.”</p> +<p>“They are here,” said Cecil; “Lanfrey’s <i>Vie +de Napoleon</i>; but I have not finished them.”</p> +<p>“The box should have gone ten days ago. My mother has +nothing to read, and has been waiting all this time for the next part +of <i>Middlemarch</i>,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“She said there was no hurry,” murmured Cecil.</p> +<p>“No doubt she did; but we must not take advantage of her consideration. +Reading is her one great resource, and we must so contrive that your +studies shall not interfere with it.”</p> +<p>He waited for some word of regret, but none came; and he was obliged +to add, “I must deprive you of the books for the present, for +she must not be kept waiting any longer; but I will see about getting +them for you in some other way. I must take the box to the station +in the dog-cart.” He went without a word from her. +It was an entirely new light to her that her self-improvement could +possibly be otherwise than the first object with everyone. At +home, father and mother told one another complacently what Cecil was +reading, and never dreamt of obstructing the virtuous action. +Were her studies to be sacrificed to an old woman’s taste for +novels?</p> +<p>Cecil had that pertinacity of nature that is stimulated to resistance +by opposition; and she thought of the Egyptian campaign, and her desire +to understand the siege of Acre. Then she recollected that Miss +Vivian had spoken of reading the book, and this decided her. “I’ll +go to Sirenwood, look at it, and order it. No one can expect me +to submit to have no friends abroad nor books at home. Besides, +it is all some foolish old family feud; and what a noble thing it will +be for my resolution and independence to force the two parties to heal +the breach, and bridge it over by giving Miss Vivian to Frank.”</p> +<p>In this mood she rang the bell, and ordered her horses; not however +till she had reason to believe the dog-cart on the way down the avenue. +As she came down in her habit, she was met by Frank, returning from +his tutor.</p> +<p>“Have I made a mistake, Cecil! I thought we were to go +out together this afternoon!”</p> +<p>“Yes; but Raymond was wanted at Willansborough, and I am going +to lunch at Sirenwood. I want to borrow a book.”</p> +<p>“Oh, very well, I’ll come, if you don’t mind. +Sir Harry asked me to drop in and look at his dogs.”</p> +<p>This was irresistible; and Frank decided on riding the groom’s +horse, and leaving him to conduct Anne to the rendezvous in the afternoon—for +Charlie had been at Sandhurst for the last week—running in first +to impart the change of scheme to her, as she was performing her daily +task of reading to his mother.</p> +<p>He did so thus: “I say, Anne, Cecil wants to go to Sirenwood +first to get a book, so Lee will bring you to meet us at the Beeches +at 2.30.”</p> +<p>“Are you going to luncheon at Sirenwood?” asked Mrs. +Poynsett.</p> +<p>“Yes; Cecil wants to go,” said the dutiful younger brother.</p> +<p>“I wish you would ask Cecil to come in. Raymond put himself +into such a state of mind at finding me reading Madame de Sévigné, +that I am afraid he carried off her books summarily, though I told him +I was glad of a little space for my old favourites.”</p> +<p>Cecil was, however, mounted by the time Frank came out, and they +cantered away together, reaching the portico of Sirenwood in about twenty +minutes.</p> +<p>Cecil had never been in the house before, having only left her card, +though she had often met the sisters. She found herself in a carpeted +hall, like a supplementary sitting-room, where two gentlemen had been +leaning over the wide hearth. One, a handsome benignant-looking +old man, with a ruddy face and abundant white whiskers, came forward +with a hearty greeting. “Ah! young Mrs. Poynsett! +Delighted to see you!—Frank Charnock, you’re come in good +time; we are just going down to see the puppies before luncheon. +Only I’ll take Mrs. Poynsett to the ladies first. Duncombe, +you don’t know Mrs. Raymond Poynsett—one must not say senior +bride, but the senior’s bride. Is that right?”</p> +<p>“No papa,” said a bright voice from the stairs, “you +haven’t it at all right; Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, if you please—isn’t +it?”</p> +<p>“I believe so,” replied Cecil. “Charnock +always seems my right name.”</p> +<p>“And you have all the right to retain it that Mrs. Poynsett +had to keep hers,” said Lady Tyrrell, as they went up-stairs to +her bedroom. “How is she?”</p> +<p>“As usual, thank you; always on the sofa.”</p> +<p>“But managing everything from it?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes.”</p> +<p>“Never was there such a set of devoted sons, models for the +neighbourhood.”</p> +<p>Cecil felt a sense of something chiming in with her sources of vexation, +but she only answered, “They are passionately fond of her.”</p> +<p>“Talk of despotism! Commend me to an invalid! Ah! +how delightfully you contrive to keep your hair in order! I am +always scolding Lenore for coming in dishevelled, and you look so fresh +and compact! Here is my sanctum. You’ll find Mrs. +Duncombe there. She drove over in the drag with her husband on +their way to Backsworth. I am so glad you came, there is so much +to talk over.”</p> +<p>“If our gentlemen will give us time,” said Mrs. Duncombe; +“but I am afraid your senator will not be as much absorbed in +the dogs as my captain.”</p> +<p>“I did not come with my husband,” said Cecil; “he +is gone to Willansborough to meet the architect.”</p> +<p>“Ah, about the new buildings. I do hope and trust the +opportunity will not be wasted, and that the drainage will be provided +for.”</p> +<p>“You are longing to have a voice there,” said Lady Tyrrell, +laughing.</p> +<p>“I am. It is pre-eminently a woman’s question, +and this is a great opportunity. I shall talk to every one. +Little Pettitt, the hair-dresser, has some ground there, and he is the +most intelligent of the tradesmen. I gave him one of those excellent +little hand-bills, put forth by the Social Science Committee, on sanitary +arrangements. I thought of asking you to join us in ordering some +down, and never letting a woman leave our work-room without one.”</p> +<p>“You couldn’t do better, I am sure,” said Lady +Tyrrell; “only, what’s the use of preaching to the poor +creatures to live in good houses, when their landlords won’t build +them, and they must live somewhere?”</p> +<p>“Make them coerce the landlords,” said Mrs. Duncombe; +“that’s the only way. Upheave the masses from beneath.”</p> +<p>“But that’s an earthquake,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Earthquakes are sometimes wholesome.”</p> +<p>“But the process is not so agreeable that we had not rather +avert it,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“All ours at Dunstone are model cottages,” said Cecil; +“it is my father’s great hobby.”</p> +<p>“Squires’ hobbies are generally like the silver trough +the lady gave her sow,” said Mrs. Duncombe; “they come before +the poor are prepared, and with a spice of the autocrat.”</p> +<p>“Come, I won’t have you shock Mrs. Charnock Poynsett,” +said Lady Tyrrell. “You illogical woman! The poor +are to demand better houses, and the squires are not to build them!”</p> +<p>“The poor are to be fitly housed, as a matter of right, and +from their own sense of self-respect,” returned Mrs. Duncombe; +“not a few favourites, who will endure dictation, picked out for +the model cottage. It is the hobby system against which I protest.”</p> +<p>“Without quite knowing what was conveyed by it in this instance?” +said Lady Tyrrell. “I am sure there is nothing I wish more +than that we had any power of improvement of the cottages here; but +influence is our only weapon.”</p> +<p>“By the bye, Mrs. Poynsett,” continued Mrs. Duncombe, +“will you give a hint to Mrs. Miles Charnock that it will never +do to preach to the women at the working-room? I don’t mean +holding forth,” she added, seeing Cecil’s look of amazement; +“but improving the occasion, talking piously, giving tracts, and +so forth.”</p> +<p>“I thought you gave sanitary tracts!” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“That is quite different.”</p> +<p>“I doubt whether the women would see the distinction. +A little book <i>is</i> a tract to them.”</p> +<p>“I would abstain rather than let our work get a goody reputation +for indoctrinating sectarianism. It would be all up with us; we +might as well keep a charity school.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think the women dislike it,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Most likely they think it the correct thing, the grain which +they must swallow with our benefits; but for that very reason it injures +the whole tone, and prevents them learning independence. Put it +in that light; I know you can.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think Anne would understand,” said Cecil, +somewhat flattered.</p> +<p>“I doubt whether there are three women in the neighbourhood +who would,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“People always think charity—how I hate the word!—a +means of forcing their own tenets down the throats of the poor,” +said Mrs. Duncombe. “And certainly this neighbourhood is +as narrow as any I ever saw. Nobody but you and—shall I +say the present company?—has any ideas. I wonder how they +will receive Clio Tallboys and her husband?”</p> +<p>“Ah! you have not heard about them,” said Lady Tyrrell. +“Most delightful people, whom Mrs. Duncombe met on the Righi. +He is a Cambridge professor.”</p> +<p>“Taillebois—I don’t remember the name,” said +Cecil, “and we know a great many Cambridge men. We went +to a Commencement there.”</p> +<p>“Oh, not Cambridge on the Cam! the American Cambridge,” +said Mrs. Duncombe. “He is a quiet, inoffensive man, great +on political economy; but his wife is the character. Wonderfully +brilliant and original, and such a lecturer!”</p> +<p>“Ladies’ lectures <i>would</i> startle the natives,” +said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Besides, the town-hall is lacking,” said Mrs. Duncombe; +“but when the Tallboys come we might arrange a succession of <i>soirées</i>, +where she might gather her audience.”</p> +<p>“But where?” said Lady Tyrrell. “It would +be great fun, and you might reckon on me; but where else? Mrs. +Charnock Poynsett has to think of <i>la belle mère</i>.”</p> +<p>“She has given up the management of all matters of society +to me,” said Cecil with dignity; “you may reckon on me.”</p> +<p>“No hope of the Bowaters, of course,” said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“Miss Bowater is coming to stay with us,” volunteered +Cecil.</p> +<p>“To be near that unlucky Life Guardsman <i>manqué</i>,” +said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“Come, I’ll not have honest Herbert abused,” said +the other lady. “He is the only one of the Bowaters who +has any go in him.”</p> +<p>“More’s the pity, if he can’t use it. Is +his sister coming to help the Reverend Julius to drill him?”</p> +<p>“On Mrs. Poynsett’s account too, I fancy,” said +Lady Tyrrell; “Jenny Bowater is her amateur companion. Indeed, +I believe it was no slight disappointment that her sons’ appreciation +did not quite reach the pitch of the mother’s.”</p> +<p>“Indeed!” asked Mrs. Duncombe; “I thought there +had been a foolish affair with poor young Douglas.”</p> +<p>“<i>Celà n</i>’<i>empêche pas</i>. +By the bye, have you finished Fleurange?”</p> +<p>“Oh, you are quite welcome to it. It is quite as goody +as an English tale in one volume.”</p> +<p>This opened the way to Cecil’s desire to borrow Lanfrey, not +concealing the reason why; and she was gratified by the full sympathy +of both ladies, who invited her in self-defence to join in their subscription +to Rolandi, to which she eagerly agreed, and would have paid her subscription +at once if there had not been a term to be finished off first.</p> +<p>The gong summoned them to luncheon, and likewise brought down Miss +Vivian, who shook hands rather stiffly, and wore a cold, grave manner +that did not sit badly on her handsome classical features. The +countenance was very fine, but of the style to which early youth is +less favourable than a more mature development; and she was less universally +admired than was her sister. Her dress was a dark maroon merino, +hanging in simple, long, straight folds, and there was as little distortion +in her coiffure as the most moderate compliance with fashion permitted; +and this, with a high-bred, distinguished deportment, gave an air almost +of stern severity. This deepened rather than relaxed at the greeting +from Frank—who, poor fellow! had an uncontrollably wistful eager +look in his face, a sort of shy entreaty, and was under an incapacity +of keeping up a conversation with anybody else, while trying to catch +the least word of hers.</p> +<p>She, however, seemed to have more eyes and ears for her father than +for any one else, and he evidently viewed her as the darling and treasure +of his life. His first question, after performing the duties of +a host, was, “Well, my little Lenore, what have you been doing?”</p> +<p>“The old story, papa,” raising her clear, sweet voice +to reach his rather deaf ears.</p> +<p>“Got on with your drawing?—The child is competing with +a club, you must know.”</p> +<p>“Not exactly, papa: it is only a little society that was set +on foot at Rockpier to help us to improve ourselves.”</p> +<p>“What is your subject this month?” Frank asked.</p> +<p>“A branch of blackberries,” she answered briefly.</p> +<p>“Ah!” said Lady Tyrrell, “I saw your pupil bringing +in a delicious festoon—all black and red fruit and crimson and +purple leaves. He is really a boy of taste; I think he will do +you credit.”</p> +<p>“The new Joshua Reynolds,” said Frank, glad of an excuse +to turn towards Eleonora. “Rosamond mentioned her discovery.”</p> +<p>“You might have seen him just now figuring as Buttons,” +said Lady Tyrrell. “Degradation of art, is it not? +But it was the only way to save it. Lenore is teaching him; and +if his talent prove worth it we may do something with him. Any +way, the produce of native genius will be grand material for the bazaar.”</p> +<p>“Card-board prettinesses!” said Mrs. Duncombe; “you +spoil him with them; but that you’ll do any way—make him +fit for nothing but a flunkey.”</p> +<p>“Unappreciated zeal!” said Lady Tyrrell, glancing at +her sister, who flushed a little, and looked the more grave.</p> +<p>“Eh, Lenore,” said her father, “wasn’t it +to please you that Camilla made me take your pet to make havoc of my +glasses?”</p> +<p>“You meant it so, dear papa,” said Eleonora, calling +up a smile that satisfied the old gentleman. “It was very +kind in you.”</p> +<p>Fresh subjects were started, and on all the talk was lively and pleasant, +and fascinated Cecil, not from any reminiscence of Dunstone—for +indeed nothing could be more unlike the tone that prevailed there: but +because it was so different from that of Compton Poynsett, drifting +on so unrestrainedly, and touching so lightly on all topics.</p> +<p>By the close of the meal, rain had set in, evidently for the afternoon. +Frank offered to ride home, and send the carriage for Cecil; but the +Duncombes proposed to take her and drop her at home; and to this she +consented, rather to Frank’s dismay, as he thought of their coach +appearing at his mother’s door.</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell took her up to resume her hat; and on the way, moved +by distaste to her double surname, and drawn on by a fresh access of +intimacy, she begged to be called Cecil—a privilege of which she +had been chary even in her maiden days; but the caressing manner had +won her heart, and spirit of opposition to the discouragement at home +did the rest.</p> +<p>The request was reciprocated with that pensive look which was so +touching. “I used to be Camilla to all the neighbourhood, +and here I find myself—miles’—no, leagues further +off—banished to Siberia.”</p> +<p>“How unjust and unkind!” cried Cecil.</p> +<p>“My dear, you have yet to learn the gentle uncharitableness +of prejudice. It is the prevailing notion that my married life +was a career of dissipation. Ah! if they only knew!”</p> +<p>“The drag is round,” said Mrs. Duncombe’s voice +at the door, in all its decisive abruptness, making both start.</p> +<p>“Just ready,” called Lady Tyrrell; adding, in a lower +tone, “Ah! she is startling, but she is genuine! And one +must take new friends when the old are chilly. She is the only +one—”</p> +<p>Cecil’s kiss was more hearty than any she had given at Compton, +and she descended; but just as she came to the door, and was only delaying +while Frank and Captain Duncombe were discussing the merits of the four +horses, the Compton carriage appeared in the approach, and Raymond’s +head within. Lady Tyrrell looked at Cecil, and saw it was safe +to make a little gesture with the white skin of her fair brow, expressing +unutterable things.</p> +<p>Mrs. Duncombe lost no time in asking if any steps were being taken +for improving the drainage; to which Raymond replied, “No, that +was not the business in hand. This was the architecture of the +town-hall.”</p> +<p>“Splendour of municipality above, and fever festering below,” +said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“Wilsborough is not unhealthy,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>She laughed ironically.</p> +<p>“The corporation have been told that they have an opportunity,” +said Raymond; “but it takes long to prepare people’s minds +to believe in the expedience of such measures. If Whitlock could +be elected mayor there would be some chance, but I am afraid they are +sure to take Truelove; and as things are at Wilsborough, we must move +all at once or not at all. Individual attempts would do more harm +than good.”</p> +<p>“Ah! you fear for your seat!” said the plain-spoken lady.</p> +<p>Raymond only chose to answer by a laugh, and would not pursue the +subject so treated. He was politeness itself to all; but he withstood +Lady Tyrrell’s earnest entreaties to come in and see some Florentine +photographs, growing stiffer and graver each moment, while his wife +waxed more wrathful at the treatment which she knew was wounding her +friend, and began almost to glory in having incurred his displeasure +herself. Indeed, this feeling caused the exchange of another kiss +between the ladies before Sir Harry handed Cecil into the carriage, +and Raymond took the yellow paper books that were held out to her.</p> +<p>Looking at the title as they drove off, he said quietly, “I +did not mean to deprive you, Cecil; I had ordered Lanfrey from Bennet +for you.”</p> +<p>She was somewhat abashed, but was excited enough to answer, “Thank +you. I am going to join Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. Duncombe in a subscription +to Rolandi’s.”</p> +<p>He started, and after a pause of a few moments said gently, “Are +you sure that Mr. and Mrs. Charnock would like to trust your choice +of foreign books to Mrs. Duncombe?”</p> +<p>Taking no notice of the point of this question, she replied, “If +it is an object to exchange books at home faster than I can read them +properly, I must look for a supply elsewhere.”</p> +<p>“You had better subscribe alone,” he replied, still without +manifest provocation.</p> +<p>“That would be uncivil now.”</p> +<p>“I take that upon myself.”</p> +<p>Wherewith there came a silence; while Cecil swelled as she thought +of the prejudice against her friend, and Raymond revolved all he had +ever heard about creatures he knew so little as women, to enable him +to guess how to deal with this one. How reprove so as not to make +it worse? Ought not his silent displeasure to suffice? And +in such musings the carriage reached home.</p> +<p>It had been an untoward day. He had been striving hard against +the stream at Willansborough. The drainage was not only scouted +as an absurd, unreasonable, and expensive fancy, but the architect whom +he had recommended, in the hope that he would insist on ground-work +which might bring on the improvement, had been rejected in favour of +a kinsman of Mr. Briggs, the out-going mayor, a youth of the lower walk +of the profession—not the scholar and gentleman he had desired, +for the tradesman intellect fancied such a person would be expensive +and unmanageable.</p> +<p>Twin plans for church and town-hall had been produced, which to Raymond’s +taste savoured of the gimcrack style, but which infinitely delighted +all the corporation; and where he was the only cultivated gentleman, +except the timid Vicar, his reasonings were all in vain. The plan +was accepted for the town-hall, and the specifications were ordered +to be made out for competition, and a rate decided on. The church +was to wait for subscription and bazaar; the drains, for reason in Wil’sbro’, +or for the hope of the mayoralty of Mr. Whitlock, a very intelligent +and superior linendraper.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XI<br /> +Rosamond’s Apologue</h2> +<blockquote><p>Pray, sir, do you laugh at me?—Title of Old Caricature</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Was Cecil’s allegiance to Dunstone, or was it to the heiress +of Dunstone? Tests of allegiance consist in very small matters, +and it is not always easy to see the turning-point. Now Cecil +had always stood on a pinnacle at Dunstone, and she had found neither +its claims nor her own recognized at Compton. One kind of allegiance +would have remained on the level, and retained the same standard, whether +accepted or not. Another would climb on any pinnacle that any +one would erect for the purpose, and become alienated from whatever +interfered with such eminence.</p> +<p>So as nobody seemed so willing to own Cecil’s claims to county +supremacy as Lady Tyrrell, her bias was all towards Sirenwood; and whereas +such practices as prevailed at Dunstone evidently were viewed as obsolete +and narrow by these new friends, Cecil was willing to prove herself +superior to them, and was far more irritated than convinced when her +husband appealed to her former habits.</p> +<p>The separation of the welfare of body and soul had never occurred +to the beneficence of Dunstone, and it cost Cecil a qualm to accept +it; but she could not be a goody in the eyes of Sirenwood; and besides, +she was reading some contemporary literature, which made it plain that +any religious instruction was a most unjustifiable interference with +the great law, “Am I my brother’s keeper?” and so, +when she met Anne with a handful of texts neatly written out in printing +letters, she administered her warning.</p> +<p>Cecil and Anne had become allies to a certain extent, chiefly through +their joint disapproval of Rosamond, not to say of Julius; and the order +was so amazing that Anne did not at first take it in; and when she understood +that all mention of religion was forbidden, she said, “I do not +think I ought to yield in this.”</p> +<p>“Surely,” said Cecil, “there is no connection between +piety and cutting out.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” said Anne; “but it does not +seem to me to be right to go on with a work where my Master’s +Name is forbidden.”</p> +<p>“Religion ought never to be obtruded,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“The Word ought to flavour everything, in season or out of +season,” said Anne, thoughtfully.</p> +<p>“Oh! that’s impossible. It’s your narrow +view. If you thrust preaching into everything, we can never work +together.”</p> +<p>“Oh, then,” said Anne, quickly, “I must give it +up!” And she turned away with a rapid step, to carry her +texts back to her room.</p> +<p>“Anne!” called Cecil, “I did not mean <i>that</i>!”</p> +<p>Anne paused for a moment, looked over the baluster, and repeated +firmly, “No, Cecil; it would be denying Christ to work where His +Name is forbidden.”</p> +<p>Perhaps there was something in the elevation and the carved rail +that gave the idea of a pulpit, for Cecil felt as if she was being preached +at, and turned her back, indignant and vexed at what she had by no means +intended to incur—the loss of such a useful assistant as she found +in Anne.</p> +<p>“Such nonsense!” she said to herself, as she crossed +the hall alone, there meeting with Rosamond, equipped for the village. +“Is not Anne going to-day?” she said, as she saw the pony-carriage +at the door.</p> +<p>“No. It is so vexatious. She is so determined upon +preaching to the women, that I have been obliged to put a stop to it.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! I should not have thought it of poor Anne; but +no one can tell what those semi-dissenters think right.”</p> +<p>“When she declared she ought to do it in season or out of season, +what was one to do?” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“I thought that was for clergymen,” said Rosamond, hitting +the right nail on the head in her ignorance, as so often happened.</p> +<p>“She sees no difference,” said Cecil. “Shall +I drive you down?” she added graciously, according to the fashion +of uniting with one sister-in-law against the other; and Rosamond not +only accepted, but asked to be taken on to Willansborough, to buy a +birthday present for her brother Terry, get stamps for an Indian letter, +and perform a dozen more commissions that seemed to arise in her mind +with the opportunity. Her two brothers were to spend the Christmas +holidays with her, and she was in high spirits, and so communicative +about them that she hardly observed how little interest Cecil took in +Terry’s achievements.</p> +<p>“Who is that,” she presently asked, “with those +red-haired children? It looked like Miss Vivian’s figure.”</p> +<p>“I believe it was. Julius and I often see her walking +about the lanes; but she passes like—like a fire-flaught, whatever +that is—just bows, and hardly ever speaks.”</p> +<p>“She is a strange girl,” said Cecil. “Lady +Tyrrell says she cannot draw her into any of her interests, but she +will go her own way.”</p> +<p>“Like poor Anne?”</p> +<p>“No, not out of mere moping and want of intellect, like Anne. +But Lady Tyrrell says she feels for her; she was brought a great deal +too forward, and was made quite mistress of the house at Rockpier, being +her father’s darling and all, and now it is trying to her, though +it is quite wholesome, to be in her proper place. It is a pity +she is so bitter over it, and flies off her own way.”</p> +<p>“That boy!” said Rosamond; “I hope she does something +for his good.”</p> +<p>“She teaches him, I believe; but there’s another instance +of her strange ways. She was absolutely vexed when Lady Tyrrell +took him into the house, though he was her <i>protégé</i>, +only because it was not done in <i>her</i> way. It is a great +trial to Camilla.”</p> +<p>“I could fancy a reason for that,” said Rosamond. +“Julius does not like the tone of the household at all.” +But she added hastily, “Who could those children be? They +did not look <i>quite</i> like poor children.”</p> +<p>“Ah! she is always taking up with some odd person in her own +away,” said Cecil. “But here we are. Will you +drive on to the hotel, or get out here?”</p> +<p>When, at the end of two hours, the sisters-in-law met at the work-room, +and Rosamond had taken a survey of the row of needle-women, coming up +one by one to give their work, be paid and dismissed, there was a look +of weariness and vexation on Cecil’s face. She had found +it less easy to keep order and hinder gossip, and had hardly known how +to answer when that kind lady, Mrs. Miles Charnock, had been asked after; +but she would have scorned to allow that she had missed her assistant, +and only politely asked how Rosamond had sped.</p> +<p>“Oh! excellently. People were so well advised as to be +out, so I paid off all my calls.”</p> +<p>“You did not return your calls without Julius?”</p> +<p>“There’s nothing he hates so much. I would not +have dragged him with me on any account.”</p> +<p>“I think it is due to one’s self.”</p> +<p>“Ah! but then I don’t care what is due to myself. +I saw a friend of yours, Cecil.”</p> +<p>“Who?”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Duncombe,” said Rosamond. “I went to +Pettitt’s—the little perfumer, you know, that Julius did +so much for at the fire; and there she was, leaning on the counter, +haranguing him confidentially upon setting an example with sanatory +measures.”</p> +<p>“Sanitary,” corrected Cecil; “<i>sanitas</i> is +health, <i>sano</i> to cure. People never know the difference.”</p> +<p>“Certainly I don’t,” said Rosamond. “It +must be microscopic!”</p> +<p>“Only it shows the difference between culture and the reverse,” +said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Well, you know, I’m the reverse,” said Rosamond, +leaning sleepily back, and becoming silent; but Cecil was too anxious +for intelligence to let her rest, and asked on what Mrs. Duncombe was +saying.</p> +<p>“I am not quite sure—she was stirring up his public spirit, +I think, about the drainage; and they were both of them deploring the +slackness and insensibility of the corporation, and canvassing for Mr. +Whitlock, as I believe. It struck me as a funny subject for a +lady, but I believe she does not stick at trifles.”</p> +<p>“No real work can be carried out by those who do,” said +Cecil.</p> +<p>“Oh!” added Rosamond, “I met Mrs. and Miss Bowater, +and they desired me to say that Jenny can’t come till the dinner-party +on the 20th, and then they will leave her.”</p> +<p>“How cool to send a message instead of writing!”</p> +<p>“Oh! she has always been like one of themselves, like a sister +to them all.”</p> +<p>“I can’t bear that sort of people.”</p> +<p>“What sort?”</p> +<p>“Who worm themselves in.”</p> +<p>“Miss Bowater could have no occasion for worming. They +must be quite on equal terms.”</p> +<p>“At any rate, she was only engaged to their poor relation.”</p> +<p>“What poor relation? Tell me! Who told you?”</p> +<p>“Raymond. It was a young attorney—a kind of cousin +of the Poynsett side, named Douglas.”</p> +<p>“What? There’s a cross in the churchyard to Elizabeth +Douglas, daughter of Francis Poynsett, and wife of James Douglas, and +at the bottom another inscription to Archibald Douglas, her son, lost +in the <i>Hippolyta</i>.”</p> +<p>“Yes, that must be the man. He was flying from England, +having been suspected of some embezzlement.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! And was Jenny engaged to him? Julius told +me that Mrs. Douglas had been his mother’s dearest friend, and +that this Archie had been brought up with them, but he did not say any +more.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he did not like having had a cousin in an attorney’s +office. I am sure I had no notion of such a thing.”</p> +<p>Rosamond laughed till she was exhausted at the notion of Julius’s +sharing the fastidious objections she heard in Cecil’s voice; +and then, struck by the sadness of the story, she cried, “And +that makes them all so fond of Miss Bowater. Poor girl, what must +she not have gone through! And yet how cheerful she does look!”</p> +<p>“People say,” proceeded Cecil, unable to resist the impulse +to acquire a partaker in her half-jealous aversion, “that it was +a great disappointment that Mrs. Poynsett could not make her sons like +her as much as she did herself.”</p> +<p>“Oh!” cried Rosamond, “how little peace we should +have if we always heeded what people say!”</p> +<p>“People that know,” persisted Cecil.</p> +<p>“Not very wise or very kind people to say so,” quoth +Rosamond; “though, by the bye, the intended sting is happily lost, +considering that it lies among five.”</p> +<p>“Why should you assume a sting?”</p> +<p>“Because I see you are stung, and want to sting me,” +said Rosamond, in so merry a tone that the earnestness was disguised.</p> +<p>“I! I’m not stung! What Mrs. Poynsett or +Miss Bowater may have schemed is nothing to me,” said Cecil, with +all her childish dignity.</p> +<p>“People talk of Irish imagination,” said Rosamond in +her lazy meditative tone.</p> +<p>“Well?” demanded Cecil, sharply.</p> +<p>“Only it is not <i>my</i> Irish imagination that has devised +this dreadful picture of the artful Jenny and Mrs. Poynsett spinning +their toils to entrap the whole five brothers. Come, Cecil, take +my advice and put it out of your head. Suppose it were true, small +blame to Mrs. Poynsett.”</p> +<p>“What do you mean?” said Cecil, in a voice of hurt dignity.</p> +<p>“I may mean myself.” And Rosamond’s peal +of merry laughter was most amazing and inexplicable to her companion, +who was not sure that she was not presuming to laugh at her.</p> +<p>There was a silence, broken at last by Rosamond. “Cecil, +I have been tumbled about the world a good deal more than you have, +and I never found that one got any good by disregarding the warnings +of the natives. There’s an immense deal in the cat and the +cock.”</p> +<p>“I do not understand, said Cecil.</p> +<p>Whereupon Rosamond, in a voice as if she were telling the story to +a small child, began: “Once upon a time there was a wee bit mousiekie, +that lived in Giberatie O—that trotted out of her hole upon an +exploring expedition. By and by she came scuttling back in a state +of great trepidation—in fact, horribly nervous. ‘Mother, +mother!’ said the little mouse, ‘I’ve seen a hideous +monster, with a red face, and a voice like a trumpet, and a pair of +spurs.’”</p> +<p>“Of course, I know that,” broke in Cecil.</p> +<p>“Ah, you haven’t heard all. ‘I should have +died of terror,’ said the little mouse, ‘only that I saw +a dear sweet graceful creature, with a lovely soft voice, and a smooth +coat, and the most beautiful eyes, and the most exquisite pathetic expression +in her smile; and she held out her velvet paw to me, and said, ‘Dear +little mousiekie-pousie, you’re the loveliest creature I ever +met, quite unappreciated in these parts. That horrid old cock +is terribly vulgar and commonplace; and never you believe your mother +if she tells you he is better worth cultivating than one who has such +a deep genuine love and appreciation of all the excellences of all mice, +and of you in particular with your dun fur.’”</p> +<p>Rosamond could not for her very life help putting in that word <i>dun</i>; +and Cecil, who had been driving straight on with her eyes fixed on her +pony’s ears, and rather a sullen expression of forced endurance, +faced about. “What you mean by all this I don’t know; +but if you think it applies to me or my friends, you are much mistaken.”</p> +<p>“I told you,” said Rosamond, with the same languor, looking +out under her half-shut eyes, “that I apply things to myself. +I’ve met both sorts in my time.”</p> +<p>And silence reigned for the rest of the way. Cecil had read +many more books, knew much more, and was altogether a far more cultivated +personage than the Lady Rosamond; but she was not half so ready in catching +the import of spoken words; and all this time she was by no means certain +whether all this meant warning or meant mockery, though either was equally +impertinent, and must be met with the same lady-like indifference, which +Cecil trusted that she had never transgressed.</p> +<p>Neither of them, nor indeed any other living creature, knew of a +little episode which had occurred about eighteen months previously, +when Joanna Bowater had been taking care of Mrs Poynsett during Raymond’s +first absence from home after her accident. Of course he took +her back to Strawyers as soon as he arrived; and about half-way, after +a prolonged and unusual silence, he said, “Jenny, I believe we +know one another’s histories pretty well. It would be a +great happiness and blessing if you could bring yourself to sink the +past so far as to take me, and become indeed my mother’s daughter. +Do not answer me in haste. Think it over, and tell me if it is +possible.”</p> +<p>Jenny let him drive on more than a mile before she spoke; and when +she did, the tears stood on her cheek, and it was quite an effort that +her voice was made steady. “No, Raymond, I am very sorry, +but it will not do. Two griefs will not make one joy.”</p> +<p>“Yes, they would, to my mother.”</p> +<p>“Ah! there it lies! Indeed, Raymond, I do feel for you +all so much, especially your dear mother, that I would bring myself +to it, if I could; but the very thought brings Archie up so vividly +before me that I cannot! He has almost seemed to be sitting by +me all this time. It seems as though beginning again would kill +my right to think of him foremost of all.”</p> +<p>“I could bear with that and trust to time,” said Raymond. +“Think it over, Jenny. I will be candid with you. +The old delusion was too strong for any repetition of that kind, as +you may see by the lame performance I am making now.”</p> +<p>Jenny gave a little agitated laugh, and ejaculated, “Dear Raymond!” +then added, “It is not on your account, but mine.”</p> +<p>“But,” he added, “my marriage is becoming a necessity, +if only for my mother’s sake; and you stand far before any other +woman with me, if that would but satisfy you. I verily believe +that in a short time we should be just as comfortable together as if +we could start with more romance.”</p> +<p>“I dare say we should, dear Raymond,” said Jenny; “but +I cannot feel that it is the right thing, while I have not <i>that</i> +feeling for you which overpowers everything else; it seems to me that +I ought not to give up my place at home. Papa depends on me a +good deal, and they both will want me more and more.”</p> +<p>“Less than my mother.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know; and they are my first duty. I can +always come to your mother when I am wanted, and I know in your secret +soul you prefer me on those terms.”</p> +<p>He made no answer, only when passing the lodge he said, “Will +you consider it a little longer, Jenny?”</p> +<p>But this only resulted in a note:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“DEAR RAYMOND,—Considering only shows me +that I must be Archie Douglas’s now and for ever. I can’t +help it. It is better for you; for you can find some young girl +who can wake your heart again, as never could be done by your still +affectionate J. B.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Raymond and Jenny had met so often since, that the matter was entirely +past, and no one ever guessed it.</p> +<p>At any rate, Rosamond, the most ready to plunge into counsel to Cecil, +was the least likely to have it accepted; Rosamond had foibles of her +own that Cecil knew of, and censured freely enough within herself.</p> +<p>That never-ending question, whether what became the Colonel’s +daughter became the clergyman’s wife, would crop up under endless +forms. Rosamond, in all opinions, was good-natured and easy, and +always for pardon and toleration to an extent that the Compton code +could not understand. She could not bear that anybody should be +punished or shut out of anything; while there was no denying that, now +the first novelty was passing, she was very lazy as to her parochial +work, and that where her feelings were not stirred she was of little +use.</p> +<p>Julius seemed shamefully tolerant of her omissions, and likewise +of her eagerness for all gaieties. He would not go himself, would +not accept a dinner invitation for any of the three busy nights of the +week, and refused all those to dances and balls for himself, though +he never hindered Rosamond’s going.</p> +<p>She used absolutely to cry with passionate entreaties that he would +relent and come with her, declaring that he was very unkind, he knew +it took away all her pleasure—he was a tyrant, and wanted her +not to go. And then he smiled, and owned that he hoped some day +she would be tired of it; whereat she raged, and begged him to forbid +her, if he really thought her whole life had been so shocking, declaring +in the same breath that she would never disown her family, or cast a +slur on her mother and sisters.</p> +<p>It always ended in her going, and though never again offending as +by her bridal gown, she seldom failed to scandalize Cecil by an excess +of talking and of waltzing, such as even Raymond regretted, and which +disabled her for a whole day after from all but sofa, sleep, novels, +and yawns.</p> +<p>Was this the person whose advice the discreet heiress of Dunstone +was likely to follow?</p> +<p>It may be mentioned here, among other elements of difficulty, that +Cecil’s maid Grindstone was a thorough Dunstonite, who ‘kept +herself to herself,’ was perfectly irreproachable, lived on terms +of distant civility with the rest of the household, never complained, +but constantly led her young mistress to understand that she was enduring +much for her sake.</p> +<p>Cecil was too well trained, and so was she, for a word of gossip +or censure to pass between them; but the influence was not the less +strong.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XII<br /> +Pastoral Visiting</h2> +<blockquote><p>A finger’s breadth at hand may mar<br /> +A world of light in heaven afar;<br /> +A mote eclipse a glorious star,<br /> + An eyelid hide the sky.—KEBLE.</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The dinner was over, and Cecil was favouring the audience with a +severely classical piece of music, when, under cover thereof, a low +voice said to Julius, “Now, really and truly, tell me how he is +getting on?”</p> +<p>“Really and truly, Jenny?”</p> +<p>“Well, not as you would tell mamma, for instance; but as you +think in your secret soul.”</p> +<p>“I am sorry you think me so duplex.”</p> +<p>“Come, you understand how anxious I am about the boy.”</p> +<p>“Exactly.” And they both laughed.</p> +<p>“Is that all?” said Joanna Bowater.</p> +<p>“<i>Really and truly</i> it is! Rose can manage him much +better than I can.”</p> +<p>“He is very fond of her; but does he—is he—is his +heart in his work?” asked the sister, looking with her honest +eyes earnestly at Julius, her contemporary and playfellow as a child, +and afterwards the companion with whom she had worked out many a deep +problem, rendering mutual assistance that made each enter in no common +degree into the inner thoughts of the other.</p> +<p>Julius smiled. “I doubt whether he has come to his heart +yet.”</p> +<p>“Why should he be so young? Think what you were at twenty-three.”</p> +<p>“I never had Herbert’s <i>physique</i>; and that makes +an immense difference. I had no taste or capacity for what is +a great privation to a fine young fellow like him. Don’t +look startled! He attempts nothing unfitting; he is too good and +dutiful, but—”</p> +<p>“Yes, I know what that <i>but</i> means.”</p> +<p>“Nothing to be unhappy about. You know how blameless +he has always been at Eton and Oxford; and though he may view his work +rather in a school-boy aspect, and me as a taskmaster, as long as he +is doing right the growth is going on. Don’t be unhappy, +Jenny! His great clear young voice is delightful to hear; he is +capital at choral practices, and is a hero to all the old women and +boys, the more so for the qualities that earnestness cannot give, but +rather detracts from.”</p> +<p>“You mean that he is not in earnest?”</p> +<p>“Don’t pervert all I say! He is not past the time +of life when all appointed work seems a task, and any sort of excuse +a valid cause against it; but he is conscientious, and always good-humoured +under a scolding,—and Rosamond does not spare him,” he added, +laughing.</p> +<p>“Then you don’t think there has been a mistake about +him?” said Jenny, in a low voice of alarm.</p> +<p>“I have little doubt that when anything develops his inner +life, so as to overcome the great strong animal that demands play and +exercise, he will be a most useful clergyman.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he is too young, though I don’t see how it could +be helped. Papa always intended it, because of the living; and +Herbert never wished anything else. I thought he really desired +it, but now I don’t know whether he did not only take it as a +matter of course.”</p> +<p>“Obedience is no unwholesome motive. As things stood, +to delay his ordination would have been a stigma he did not deserve; +and though he might have spent a year with advantage in a theological +college, pupilage might only have prolonged his boyhood. It must +be experience, not simply years of study, that deepens him.”</p> +<p>“Ah, those studies!”</p> +<p>“To tell the truth, that’s what I am most uneasy about. +I take care he should have two hours every forenoon, and three evenings +every week, free; but when a man is in his own neighbourhood, and so +popular, I am afraid he does not get many evenings at home; and I can’t +hinder Bindon from admonishing him.”</p> +<p>“No,” said the sister; “nothing will stir him till +the examination is imminent; but I will try what I can do with him for +the present. Here he comes, the dear old idle fellow!”</p> +<p>“Joanie, here you are at last, in conclave with the Rector. +Lady Rose wants me to sing, and you must accompany me. No one +is so jolly for picking one up.”</p> +<p>‘Picking one up’ was apt to be needed by Herbert, who +had a good ear and voice, but had always regarded it as ‘bosh’ +to cultivate them, except for the immediately practical purposes that +had of late been forced on him. The choral society had improved +him; but Jenny was taken aback by being called on to accompany him in +<i>Mrs. Brown</i>’<i>s Luggage</i>; and his father made his way +up to him, saying, “Eh, Herbert! is that the last clerical fashion?”</p> +<p>“’Tis my Rectoress who sets me on, sir,” was Herbert’s +merry answer, looking at her. “Now, Lady Rose, you’ll +keep me in countenance! My father has never heard you sing <i>Coming +through the Rye</i>.”</p> +<p>“No, no, Herbert, my singing is only to amuse little boys. +Here’s the higher order of art!”</p> +<p>For Cecil was leading a young lady to the piano, and looking as if +she by no means approved of such folly, though everybody had listened +to the <i>Poor Old Cockatoo</i>, laughed and applauded heartily; and +the ensuing performance seemed to be unappreciated by any one except +Raymond and Cecil themselves.</p> +<p>Anne was sitting in a corner of the sofa, with a straight back and +weary face, having been driven out into the throng by the old friends +who came to sit with Mrs. Poynsett; but she brightened as Miss Bowater +took a seat beside her, and accepted her inquiries for Captain Charnock +far more graciously than the many which had preceded them. Was +not her likeness in his album? And had he not spoken of her as +one whom Anne would like?</p> +<p>Soon Joanna had led her to tell not only of Miles’s last letter, +but of those from Glen Fraser, of which she had spoken to no one, under +the impression that nobody cared. She even spoke of the excellent +farm and homestead which Mr. Van Dorp wanted to sell before going to +the Free State, and which her father thought would exactly suit Miles.</p> +<p>“Does he mean to settle there?”</p> +<p>“Oh, yes; he promised me to leave the navy and take me home +as soon as this voyage is over,” said Anne, eagerly. “If +the <i>Salamanca</i> only puts in for long enough, he might run up to +Glen Fraser, and see Bocksfeld Stoop, and settle it all at once. +I am sure he would be delighted with it, and it is only two miles from +Mr. Pilgrim’s.”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid you can never feel this like home,” +said Jenny.</p> +<p>“Miles wanted me to know his family, and thought I should be +useful to his mother,” said Anne; “but she does not want +anything I could do for her. If she has Raymond, she seems to +need nobody else.”</p> +<p>“And have you nothing to do?”</p> +<p>“I have letters to write to Miles and to them all at home; +and I am making a whole set of shirts and stockings for papa and the +boys—it will spare mamma and Jeanie, and I have plenty of time.”</p> +<p>“Too much, I am afraid! But Herbert said you were very +useful at the Work Society at Wil’sbro’.”</p> +<p>“Not now.”</p> +<p>“Indeed!”</p> +<p>“No,” in the old cold dry tone. But while Jenny +was doubting whether to inquire further, innate sympathy conquered, +and Anne added, “I wonder whether I did wrong!”</p> +<p>“As how?” asked Joanna, kindly.</p> +<p>“They said”—she lowered her voice—“I +must never speak on religious subjects.”</p> +<p>“How do you mean? What had you done?”</p> +<p>“One day I found a woman crying because her husband had gone +away to seek work, so I told her my husband was further away and repeated +the texts I like. She was so much comforted that I printed them +on a card for her.”</p> +<p>“Was that all?”</p> +<p>“No; there was another poor dear that was unhappy about her +baby; and when I bade her pray for it, she did not know how, so I had +to tell her a little. There is one who does know her Saviour, +and I did love to have a few words of peace with her.”</p> +<p>“And was that what was objected to?”</p> +<p>“Yes; they said it would change the whole character of the +institution.”</p> +<p>“Who did?”</p> +<p>“Cecil—Mrs. Charnock Poynsett. I think Lady Tyrrell +and Mrs. Duncombe desired her. I thought it was no place for me +where I might not speak one word for Christ, and I said so; but since +I have wondered whether the old Adam did not speak in me, and I ought +to have gone on.”</p> +<p>“My wonder,” said Jenny, indignantly, “would be +what right they had to stop you. This was private interference, +not from the Vicar or the committee.”</p> +<p>“But I am not a real visiting lady. I only go to help +Cecil.”</p> +<p>“I see; but why didn’t you ask Julius what was right? +He would have told you.”</p> +<p>“Oh, no, I could not.”</p> +<p>“Why not?”</p> +<p>“It would seem like a complaint of Cecil. Besides—”</p> +<p>“Besides?”</p> +<p>“I don’t think Julius is a Christian.”</p> +<p>The startling announcement was made in so humble and mournful a voice +as almost to disarm Jenny’s resentment; and before she had recovered +enough for a reply, she was called to take leave of her parents.</p> +<p>Her brother was the professed object of her visit, and she was only +at the Hall because there was no accommodation at his lodgings, so that +she had no scruple in joining the early breakfast spread for the Rector +and his wife, so as to have the morning free for him; but she found +Julius alone, saying that his wife was tired after the party; and to +Jenny’s offer to take her class, he replied, “Thank you, +it will be a great kindness if you will teach; but Rose has no regular +class. Teaching is not much in her line; and it is a pity she +should have to do it, but we have to make the most of the single hour +they allow us for godliness.”</p> +<p>“Don’t you utilize Mrs. Charnock? or is she not strong +enough for early hours?”</p> +<p>“Poor Anne! The truth is, I am afraid of her. I +fancy all her doctrine comes out of the Westminster Catechism.”</p> +<p>“Could Calvinism be put in at seven years old? Would +not it be a pouring of stiff glue into a narrow-necked phial?”</p> +<p>“Result—<i>nil</i>.”</p> +<p>“A few pure drops might got in—and you could give her +books.”</p> +<p>“It had struck me that it might be wholesome work for her; +but the children’s good must stand first. And, timid and +reserved as she seems, she insisted on preaching at the work-room, so +that Cecil had to put a stop to it.”</p> +<p>“Are you certain about that preaching?”</p> +<p>“Rose heard of it from Cecil herself.”</p> +<p>“Did she ask what it amounted to?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know; perhaps I had better find out. I +remember it came after that ride to Sirenwood. By the bye, Jenny, +I wish Cecil could be hindered from throwing herself into that oak of +Broceliande!”</p> +<p>“Are not you so suspicious that you see the waving arms and +magic circles everywhere?”</p> +<p>“A friendship with any one here is so unnatural, that I can’t +but think it a waving of hands boding no good. And there is worse +than friendship in that quarter too.”</p> +<p>“Oh, but Lenore is quite different!”</p> +<p>“A Vivienne still!” said Julius, bitterly. “If +she costs poor Frank nothing more than his appointment, it will be well.”</p> +<p>“I don’t understand!”</p> +<p>“She caught him in her toils two years ago at Rockpier; and +now she is playing fast and loose with him—withdrawing, as I believe; +and at any rate keeping the poor foolish boy in such an agitation, that +he can’t or won’t settle to his reading; and Driver thinks +he will break down.”</p> +<p>“I can’t think it of Lenore.—Oh! good morning, +Raymond!”</p> +<p>“Good morning! May I come to breakfast number one? +I have to go to Backsworth.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Jenny; “we told papa it was too bad +to put you on the Prison Committee. What does your wife say?”</p> +<p>“My wife has so many occupations, that she is very sufficient +for herself,” said Raymond. “I hope you will get on +with her, Jenny. If she could only be got to think you intellectual!”</p> +<p>“Me? O, Raymond! you’ve not been telling her so?” +exclaimed Jenny, laughing heartily.</p> +<p>“A very superior coach in divinity, &c.,” said Julius, +in a tone half banter, half earnest.</p> +<p>But Jenny exclaimed in distress, “No, no, no; say nothing about +that! It would never do for Herbert to have it known. Don’t +let him guess that you know.”</p> +<p>“Quite right, Jenny; never fear,” said Julius; “though +it is tempting to ask you to take Frank in hand at the same time.”</p> +<p>“Have you seen anything of the Vivians?” asked Raymond.</p> +<p>“Very little. I hoped to see something of Eleonora from +hence.”</p> +<p>“I can’t understand that young lady,” said Julius. +“She was very friendly when first we met her; but now she seems +absolutely repellant.”</p> +<p>“<i>Tant mieux</i>,” Raymond</p> +<p>“They seem inclined to take up all the good works in hand,” +said Jenny. “By the bye, what is all this story about Raymond +affronting Wil’sbro’ by stirring up their gutters? +Papa has been quite in a state of mind for fear they should take offence +and bring in Mr. Moy.”</p> +<p>“Julius only thinks I have not stirred the gutters enough,” +said Raymond. “And after all, it is not I, but Whitlock. +I was in hopes that matters might have been properly looked after if +Whitlock had been chosen mayor this year; but, somehow, a cry was got +up that he was going to bring down a sanitary commission, and put the +town to great expense; and actually, this town-council have been elected +<i>because</i> they are opposed to drainage.”</p> +<p>“And Truelove, the grocer, is mayor?”</p> +<p>“Yes; one of the most impracticable men I ever encountered. +One can’t get him so much as to understand anything. Now +Briggs does understand, only he goes by £ <i>s. d</i>.”</p> +<p>“Posterity has done nothing for me, and I will do nothing for +posterity, is his principle,” said Julius. “Moreover, +he is a Baptist.”</p> +<p>“No chance for the Church in his time,” said Jenny.</p> +<p>“There’s the less harm in that,” said Raymond, +“that the plan is intolerable. Briggs’s nephew took +the plan of what he calls a German Rat-house, for the town-hall, made +in gilt gingerbread; and then adapted the church to a beautiful similarity. +If that could be staved off by waiting for the bazaar, or by any other +means, there might be a chance of something better. So poor Fuller +thinks, though he is not man enough to speak out at once.”</p> +<p>“Then the bazaar is really fixed?”</p> +<p>“So far as the resolution goes of the lady population, though +Julius is sanguine, and hopes to avert it. After all, I believe +the greatest obstructive to improvement is Moy.”</p> +<p>“Old Mr. Proudfoot’s son-in-law?” said Jenny. +“I know he has blossomed out in great splendour on our side of +the county, and his daughter is the general wonder. Papa is always +declaring he will set up in opposition to you.”</p> +<p>“Not much fear of that,” said Raymond. “But +the man provokes me, he has so much apparent seriousness.”</p> +<p>“Even to the persecution of Dr. Easterby,” put in Julius. +“And yet he is the great supporter of that abominable public-house +in Water Lane, the Three Pigeons—which, unluckily, escaped the +fire. He owns it, and all those miserable tenements beyond it, +and nothing will move him an inch towards doing any good there!”</p> +<p>“I remember,” said Jenny, “papa came home very +angry on the licensing day; the police had complained of the Three Pigeons, +and the magistrates would have taken away the license, but that Mr. +Moy made such a personal matter of it.”</p> +<p>“You don’t mean that he is a magistrate!” exclaimed +Julius.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Raymond. “He got the ear of the +Lord-Lieutenant.”</p> +<p>“And since he has lived at the Lawn, they have all quite set +up for county people or anything you please,” said Jenny, a little +bitterly. “Mrs. Moy drives about with the most stylish pair +of ponies; and as to Miss Gussie, she is making herself into a proverb! +I can’t bear them.”</p> +<p>“Well done, Jenny!” exclaimed Julius.</p> +<p>“Perhaps it is wrong,” said Jenny, in a low voice. +“I dare say I am not just. You know I always did think Mr. +Moy could have cleared Archie if he would,” she added, with a +slightly trembling tone.</p> +<p>“So did I,” said Raymond. “I gave him the +opportunity after George Proudfoot’s death; but when the choice +lay between two memories, one could hardly wonder if he preferred to +shield his brother-in-law.”</p> +<p>“Or himself!” said Jenny, under her breath.</p> +<p>“Come, Jenny,” said Julius, feeling that the moment for +interruption had come, “it is time we should be off. Methinks +there are sounds as if the whole canine establishment at Mrs. Hornblower’s +were prancing up to meet us.”</p> +<p>So it proved; and Jenny had to run the gauntlet through the ecstasies +of all the dogs, whose ecclesiastical propriety was quite overthrown, +for they danced about her to the very threshold of the church, and had +to have the door shut on their very noses. That drop of bitterness, +which her sad brief story could not fail to have left in poor Joanna’s +heart, either passed out of mind in what followed, or was turned into +the prayer, “And to turn their hearts;” and she was her +bright self again for her promised assistance at the school.</p> +<p>Then Herbert’s address was, “Come, Joan, I promised to +take you to see the Reeves’s pheasant at the Outwood Lodge. +Such a jolly old woman!”</p> +<p>“The pheasant?”</p> +<p>“No; the keeper’s mother. Tail a yard long! +I don’t see why we shouldn’t turn them out at home. +If father won’t take it up, I shall write to Phil.”</p> +<p>“Thank you, Herbs. Hadn’t you better secure a little +reading first? I could wait; I’ve got to write to Will.”</p> +<p>“The post doesn’t go till five.”</p> +<p>“But I want to get it done. The mail goes to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“You’ll do it much better after a walk. I can’t +understand anything after the fumes of the school, unless I do a bit +of visiting first; and that pheasant is a real stunner. It really +is parish work, Jenny. Look here, this is what I’m reading +her.”</p> +<p>“<i>Learn to die</i>!” said Jenny, laughing heartily. +“Nothing could be more appropriate, only you should have begun +before October.”</p> +<p>“You choose to make fun of everything!” answered Herbert, +gruffly; and Jenny, deciding that she would see a specimen day, made +her peace by consenting to share in the pastoral visit, whether to pheasant +or peasant. Indeed, a walk with Herbert was one of the prime pleasures +of her life—and this was delightful, along broad gravelled drives +through the autumnal woods with tinted beech-leaves above, and brackens +of all shades of brown, green, and yellow beneath. And it was +charming to see Herbert’s ways with the old woman—a dainty +old dame, such as is grown in the upper ranks of service, whom he treated +with a hearty, bantering, coaxing manner, which she evidently enjoyed +extremely. His reading, for he <i>did</i> come to more serious +matters, was very good—in a voice that without effort reached +deaf ears, and with feeling about it that did a great deal to reassure +his sister that there was something behind the big bright boy.</p> +<p>But by the time he had done the honours of all the pheasants, and +all the dogs, and all the ferrets, and all the stuffed birds, and all +the eggs (for the keeper was a bit of a naturalist), and had discussed +Mr. Frank’s last day’s shooting, it was so late, that Jenny +had only just time to walk back to the Hall at her best pace, to see +Mrs. Poynsett for a few minutes before luncheon; and her reception was, +“Is that Herbert’s step? Call him in, my dear!—You +must make the most of your sister, Herbert. Come in to all meals +while she is here.”</p> +<p>He heard with gratitude—his sister with consternation. +If forenoon pastoral visits were to be on that scale, and he dined out +whenever he was not at school or at church, how would his books fare? +and yet she could not grudge his pleasure. She could not help +looking half foolish, half sad, when she met the Rector’s eye.</p> +<p>Julius thought so much of her advice, as to knock at Cecil’s +sitting-room door, and beg to ask her a question; and as she liked to +be consulted, she welcomed him hospitably into that temple, sacred to +culture and to Dunstone—full of drawings, books, and china.</p> +<p>“I was thinking,” he said, “of offering Anne some +parish work. I wanted to know if you saw any objection?”</p> +<p>“Certainly not; I have not been able to make acquaintance yet +with all our tenants, but they seem quite to understand the difference +in our positions,” said Cecil, with due deliberation.</p> +<p>Julius choked his amusement, and waived that point. “But +did you not feel obliged to decline her services at the Wil’sbro’ +work-room?”</p> +<p>“That was quite another thing. What was most undesirable +in such an institution would be all very well for your old women.”</p> +<p>“What kind of thing?”</p> +<p>“Talking piously, giving away texts, and so on; just the way +to make the women think we intended to impose religious instruction +and give a sectarian character, defeating our own object.”</p> +<p>“Was there any flaw in what she said?”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell what she said. It was just a little +murmur over the work.”</p> +<p>“Not preaching?”</p> +<p>“Not in that sense,” said Cecil, with a little compunction.</p> +<p>“I am glad to hear it; it makes a great difference.”</p> +<p>“You see,” said the lady, “our institution is merely +intended to support these women in the time of want; and if we were +to couple our assistance with religion we should just sink into a mothers’ +meeting, and make the women think—”</p> +<p>“Think that you prize the soul more than the body,” said +Julius, as she halted in search of a word. “I understand, +Cecil; you would not be in the prevailing fashion. I don’t +want to argue that point, only to understand about Anne.”</p> +<p>So saying, he went at once to Anne’s abode, the old schoolroom, +which, like everything else belonging to Mrs. Miles Charnock, had a +sad-coloured aspect, although it had been fitted up very prettily. +The light was sombre, and all the brighter pictures and ornaments seemed +to have been effaced by a whole gallery of amateur photographs, in which +the glories of the African bush were represented by brown masses of +shade variegated by blotches of white. Even in Miles’s own +portrait on the table, the gold seemed overwhelmed by the dark blue; +and even as Julius entered, she shut it up in its brown case, as too +sacred for even his brother’s eyes.</p> +<p>However, a flush of pleasure came to her pale face at the invitation +to take a class, and to read to a good old woman, whom in his secret +soul he thought so nearly a dissenter, that she could not be made more +so. She promised her help with some eagerness for as long as she +should remain in England, and accepted the books he gave her without +protest. Nay, that same evening she took Jenny off into her gray +abode, to consult her whether, since she must now join the early breakfast, +she could go to daily service without becoming formal.</p> +<p>She even recurred to her question, whether Julius was a Christian, +without nearly as much negation in her tones as before; and Jenny, taking +it as it was meant, vouched for his piety, so as might render it a little +more comprehensible to one matured on Scottish Calvinism and English +Methodism, diluted in devout undogmatic minds, with no principle more +developed than horror of Popery and of worldliness. Turned loose +in solitude, reserve, and sadness, on her husband’s family, who +did nothing but shock her with manifestations of the latter, she could +hardly turn even to the clerical portion of it, while Julius, as well +as his curates, bore all the tokens by which she had been taught to +know a Papist. Daily intercourse was perhaps drawing her a little +towards her brother-in-law; but Herbert Bowater united these obnoxious +externals to a careless tongue, and joyous easy-going manner, and taste +for amusement, which so horrified Anne, that she once condoled with +his sister, and proposed to unite in prayer for his conversion; but +this was more than Joanna could bear, and she cried, “I only wish +I were as good a Christian as dear Herbert!”</p> +<p>For indeed, the sister’s heart intensely esteemed his sweetness, +honesty, and simplicity, even while she found it an uphill task to coax +him to steady work. After that first morning he was indeed ashamed +to let her see the proportion between his pastoral visits and his theological +reading; but the newspapers (he had two or three weekly ones) had a +curious facility of expansion, and there was a perilous sound in “I’ll +just see where the meet is,”—not that he had the most distant +idea of repairing thither; it was pure filial interest in learning where +his father and Edith would be.</p> +<p>Jenny could not tell whether her presence conduced to diligence or +to chatter, but he minded her more than any one else, and always stuck +close to her, insisting on her admiring all his <i>protégés</i>. +There was one with whom he was certainly doing a work, which, as Julius +truly said, no one more clerical could have done so well—namely, +the son of his landlady, a youth who held a small clerkship in an office +at Willansborough, and who had fallen this year under the attraction +of the Backsworth races, so as to get into serious difficulties with +his master, and narrowly escape dismissal for the sake of his mother.</p> +<p>The exceeding good-nature and muscular Christian side of the lodger’s +character was having a most happy effect on the lad. He had set +up a regular hero-worship, which Herbert encouraged by always calling +for him when going to the choral practices, getting him into the choir, +lending him books, and inviting him to read in his room in the evening. +How much they played with the dogs was not known; but at any rate, Harry +Hornblower was out of mischief, and his mother was so grateful to Mr. +Bowater, that she even went the length of preferring his sermons to +those of both his seniors.</p> +<p>The discovery that most vexed Jenny was that Sirenwood had so much +of his time. He seemed to be asked to come to dinner whenever +Sir Harry saw him, or a chair was left vacant at a party; and though +his Rector was inexorable as to releasing him on casual notice from +the parish avocations of three nights in the week, the effect was grumbling +as savage as was possible from so good-humoured a being; and now and +then a regular absence without leave, and a double growl at the consequent +displeasure. It was true that in ten minutes he was as hearty +and friendly as ever to his colleagues, but that might be only a proof +of his disregard of their reproofs, and their small effect.</p> +<p>Eleonora Vivian was not the attraction. No; Herbert thought +her a proud, silent, disagreeable girl, and could see no beauty in her; +but he had a boy’s passion for the matured splendour of her sister’s +beauty; and she was so kind to him!</p> +<p>What could Jenny mean by looking glum about it? She was stunningly +good, and all that. She had done no end of good with clubs and +mothers’ meetings at her married home; and it was no end of a +pity she was not in Compton parish, instead of under poor wretched old +Fuller, whom you could not stir—no, not if you tied a firebrand +to his tail.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIII<br /> +Withered Leaves and Fresh Buds</h2> +<p>Lady Rosamond and Joanna Bowater could not fail to be good friends; +Herbert was a great bond of union, and so was Mrs. Poynsett. Rosamond +found it hard to recover from the rejection of her scheme of the wheeled-chair, +and begged Jenny to become its advocate; but Mrs. Poynsett listened +with a smile of the unpromising kind—“You too, Jenny?”</p> +<p>“Why not, dear Mrs. Poynsett? How nice it would be to +see you in your own corner again!”</p> +<p>“I don’t think my own corner remains.”</p> +<p>“Oh! but it could be restored at once.”</p> +<p>“Do you think so? No, no, Jenny my dear; cracked china +is better left on the shelf out of the way, even if it could bear the +move, which it can’t.”</p> +<p>Then Jenny understood, and advised Rosamond to bide her time, and +wait till the session of parliament, when the house would be quieter; +and Rosamond nodded and held her peace.</p> +<p>The only person who held aloof was Cecil, who would not rise to the +bait when Raymond tried to exhibit Miss Bowater as a superior intellectual +woman.</p> +<p>Unluckily, too, Jenny observed one evening at the five o’clock +tea, “I hear that Mrs. Duncombe has picked up some very funny +people—a lady lecturer, who is coming to set us all to rights.”</p> +<p>“A wonderful pair, I hear!” said Frank. “Mrs. +Clio Tallboys, she calls herself, and a poor little husband, whom she +carries about to show the superiority of her sex.”</p> +<p>“A Cambridge professor and a great political economist!” +observed Cecil, in a low but indignant voice.</p> +<p>“The Yankee Cambridge!” quoth Frank.</p> +<p>“The American Cambridge is a distinguished university,” +returned Cecil.</p> +<p>“Cecil is right, Master Frank,” laughed his mother; “Cam +and Isis are not the only streams of learning in the world.”</p> +<p>“I never heard of him,” said Jenny; “he is a mere +satellite to the great luminary.”</p> +<p>“They are worth seeing,” added Frank; “she is one +of those regular American beauties one would pay to get a sight of.”</p> +<p>“Where did you get all this information?” asked Cecil.</p> +<p>“From Duncombe himself. They met on the Righi; and nothing +is more comical than to near him describe the ladies’ fraternization +over female doctors and lawyers, till they rushed into each other’s +arms, and the Clio promised to come down on a crusade and convert you +all.”</p> +<p>“There are two ways of telling a story,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“No wonder the gentlemen quake!” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“I don’t,” said Frank, boyishly.</p> +<p>“Because you’ve no wife to take you in hand,” retorted +Jenny.</p> +<p>“For my part,” said Mrs. Poynsett, “I can’t +see what women want. I have always had as many rights as I could +exercise.”</p> +<p>“Ah! but we are not all ladies of the manor,” said Jenny, +“nor do we all drive coaches.”</p> +<p>“I observe,” said Cecil, with dignity, “that there +is supposed to be a license to laugh at Mrs. Duncombe and whatever she +does.”</p> +<p>“She would do better to mind her children,” said Frank.</p> +<p>“Children! Has she children?” broke in Anne and +Rosamond, both at once.</p> +<p>“Didn’t you know it?” said Jenny.</p> +<p>“No, indeed! I didn’t think her the sort of woman,” +said Rosamond. “What does she do with them?”</p> +<p>“Drops them in the gutter,” said Frank. “Literally, +as I came home, I heard a squeak, and found a child flat in a little +watercourse. I picked it out, and the elder one told me it was +Ducky Duncombe, or some such word. Its little boots had holes +in them, mother; its legs were purple, and there was a fine smart foreign +woman flirting round the corner with young Hornblower.”</p> +<p>“Boys with long red hair, and Highland dresses?” exclaimed +Rosamond. “Yes, the same we saw with Miss Vivian!”</p> +<p>“Exactly!” said Frank, eagerly. “She is quite +a mother to those poor little wretches; they watch for her at the Sirenwood +gate, and she walks with them. The boy’s cry was not for +mother or nurse, but for Lena!”</p> +<p>“Pray, did she come at his call?”</p> +<p>“No; but when I carried the brat home, poor Duncombe told me +almost with tears, how good she is to them. I fancy he feels their +mother’s neglect of them.”</p> +<p>“I’m sure I gave her credit for having none,” said +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Ah!” said Jenny, “you should have heard her condolences +with my sister Mary on her last infliction. Fancy Mary’s +face!”</p> +<p>“No doubt it was to stem a torrent of nursery discussions,” +said Cecil. “Such bad taste!”</p> +<p>“Which?” murmured Rosamond under her breath, with an +arched eyebrow.</p> +<p>“Plain enough,” said Frank: “if a woman is a woman, +the bad taste is to be ashamed of it.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Cecil, “that is the way with men; they +would fain keep us down to the level of the nursery.”</p> +<p>“I thought nurseries were usually at the top of the house.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps,” said Mrs. Poynsett, disregarding this mischievous +suggestion, “they mean that organization, like charity, should +begin at home.”</p> +<p>“You say that meaningly,” said Rosamond. “I +have heard very odd stories of domestic affairs at Aucuba Villa, and +that she can’t get a servant to stay there.”</p> +<p>“That man, Alexander, has always been there,” said Frank.</p> +<p>“Yes; but he has occasionally to do all the work of the house. +Yes, I can’t help it, Cecil, Susan will regale me with cook-stories +sometimes; and I have heard of the whole establishment turning out on +being required to eat funguses.”</p> +<p>“I shall beware of dining there!” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Don’t they dine here to-morrow?” asked Frank.</p> +<p>“No, they are engaged to the Moys,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“But the Vivians come?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes.”</p> +<p>Every one knew that already; but Frank could not help having it repeated. +It was a mere formal necessity to ask them, and had been accepted as +such; but there was some amazement when Cecil brought home Lady Tyrrell +and Miss Vivian to lunch and spend the afternoon. It might be +intended as one of her demonstrations; for though it was understood +that any of the inmates were free to bring home friends to luncheon, +it was not done—except with a casual gentleman—without notice +to the mistress of the house. Cecil, however, comported herself +entirely as in that position, explaining that Lady Tyrrell was come +to give her advice upon an intended fernery, and would perform her toilette +here, so as to have plenty of time. Frank, little knowing what +was passing, was working the whole day at his tutor’s for the +closely imminent examination; Julius and Raymond were gravely polite; +Eleonora very silent; and as soon as the meal was over, Rosamond declared +that she should not come out to stand planning in the cold; and though +Herbert would have liked nothing better in that company, his Rector +carried him off to arrange an Advent service in a distant hamlet; Anne’s +horse came to the door; and only Joanna remained to accompany the gardening +party, except that Raymond came out with them to mark the limits of +permissible alteration.</p> +<p>“How unchanged!” exclaimed Lady Tyrrell. “Time +stands still here; only where is the grand old magnolia? How sweet +it used to be!”</p> +<p>“Killed by the frost,” said Raymond, shortly, not choosing +to undergo a course of reminiscences, and chafing his wife by his repressive +manner towards her guest. When he had pointed out the bed of Americans +that were to be her boundary, he excused himself as having letters to +finish; and as he went away Cecil gave vent to her distaste to the old +shrubs and borders, now, of course, at their worst—the azaleas +mere dead branches, the roses with a few yellow night-capped buds still +lingering, and fuchsias with a scanty bell or two.</p> +<p>Jenny fought for their spring beauty, all the more because Lady Tyrrell +was encouraging the wife to criticize the very things she had tried +to sentimentalize over with the husband; but seeing that she was only +doing harm, she proposed a brisk walk to Eleonora, who gladly assented, +though her sister made a protest about damp, and her being a bad walker. +The last things they heard was Cecil’s sigh, “It is all +so shut in, wherever there is level ground, that the bazaar would be +impossible.”</p> +<p>“I should hope so!” muttered Jenny.</p> +<p>“What do you mean to do about this bazaar?” asked Eleonora, +as they sped away.</p> +<p>“I don’t know. Those things so often go off in +smoke, that I don’t make up my mind till they become imminent.”</p> +<p>“I am afraid this will go on,” said Eleonora. “Camilla +means it and she always carries out her plans; I wish I saw the right +line.”</p> +<p>“About that?”</p> +<p>“About everything. It seems to me that there never was +any one so cut off from help and advice as I am;” then, as Joanna +made some mute sign of sympathy, “I knew you would understand; +I have been longing to be with you, for there has been no one to whom +I could speak freely since I left Rockpier.”</p> +<p>“And I have been longing to have you. Mamma would have +asked you to stay with us before, only we had the house full. +Can’t you come now?”</p> +<p>“You will see that I shall not be allowed. It is of no +use to think about it!” said the girl, with a sigh. “Here, +let us get out of this broad path, or she may yet come after us—persuade +Mrs. Charnock Poynsett it is too cold to stand about—anything +to break up a <i>tête-à-tête</i>.”</p> +<p>Jenny saw she really was in absolute fear of pursuit; but hardly +yet understood the nervous haste to turn into a not very inviting side-path, +veiled by the trees, whose wet leaves were falling.</p> +<p>“Do you mind the damp?” asked the girl, anxiously.</p> +<p>“No, not at all; but—”</p> +<p>“You don’t know what it is never to feel free, but be +like a French girl, always watched—at least whenever I am with +any one I care to speak to.”</p> +<p>“Are you quite sure it is not imagination?”</p> +<p>“O, Joanna, don’t be like all the rest, blinded by her! +You knew her always!”</p> +<p>“Only from below. I am four years younger; you know dear +Emily was my contemporary.”</p> +<p>“Dear Emily! I miss her more now than even at Rockpier. +But you, who were her friend, and knew Camilla of old, I know you can +help me as no one else can.”</p> +<p>Jenny returned a caress; and Eleonora spoke on. “You +know I was only eight years old when Camilla married, and I had scarcely +seen her till she came to us at Rockpier, on Lord Tyrrell’s death, +and then she was most delightful. I thought her like mother and +sister both in one, even more tender than dear Emily. How could +I have thought so for a moment? But she enchanted everybody. +Clergy, ladies, and all came under the spell; and I can’t get +advice from any of them—even from Miss Coles—you remember +her?”</p> +<p>“Your governess? How nice she was!”</p> +<p>“Emily and I owed everything to her! She was as near +being a mother to us as any one could be; and Camilla could not say +enough of gratitude, or show esteem enough, and fascinated her like +all the rest of us; but she never rested till she had got her off to +a situation in Russia. I did not perceive the game at the time, +but I see now how all the proposals for situations within reach of me +were quashed.”</p> +<p>“But you write to her?”</p> +<p>“Yes; but as soon as I showed any of my troubles she reproved +me for self-will and wanting to judge for myself, and not submit to +my sister. That’s the way with all at Rockpier. Camilla +has gone about pitying me to them for having to give way to my married +sister, but saying it was quite time that she took charge of us; and +on that notion they all wrote to me. Then she persuaded papa to +go abroad; and I was delighted, little thinking she never meant me to +go back again.”</p> +<p>“Did she not?”</p> +<p>“Listen! I’ve heard her praise Rockpier and its +church to the skies to one person—say Mr. Bindon. To another, +such as our own Vicar, she says it was much too <i>ultra</i>, and she +likes moderation; she tells your father that she wants to see papa among +his old friends; and to Mrs. Duncombe, I’ve heard her go as near +the truth as is possible to her, and call it a wearisome place, with +an atmosphere of incense, curates, and old maids, from whom she had +carried me off before I grew fit for nothing else!”</p> +<p>“I dare say all these are true in turn, or seem so to her, +or she would not say them before you.”</p> +<p>“She has left off trying to gloss it over with me, except so +far as it is part of her nature. She did at first, but she knows +it is of no use now.”</p> +<p>“Really, Lenore, you must be going too far.”</p> +<p>“I have shocked you; but you can’t conceive what it is +to live with perpetual falsity. No, I can’t use any other +word. I am always mistrusting and being angered, and my senses +of right and wrong get so confused, that it is like groping in a maze.” +Her eyes were full of tears, but she exclaimed, “Tell me, Joanna, +was there ever anything between Camilla and Mr. Poynsett?”</p> +<p>“Why bring that up again now?”</p> +<p>“Why did it go off?” insisted Lenore.</p> +<p>“Because Mrs. Poynsett could not give up and turn into a dowager, +as if she were not the mistress herself.”</p> +<p>“Was that all?”</p> +<p>“So it was said.”</p> +<p>“I want to get to the bottom of it. It was not because +Lord Tyrrell came in the way.”</p> +<p>“I am afraid they thought so here.”</p> +<p>“Then,” said Eleonora, in a hard, dry way, “I know +the reason of our being brought back here, and of a good deal besides.”</p> +<p>“My dear Lena, I am very sorry for you; but I think you had +better keep this out of your mind, or you will fall into a hard, bitter, +suspicious mood.”</p> +<p>“That is the very thing. I am in a hard, bitter, suspicious +mood, and I can’t see how to keep out of it; I don’t know +when opposition is right and firm, and when it is only my own self-will.”</p> +<p>“Would it not be a good thing to talk to Julius Charnock? +You would not be betraying anything.”</p> +<p>“No! I can’t seem to make up to the good clergyman! +Certainly not. Besides, I’ve heard Camilla talking to his +wife!”</p> +<p>“Talking?”</p> +<p>“Admiring that dress, which she had been sneering at to your +mother, don’t you remember? It was one of her honey-cups +with venom below—only happily, Lady Rosamond saw through the flattery. +I’m ashamed whenever I see her!”</p> +<p>“I don’t think that need cut you off from Julius.”</p> +<p>“Tell me <i>truly</i>,” again broke in Lenore, “what +Mrs. Poynsett really is. She is a standing proverb with us for +tyranny over her sons; not with Camilla alone, but with papa.”</p> +<p>“See how they love her!” cried Jenny, hotly.</p> +<p>“Camilla thinks that abject; but I can’t forget how Frank +talked of her in those happy Rockpier days.”</p> +<p>“When you first knew him?” said Jenny.</p> +<p>They must have come at length to the real point, for Eleonora began +at once—“Yes; he was with his sick friend, and we were so +happy; and now he is being shamefully used, and I don’t know what +to do!”</p> +<p>“Indeed, Lenore,” said Jenny, in her downright way, “I +do not understand. You do not seem to care for him.”</p> +<p>“Of course I am wrong,” said the poor girl; “but +I hoped I was doing the best thing for him.” Then, as Jenny +made an indignant sound, “See, Jenny, when he came to Rockpier, +Camilla had been a widow about three months. She never had been +very sad, for Lord Tyrrell had been quite imbecile for a year, poor +man! And when Frank came, she could not make enough of him; and +he and I both thought the two families had been devotedly fond of each +other, and that she was only too glad to meet one of them.”</p> +<p>“I suppose that was true.”</p> +<p>“So do I, as things stood then. She meant Frank to be +a sort of connecting link, against the time when she could come back +here; but we, poor children, never thought of that, and went on together, +not exactly saying anything, but quite understanding how much we cared. +Indeed, I know Camilla impressed on him that, for his mother’s +sake, it must go no farther then, while he was still so young; and next +came our journey on the Continent, ending in our coming back here last +July.”</p> +<p>Jenny remembered that Raymond’s engagement had not been made +known till August, and Frank had only returned from a grouse-shooting +holiday a week or two before the arrival of the brides.</p> +<p>“Now,” added Eleonora, “Camilla has made me understand +that nothing will induce her to let papa consent; and though I know +he would, if he were left to himself, I also see how all this family +must hate and loathe the connection.”</p> +<p>“May I ask, has Frank ever spoken?”</p> +<p>“Oh no! I think he implied it all to Camilla when she +bade him wait till our return, fancying, I suppose, that one could forget +the other.”</p> +<p>“But why does she seem so friendly with him?”</p> +<p>“It is her way; she can’t be other than smooth and caressing, +and likes to have young men about; and I try to be grave and distant, +because—the sooner he is cured of me the better for him,” +she uttered, with a sob; “but when he is there, and I see those +grieved eyes of his, I can’t keep it up! And papa does like +him! Oh! if Camilla would but leave us alone! See here, +Jenny!” and she showed, on her watch-chain, a bit of ruddy polished +pebble. “Is it wrong to keep this? He and I found +the stone in two halves, on the beach, the last day we were together, +and had them set, pretending to one another it was only play. +Sometimes I think I ought to send mine back; I know he has his, he let +me see it one day. Do you think I ought to give it up?”</p> +<p>“Why should you?”</p> +<p>“Because then he would know that it must be all over.”</p> +<p>“But <i>is</i> it all over? Within, I mean?”</p> +<p>“Jenny, you know better!”</p> +<p>“Then, Lenore, if so, and it is only your sister who objects, +not your father himself, ought you to torment poor Frank by acting indifference +when you do not feel it?”</p> +<p>“Am I untrue? I never thought of that. I thought +I should be sacrificing myself for his good!”</p> +<p>“His good? O, Lenore, I believe it is the worst wrong +a woman can do a man, to let him think he has wasted his heart upon +her, and that she is trifling with him. You don’t know what +a bad effect this is having, even on his prospects. He cannot +get his brain or spirits free to work for his examination.”</p> +<p>“How hard it is to know what is right! Here have I been +thinking that what made me so miserable must be the best for him, and +would it not make it all the worse to relax, and let him see?”</p> +<p>“I do not think so,” returned Jenny. “His +spirits would not be worn by doubt of <i>you</i>—the worst doubt +of all: and he would feel that he had something to strive for.”</p> +<p>Eleonora walked on for some steps in silence, then exclaimed, “Yes, +but there’s his family. It would only stir up trouble for +them there. They can’t approve of me.”</p> +<p>“They don’t know you. When they do, they will. +Now they only see what looks like—forgive me, Lena—caprice +and coquetry; they will know you in earnest, if you will let them.”</p> +<p>“You don’t mean that they know anything about it!” +exclaimed Eleonora.</p> +<p>Jenny almost laughed. “Not know where poor Frank’s +heart is? You don’t guess how those sons live with their +mother!”</p> +<p>“I suppose I have forgotten what sincerity and openness are,” +said Eleonora, sadly. “But is not she very much vexed?”</p> +<p>“She was vexed to find it had gone so deep with him,” +said Jenny; “but I know that you can earn her affection and trust +by being staunch and true yourself—and it is worth having, Lena!”</p> +<p>For Jenny knew Eleonora of old, through Emily’s letters, and +had no doubt of her rectitude, constancy, and deep principle, though +she was at the present time petrified by constant antagonism to such +untruthfulness as, where it cannot corrupt, almost always hardens those +who come in contact with it. And this cruel idea of self-sacrifice +was, no doubt, completing the indurating process.</p> +<p>Jenny knew the terrible responsibility of giving such advice. +She had not done it lightly. She had been feeling for years past +that “’Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to +have loved at all;” and she knew that uncertainty of the right +to love and trust would have been a pang beyond all she had suffered. +To give poor Eleonora, situated as she now was, admission to the free +wholesome atmosphere of the Charnock family, was to her kind heart irresistible; +and it was pleasant to feel the poor girl clinging to her, as people +do to those who have given the very counsel the heart craved for.</p> +<p>It was twilight when the walk was over, and the drawing-room was +empty; but Anne came to invite them to Mrs. Poynsett’s tea, saying +that Cecil had Lady Tyrrell in her own sitting-room. Perhaps Mrs. +Poynsett had not realized who was Jenny’s companion, for she seemed +startled at their entrance; and Jenny said, “You remember Lenore +Vivian?”</p> +<p>“I must have seen you as a child,” said Mrs. Poynsett, +courteously. “You are very like your sister.”</p> +<p>This, though usually a great compliment, disappointed Eleonora, as +she answered, rather frigidly, “So people say.”</p> +<p>“Have you walked far?”</p> +<p>“To the Outwood Lodge.”</p> +<p>“To-day? Was it not very damp in the woods?”</p> +<p>“Oh no, delightful!”</p> +<p>“Lena and I are old friends,” said Jenny; “too +glad to meet to heed the damp.”</p> +<p>Here Raymond entered, with the air of a man who had just locked up +a heavy post-bag at the last possible moment; and he too was amazed, +though he covered it by asking why the party was so small.</p> +<p>“Rosamond has gone to meet her husband, and Cecil has her guest +in her own domains.”</p> +<p>Then Jenny asked after his day’s work—a county matter, +interesting to all the magistracy, and their womankind in their degree; +and Eleonora listened in silence, watching with quiet heedfulness Frank’s +mother and brother.</p> +<p>When Frank himself came in, his face was a perfect study; and the +colour mantled in her cheeks, so that Jenny trusted that both were touched +by the wonderful beauty that a little softness and timidity brought +out on the features, usually so resolutely on guard. But when, +in the later evening, Jenny crept in to her old friend, hoping to find +that the impression had been favourable, she only heard, “Exactly +like her sister, who always had the making of a fine countenance.”</p> +<p>“The mask—yes, but Lena has the spirit behind the mask. +Poor girl! she is not at all happy in the atmosphere her sister has +brought home.”</p> +<p>“Then I wish they would marry her!”</p> +<p>“Won’t you believe how truly nice and good she is?”</p> +<p>“That will not make up for the connection. My heart sank, +Jenny, from the time I heard that those Vivians were coming back. +I kept Frank away as long as I could—but there’s no help +for it. It seems the fate of my boys to be the prey of those sirens.”</p> +<p>“Well, then, dear Mrs. Poynsett, do pray believe, on my word, +that Eleonora is a different creature!”</p> +<p>“Is there no hope of averting it? I thought Camilla would—poor +Frank is such insignificant game!”</p> +<p>“And when it does come, don’t be set against her, please, +dear Mrs. Poynsett. Be as kind to her—as you were to me,” +whispered Jenny, nestling up, and hiding her face.</p> +<p>“My dear, but I knew you! You were no such case.”</p> +<p>“Except that you all were horribly vexed with us, because we +couldn’t help liking each other,” said Jenny.</p> +<p>“Ah! my poor child! I only wish you could have liked +any one else!”</p> +<p>“Do you?” said Jenny, looking up. “Oh no, +you don’t! You would not have me for your supplementary +child, if I had,” she added playfully; then very low—“It +is because the thought of dear Archie, even ending as it did, is my +very heart’s joy, that I want you to let them have theirs!”</p> +<p>And then came a break, which ended the pleading; and Jenny was obliged +to leave Compton without much notion as to the effect of her advice, +audacious as she knew it to have been.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIV<br /> +Neither Land Nor Water</h2> +<blockquote><p>A light that never was on sea or land.—WORDSWORTH</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Nothing could be prettier than Rosamond’s happiness in welcoming +her school-boy brothers, and her gratitude to Mrs. Poynsett for inviting +them, declaring that she liked boys. Her sons, however, dreaded +the inroad of two wild Irish lads, and held council what covers and +what horses could most safely be victimized to them, disregarding all +testimony in their favour from interested parties. When, therefore, +Terence and Thomas de Lancey made their appearance, and were walked +in for exhibition by their proud and happy sister, there was some surprise +at the sight of two peculiarly refined, quiet boys, with colourless +complexions, soft, sleepy, long-lashed, liquid brown eyes, the lowest +of full voices, and the gentlest of manners, as if nothing short of +an explosion could rouse them.</p> +<p>And it was presently manifest that their sister had said rather too +little than too much of Terry’s abilities. Not only had +he brought home a huge pile of prizes, but no sooner was the <i>séance</i> +after dinner broken up, than he detained Julius, saying, in a very meek +and modest tone, “Rose says you know all the books in the library.”</p> +<p>“Rose undertakes a great deal for me. What is this the +prelude to?”</p> +<p>“I wanted to ask if I might just look at any book about the +physical geography of Italy, or the History of Venice, or the Phœnicians.”</p> +<p>“Why, Terry?”</p> +<p>“It is for the Prize Essay,” explained the boy; “the +subject is the effect of the physical configuration of a country upon +the character of a nation.”</p> +<p>Julius drew a long breath, astounded at the march of intellect since +his time. “They don’t expect such things of fellows +like you!” he said.</p> +<p>“Only of the sixth, but the fifth may go in for it, and I want +to get up to the Doctor himself; I thought, as I was coming to such +a jolly library, I might try; and if I do pretty well, I shall be put +up, if any more fellows leave. Do you think I may use the books? +I’m librarian, so I know how to take care of them.”</p> +<p>“You can be trusted for that, you book-worm,” said Julius; +“here’s the library, but I fear I don’t know much +about those modern histories. My mother is a great reader, and +will direct us. Let us come to her.”</p> +<p>Quiet as Terry was, he was neither awkward nor shy; and when Julius +had explained his wishes, and Mrs. Poynsett had asked a few good-natured +questions, she was charmed as well as surprised at the gentle yet eager +modesty with which the low-pitched tones detailed the ideas already +garnered up, and inquired for authorities, in which to trace them out, +without the least notion of the remarkable powers he was evincing. +She was delighted with the boy; Julius guided his researches; and he +went off to bed as happy as a king, with his hands full of little dark +tarnished French duodecimos, and with a ravenous appetite for the pasture +ground he saw before him. Lower Canada had taught him French, +and the stores he found were revelry to him.</p> +<p>Cecil’s feelings may be better guessed than described when +the return of Mudie’s box was hastened that he might have Motley’s +<i>Dutch Republic</i>. She thought this studiousness mere affectation; +but it was indisputable that Terry’s soul was in books, and that +he never was so happy as when turned loose into the library, dipping +here and there, or with an elbow planted on either side of a folio.</p> +<p>Offers of gun or horse merely tormented him, and only his sister +could drag him out by specious pleas of need, to help in those Christmas +works, where she had much better assistance in Anne and the curates—the +one for clubs and coals, the other for decorations.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett was Terry’s best friend. He used to come +to her in the evening and discuss what he had been reading till she +was almost as keen about his success as Frank’s. He talked +over his ambition, of getting a scholarship, becoming a fellow, and +living for ever among the books, for which the scanty supply in his +wandering boyhood had but whetted his fervour. He even confided +to her what no one else knew but his sister Aileen, his epic in twenty-four +books on Brian Boromhe and the Battle of Clontarf; and she was mother +enough not to predict its inevitable fate, nor audibly to detect the +unconscious plagiarisms, but to be a better listener than even Aileen, +who never could be withheld from unfeeling laughter at the touching +fate of the wounded warriors who were tied to stakes that they might +die fighting.</p> +<p>Tom was a more ordinary youth, even more lazy and quiet in the house, +though out of it he amazed Frank and Charlie by his dash, fire, and +daring, and witched all the stable-world with noble horsemanship. +Hunting was prevented, however, by a frost, which filled every one with +excitement as to the practicability of skating.</p> +<p>The most available water was a lake between Sirenwood and Compton; +and here, like eagles to the slaughter, gathered, by a sort of instinct, +the entire skating population of the neighbourhood on the first day +that the ice was hard enough. Rosamond was there, of course, with +both her brothers, whom she averred, by a bold figure of speech, to +have skated in Canada before they could walk. Anne was there, +studying the new phenomena of ice and snow under good-natured Charlie’s +protection, learning the art with unexpected courage and dexterity. +Cecil was there but not shining so much, for her father had been always +so nervous about his darling venturing on the ice, that she had no skill +in the art; and as Raymond had been summoned to some political meeting, +she had no special squire, as her young brother-in-law eluded the being +enlisted in her service; and she began to decide that skating was irrational +and unwomanly; although Lady Tyrrell had just arrived, and was having +her skates put on; and Eleonora was only holding back because she was +taking care of the two purple-legged, purple-faced, and purple-haired +little Duncombes, whom she kept sliding in a corner, where they could +hardly damage themselves or the ice.</p> +<p>Cecil had just thanked Colonel Ross for pushing her in a chair, and +on his leaving her was deliberating whether to walk home with her dignity, +or watch for some other cavalier, when the drag drew up on the road +close by, and from it came Captain and Mrs. Duncombe, with two strangers, +who were introduced to her as ‘Mrs. Tallboys and the Professor, +just fetched from the station.’</p> +<p>The former was exquisitely dressed in blue velvet and sealskin, and +had the transparent complexion and delicate features of an American, +with brilliant eyes, and a look of much cleverness; her husband, small, +sallow, and dark, and apparently out of health. “Are you +leaving off skating, Cecil?” asked Mrs. Duncombe; “goodness +me, I could go on into next year! But if you are wasting your +privileges, bestow them on Mrs. Tallboys, for pity’s sake. +We came in hopes some good creature had a spare pair of skates. +Gussie Moy offered, but hers were yards too long.”</p> +<p>“I hope mine are not too small,” said Cecil, not quite +crediting that an American foot could be as small as that of a Charnock; +but she found herself mistaken, they were a perfect fit; and as they +were tried, there came a loud laugh, and she saw a tall girl standing +by her, whom, in her round felt hat and thick rough coat with metal +buttons, she had really taken for one of the Captain’s male friends.</p> +<p>“I wouldn’t have such small feet,” she said; “I +shouldn’t feel secure of my understanding.”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Tallboys would not change with you, Gussie,” said +Captain Duncombe. “I’d back her any day—”</p> +<p>“What odds will you take, Captain—”</p> +<p>But Mrs. Duncombe broke in. “Bless me, if there aren’t +those little dogs of mine! Lena Vivian does spoil them. +Send them home, for pity’s sake, Bob.”</p> +<p>“Poor little kids, they are doing no harm.”</p> +<p>“We shall have them tumbling in, and no end of a row! +I can’t stand a swarm of children after me, and they are making +a perfect victim of Lena. Send them home, Bob, or I shall have +to do it.”</p> +<p>The Captain obeyed somewhat ruefully. “Come, my lads, +Bessie says you must go home, and leave Miss Vivian in peace.”</p> +<p>“O, Bob, please let us stay; Lena is taking care of us—”</p> +<p>“Indeed I like nothing so well,” protested Lenore; but +the Captain murmured something about higher powers, and cheerfully saying +he would give the boys a run, took each by an unwilling hand, and raced +them into a state of frightened jollity by a short cut, by which he +was able to dispose of them in the drag.</p> +<p>The Professor, meanwhile, devoted himself to Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, +took her chair for a whirl on the ice; described American sleighing +parties; talked of his tour in Europe. He was really a clever, +observant man, and Cecil had not had any one to talk Italy to her for +a long time past, and responded with all her full precision. The +Professor might speak a little through his nose, but she had seldom +met any one more polite and accomplished.</p> +<p>Meantime, a quadrille was being got up. Such a performance +and such partners had never been seen in light that shone on water or +on land, being coupled by their dexterity in the art. They were +led off by Mrs. Duncombe and the Reverend James Bindon. Mrs. Tallboys +paired with Terry De Lancey, Lady Tyrrell with Herbert Bowater, Lady +Rosamond with one of the officers. Tom was pounced on by the great +‘Gussy Moy,’ who declared, to his bitter wrath, that she +preferred little boys, turning her back on Mr. Strangeways and two or +three more officers, as she saw them first solicitous to engage Eleonora +Vivian—who, however, was to skate with Charlie.</p> +<p>A few wistful glances were cast towards the Wil’sbro’ +road, for Frank had been obliged by the cruel exigencies of the office +to devote this magnificent frosty day to the last agonies of cram. +This, however, had gone on better for the last fortnight—owing, +perhaps, to some relaxation of Eleonora’s stern guard over her +countenance in their few meetings since Jenny’s departure.</p> +<p>“And after all,” as Charlie said, with the cheeriness +of one who has passed his own ordeal, “a man who had taken such +a degree as Frank could not depend on a few weeks of mere cramming.”</p> +<p>Frank did come speedily up the road just as the quadrille was in +full force; and perhaps the hindrance had stood him in good stead; for +when the performance ceased in the twilight, and voices were eagerly +talking of renewing it as a <i>fackel-tanz</i> in the later evening, +and only yielding at the recollection of dinner engagements, it was +not Charlie who was taking off Eleonora’s skates; and when, after +fixing grand plans for the morrow, Lady Tyrrell mounted her pony-carriage +and looked for her sister, she heard that Miss Vivian was walking home.</p> +<p>Yes, Miss Vivian was walking home; and there was a companion by her +side feeling as if that dark, hard gravelled road were the pebbly beach +of Rockpier.</p> +<p>“When do you go to London?” she asked.</p> +<p>“To-morrow afternoon. Wish me well through, Lenore.”</p> +<p>“Indeed I do.”</p> +<p>“Say it again, Lenore! Give me the elixir that will give +me power to conquer everything.”</p> +<p>“Don’t say such exaggerated things.”</p> +<p>“Do you think it is possible to me to exaggerate what a word +from you is to me?” said Frank, in a low voice of intense feeling.</p> +<p>“O Frank! it is wiser not to say such things.”</p> +<p>“Wise! what is that to me? It is true, and you have known +it—and why will you not allow that you do, as in those happy old +days—”</p> +<p>“That’s what makes me fear. It would be so much +better for you if all this had never begun.”</p> +<p>“It has begun, then!” murmured Frank, with joy and triumph +in the sound. “As long as you allow that, it is enough for +me.”</p> +<p>“I must! It is true; and truth must be somewhere!” +was whispered in a strange, low, resolute whisper.</p> +<p>“True! true that you can feel one particle of the intensity—Oh! +what words can I find to make you understand the glow and tenderness +the very thought of you has been!”</p> +<p>“Hush, hush!—pray, Frank. Now, if I do own it—”</p> +<p>“It—what? Let me hear! I’m very stupid, +you know!” said Frank, in a voice of exulting comprehension, belying +his alleged stupidity.</p> +<p>“What you have been to me—”</p> +<p>“Have been—eh?” said this cruel cross-examiner.</p> +<p>“Do not let us waste time,” said Eleonora, in a trembling +voice; “you know very well.”</p> +<p>“Do I?”</p> +<p>“Now, Frank!”</p> +<p>“If you only knew what it would be worth to me to hear you +say it!”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid it would be only worth pain and grief to +you, and anger from every one,” said she, in a low dejected voice, +“far more than I am worth.”</p> +<p>“You? Trust me to judge of that, Lenore. Would +not you be worth all, and more than all, that flesh or spirit could +feel! I could face it all for one look from you!” said Frank, +with fervour from his heart of hearts.</p> +<p>“You make me more and more afraid. It is all too wretched +to lead any one into. Since I knew the whole truth, I have tried +to spare you from it.”</p> +<p>“That is why you have been so cold, and held so cruelly aloof +all this time, so that if I had not caught one ray now and then, you +would have broken my heart, Lenore; as it is, I’ve been wretched +beyond description, hardly able to sleep by night or speak rationally +by day. How had you the heart to serve me so, like a stony Greek +statue?”</p> +<p>“I thought it must be right. It seemed to break my own +heart too.”</p> +<p>“That’s the woman’s way of showing a thing is right; +but why I can’t see. If you did hate me, it might be all +very well to throw me over; but if not, why torture two as well as one? +Are you afraid of my people? I’ll manage them.”</p> +<p>“You little know—”</p> +<p>“Know what?”</p> +<p>“All that made it cruel in Camilla to throw us together.”</p> +<p>“Cruel! when it was the crowning joy of my past life, and is +to be the crowning joy of the future?”</p> +<p>“How can it? Frank, you must know the causes your mother +has for abhorring any connection with our unhappy family.”</p> +<p>“My mother has too much sense to think a little extravagance +among the men of a family can affect the daughters. I know the +outer world is afraid of her, but she is the tenderest and most indulgent +of mothers to us. No fear of her!”</p> +<p>“Ah! but that’s not all.”</p> +<p>“You mean that she has not taken much to your sister. +I know; and I’m very sorry; but bring them together, and it would +soon be got over. Besides, it is not your sister, but you. +What do you mean?” rather disconcerted.</p> +<p>“Then you really did not know of the old engagement between +Camilla and your eldest brother?”</p> +<p>“Oh, oh! So she consented once! Then she will do +so again.”</p> +<p>“Listen! Camilla broke it off because your mother could +not resign her position to her.”</p> +<p>He gave a whistle of dismay, then recovering himself with a laugh, +said, “Fourth sons don’t have such expectations founded +on them. Don’t fear, dearest; that can’t be all the +story, though no doubt it was part of it. My mother would rather +go into a hermitage than stand in the way of Raymond’s happiness. +Some one must have made mischief.”</p> +<p>“It was not all,” said the girl; “it was Lord Tyrrell’s +coming in the way. Yes, my father told me so; he held it up to +me as an example of what one ought to do for one’s family.”</p> +<p>“Then she was coerced?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know; but such a marriage for me, with some +one who would redeem the property, is their scheme for me. Even +if your mother and brother could tolerate the thought of one of us, +my poor dear father will never dare to consent as long as she is with +him.”</p> +<p>“Nay, Lenore; have I not often heard her say she prefers happiness +to ambition? Whatever she may have done, she has come to think +differently. She has well-nigh told me so.”</p> +<p>“Yes, at Rockpier,” sighed Eleonora. “Hark!” +The sound of the ponies’ bells and hoofs was heard; Lenore put +her hand on his arm, and drew him aside on the grass, behind a clump +of trees, hushing him by a silent pressure as he tried to remonstrate. +He clasped her hand, and felt her trembling till the tinkling and tramp +were gone by.</p> +<p>“You frightened darling!” were his first words, when +she let him speak. “Who would have thought you would be +so shy? But we’ll have it out, and—”</p> +<p>“It is not that,” interrupted Lenore, “not maidenly +shyness. That’s for girls who are happy and secure. +No; but I don’t want to have it all overthrown at once—the +first sweetness—”</p> +<p>“It can’t be overthrown!” he said, holding arm +and hand in the intense grasp.</p> +<p>“Not really, never; but there is no use in attempting anything +till I am of age—next autumn, the 7th of November.”</p> +<p>“Say nothing till then!” exclaimed Frank, in some consternation.</p> +<p>“We are only where we were before! We are sure of each +other now. It will be only vexation and harass,” said she, +with the instinct of a persecuted creature.</p> +<p>“I couldn’t,” said Frank. “I could +not keep it in with mother! It would not be right if I could, +nor should I feel as if I were acting fairly by your father.”</p> +<p>“You are right, Frank. Forgive me! You don’t +know what it is to have to be always saving one’s truth only by +silence. Speak when you think right.”</p> +<p>“And I believe we shall find it far easier than you think. +I’m not quite a beggar—except for you, my Lena. I +should like to go home this minute, and tell mother and Charlie and +Rose, that I’m—I’m treading on air; but I should only +be fallen upon for thinking of anything but my task-work. So I’ll +take a leaf out of your book, you cautious Lenore, and wait till I come +down victorious, happy and glorious—and I shall now. I feel +as if you had given me power to scale Olympus, now I know I may carry +your heart with me. Do you remember this, Lena?” He +guided her hand to the smooth pebble on his chain. She responded +by putting her own into his.</p> +<p>“My talisman!” he said. “It has been my talisman +of success many a time. I have laid my hand on it, and thought +I was working for you. Mine! mine! mine! Waters cannot quench +love—never fear.”</p> +<p>“Hush!” as the light of the opening hall door was seen, +and Lady Tyrrell’s voice was heard, saying, “I thought we +passed her; I am sure she was near.”</p> +<p>Eleonora withdrew her arm, patted Frank back, waved him into silence, +and went forward, saying, “Here I am, Camilla; I walked home.”</p> +<p>Her voice was calm and self-contained as ever—the unassailable +dignity just as usual. The hall was full of officers, standing +about the fire and drinking tea, and Eleonora’s well-worn armour +was instantly on, as her sister asked where she had been, since others +had walked home and had not overtaken her.</p> +<p>“I came by the lower road,” said she.</p> +<p>“Indeed! I never saw you.”</p> +<p>“I saw you pass—or rather heard you.”</p> +<p>“And did not let me pick you up! Did you hide yourself?”</p> +<p>“It was much warmer to walk.”</p> +<p>“So you seem to have found it, to judge by your cheeks,” +said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>And Mr. Strangeways and one or two others could not restrain a murmured +exclamation on the exceeding loveliness of that deepened colour and +brightened eye; but Lenore only knew that an equally bright and keen +eye was watching her heedfully, and knew that she was suspected, if +not read through and through.</p> +<p>She mingled in the discussion of the skating, with those outward +society-senses that she learnt to put on, and escaped as soon as possible +to her own room.</p> +<p>Again she almost fell on the ground in her own little oratory chamber, +in a tumult of gladness that was almost agony, and fear that was almost +joy.</p> +<p>She wanted to give thanks that Frank had become so wholly and avowedly +hers, and for that deep intense affection that had gone on, unfed, uncherished, +for years; but the overflow of delight was checked with foreboding—there +was the instinctive terror of a basilisk eye gazing into her paradise +of joy—the thanksgiving ran into a half-despairing deprecation.</p> +<p>And she knew that Frank was under Camilla’s spell, and admired +and trusted her still; nor had she been able to utter a word of caution +to undeceive him. Should she have the power on the morrow? +Camilla really loved skating, and surrounded as she was sure to be, +there was hope of escaping her vigilant eye once more. To-morrow +there would be another meeting with Frank! perhaps another walk with +him!</p> +<p>That anticipation was soothing enough to bring back the power of +joyful gratitude, and therewith of hopeful prayer.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XV<br /> +Plot and Counterplot</h2> +<blockquote><p>A lady a party of pleasure made,<br /> + And she planned her scheme full well,<br /> +And day and night the party filled<br /> + The head of the demoiselle.—FABER</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Though Frank had no reason to expect that the tidings of his success +would be hailed with much satisfaction at home, yet his habit of turning +to his mother for sympathy would have been too much for his prudence, +but for the fact that Terry De Lancey had dragged into her room a massive +volume of prints from the Uffizi Gallery, and was looking it over with +her, with a zest she had not seen since the days when her father gloried +in his collection.</p> +<p>His victory could only be confided to Charlie, who might laugh, but +fully appreciated the repose of mind with which he could now encounter +the examiners, and promised to do his part to cover the meetings of +the lovers the next day. But even then the chances of another +performance on the lake, or of a walk among the icicles afterwards, +were departing. Thaw was setting in and by breakfast-time there +was a down-pouring rain. Frank lingered about Cecil in hopes of +a message to serve as an excuse for a rush to Sirenwood; but she proved +to be going to drive to the working-room, and then to lunch at Mrs. +Duncombe’s, to meet the Americans and the ladies from Sirenwood, +according to a note sent over in early morning at first sight of the +wet.</p> +<p>Thereupon Frank found he had a last reference to make to his tutor, +and begged for a lift. A touch of warmth in Cecil would have opened +the flood-gates of his confidence, but she was exercised about a mistake +in the accounts, and claimed his aid in tracking a defective seven-pence. +When she heard him utter the monstrous statement that a hundred and +five farthings were almost nine shillings, she looked at him with withering +compassion, as sure to fail, and a small loss to Her Majesty; nor would +she listen to any of his hints that he was very curious to see her working-room.</p> +<p>His question to the tutor judiciously lasted till twelve, when he +dropped in to consult Captain Duncombe about horse-hire in London; and +that gentleman, who had been undergoing a course of political economy +all the morning, eagerly pounced on him for a tour of his stables, which +lasted till luncheon was due, and he could casually enter the dining-room, +where Lady Tyrrell held out her hand good-naturedly to him, laughing +at the blankness he could not entirely conceal. “Only me!” +she said. “It can’t be helped! Poor Lenore caught +such a dreadful sore throat last night, that I have shut her up in her +room with a mustard poultice.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! I am very sorry.”</p> +<p>“You may well look horrified! You were the guilty party, +I suspect. Taking her all across the park under those dank trees!”</p> +<p>He coloured up to the eyes, little expecting to be thus convicted; +but Mrs. Duncombe came to his aid. “My impartiality would +impute the damage to her standing about with those wretched little dogs +of mine.”</p> +<p>“It is your climate,” said Mrs. Tallboys. “In +our dry atmosphere there would be no risk with a far lower temperature.”</p> +<p>“I hope it is nothing serious,” said Frank, anxiously.</p> +<p>“I hope so too,” said Lady Tyrrell, looking archly into +his face, which had not learnt such impenetrability as poor Lenore’s.</p> +<p>“No; but really?” he said, in anxiety that would not +be rallied away.</p> +<p>“This is the way,” said Lady Tyrrell. “Young +gentlemen persuade young ladies to do the most imprudent things—saunter +about in the cold after skating, and dawdle under trees, and then wonder +when they catch cold.—Do they do such things in your country, +Mrs. Tallboys, and expect the mammas and elder sisters to be gratified?”</p> +<p>“Mammas and elder sisters are at a discount with you, are not +they?” said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“Our young women are sufficient to protect themselves without +our showing tacit distrust, and encumbering them with guardianship,” +returned the Professor.</p> +<p>“Mr. Charnock wishes we had reached that point,” said +Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>She had put him completely out of countenance. He had not supposed +her aware of his having been Lenore’s companion, and was not certain +whether her sister had not after all confided in her, or if he himself +had not been an unconscious victim. The public banter jarred upon +him; and while Cecil was making inquiries into the extent of the young +ladies’ privileges in America, he was mentally calculating the +possibilities of rushing up to Sirenwood, trying to see Lenore in spite +of her throat, and ascertaining her position, before his train was due; +but he was forced to resign the notion, for Raymond had made an appointment +for him in London which must not be missed; and before luncheon was +over the dog-cart, according to agreement with Charlie, called for him.</p> +<p>“Good-bye, Mr. Frank,” said Mrs. Duncombe; “will +you have an old shoe thrown after you for luck?”</p> +<p>“The time is not come for that yet,” said Cecil, gravely.</p> +<p>“Tending in that direction. Eh, Charnock?” said +the Captain. “Here’s to your success—now, and +in what’s to come!”</p> +<p>“Thank you, Captain,” said Frank, shaking his hand, liking +the hearty voice. “Lady Tyrrell, won’t you give me +your good wishes?” he asked, half diffidently.</p> +<p>“For the examination—yes, certainly,” she replied. +“It is safer not to look too far into your wishing-well.”</p> +<p>“And—and will you give my—my best regards to Le—to +Miss Vivian, and say I grieve for her cold, and trust to her—to +her good wishes—” he uttered, quick and fast, holding her +hand all the time.</p> +<p>“Yes, yes,” she said quickly; “but last messages +won’t do when trains are due.”</p> +<p>“Not due yet,” said Frank; “but I must go home. +I’ve not seen my mother to-day, and I shall not have a moment.—Good-bye, +Cecil; have you any commands for Raymond?”</p> +<p>“No, thank you,” said Cecil, gravely; and with a bow +to the Americans, he was gone.</p> +<p>“That is one of your products of the highest English refinement?” +said Mrs. Tallboys, whom in his preoccupation he had scarcely noticed.</p> +<p>“How does he strike you?” said Cecil. “He +is my brother-in-law, but never mind that.”</p> +<p>“He looks fitted for the hero of a vapid English novel. +I long to force him to rough it, and to rub off that exquisite do-nothing +air. It irritates me!”</p> +<p>“Frank Charnock has done a good deal of hard work, and is not +to lead the life of an idle man,” said Captain Duncombe. +“I know I should not like to be in his shoes if he succeeds—grinding +away in an office ten months out of the twelve.”</p> +<p>“In an office! I should like to set him to work with +an axe!”</p> +<p>“Well, those dainty-looking curled darlings don’t do +badly in the backwoods,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Ah! I understand! You stand up for him because +there’s a little <i>tendresse</i> for your sister,” said +the plain-spoken American.</p> +<p>“Poor fellow! I am afraid he is far gone. It is +an impossible thing, though, and the sooner he can be cured of it the +better,” said Lady Tyrrell. “I am sorry that walk +took place yesterday.—Did he mention it at home, Cecil?”</p> +<p>“You are a very inconsistent woman, Lady Tyrrell,” broke +in Mrs. Duncombe in her abrupt way. “Here you are come to +uphold the emancipation of woman, and yet, when we come to your own +sister taking one poor walk—”</p> +<p>“I beg your pardon, Bessie,” said Lady Tyrrell, with +her most courteous manner. “I never said I was come to uphold +the emancipation of woman; only to subject myself to Mrs. Tallboys’ +influence—she has to make a convert of me.”</p> +<p>For, of course, Lady Tyrrell was only drawn into the controversy +as a matter of amusement, and possibly as something specially distasteful +to the house of Charnock Poynsett; and Cecil was a good deal influenced +by the fascination of her example, as well as by the eagerness of Mrs. +Duncombe and the charms of the Americans; and above all, they conspired +in making her feel herself important, and assuming that she must be +foremost in all that was done. She did not controvert the doctrines +of Dunstone so entirely as to embrace the doctrines of emancipation, +but she thought that free ventilation was due to every subject, most +especially when the Member’s wife was the leading lady in bringing +about such discussion. The opposition made in the town to Mrs. +Duncombe’s sanitary plans, and the contempt with which they had +been treated as ladies’ fancies, had given a positive field of +battle, with that admixture of right and wrong on either side which +is essential to championship. And in truth Cecil was so much more +under the influence of Camilla Tyrrell and Bessie Duncombe than under +that of any other person, that she was ready to espouse any cause that +they did.</p> +<p>How to arrange for the intended instruction was the difficulty, since +Wil’sbro’ was without a town-hall, and, moreover, the inhabitants +were averse to all varieties of change, either as to the claims of women, +the inequality of social laws, the improvement of education, or the +comprehension of social science—the regular course which Mrs. +Clio W. Tallboys was wont to lecture.</p> +<p>The matter could only be managed by arranging a series of <i>soirées</i> +at different houses. Mrs. Duncombe’s rooms were far too +small; but if some person of more note—‘some swell’ +as she said—would make the beginning, there would be no difficulty +in bringing others to follow suit.</p> +<p>“You must do it, Lady Tyrrell,” said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“I! If there’s nobody else; but it would come much +better from another quarter,” nodding at Cecil.</p> +<p>“Don’t you wish you may get it?” muttered the slang-loving +Bessie.</p> +<p>“That’s one point in which we leave you far behind,” +said Mrs. Tallboys. “We issue our invitations quite independently +of the other members of the household. Each has a separate visiting +list.”</p> +<p>“There need be no difficulty,” said Cecil; “all +matters of visiting are in my hands. It is necessary in our position; +and if Lady Tyrrell thinks it proper that I should give the first party, +I will do so.”</p> +<p>“Bravo, what fun!” cried Mrs. Duncombe, clapping her +hands. “You won’t get into a jolly row, though?” +she added, anxiously.</p> +<p>“I am perfectly sure of my ground,” said Cecil, with +the dignity of one to whom a ‘row’ was unheard of. +“It is the simple duty of a Member to come forward in promoting +free discussion of opinions.”</p> +<p>“You are a public-spirited woman, Cecil,” said Lady Tyrrell. +“When you have made the first move, I’ll follow. Then +whom shall we ask next?”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Moy,” said Bessie. “She is a nonentity +herself, but if Gussie were to be strongly bitten she could do more +than any one else, and make her father reform that nest of horrors in +Water Lane!”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid the freedom side will bite her more than +the sanitary side,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“She is capital fun, though, and a great ally of ours,” +said Mrs. Duncombe; “and the rooms at Proudfoot Lawn are worth +anything!”</p> +<p>Other details were fixed, even to the day of Cecil’s opening +party, which must take place on the first practicable day; but there +was none to be found till the Wednesday week, the day before Raymond +would return home. Cecil did not recollect this till the day had +been unanimously agreed on, and it was with a little alarm; but after +what she had asserted about her freedom of action, she could not retract +before the eyes of the American lady; and, as she said to herself, she +could receive her own ladies’ party, without interfering with +any one else, in the library, so that no one had a right to object. +However, she had a certain anticipation of opposition, which caused +her to act before announcing her intention; and thus it was that Rosamond +found her dropping a number of notes through the slit in the lid of +the post-box. “Another dinner?” was the question.</p> +<p>“No, this is a <i>soirée</i> in the library, entirely +for ladies; Mrs. Tallboys is to explain her views in the evenings at +the Principal houses in the neighbourhood. She will begin here +on Wednesday week.”</p> +<p>“Why, that’s before Raymond comes back!”</p> +<p>“This is entirely for women.”</p> +<p>“Women! women’s rights! How have you got Mrs. Poynsett +to consent?”</p> +<p>“I have <i>carte blanche</i> in these matters.”</p> +<p>“Do you mean that you have not consulted her? Does Raymond +know? Oh! Yes, I see I have no right to ask; but, Cecil, +for your own sake, I entreat you to consider what you are about, before +running into such a frightful scrape!” and Rosamond impulsively +caught the hand that was still putting in a letter; but Cecil stood +still, not withdrawing or moving a muscle, perfectly impassive. +Rosamond went on more eagerly, “Oh yes, I know you don’t +like me—I’m only a poor battered soldier’s daughter, +quite an unworthy associate for a Charnock of the Charnocks; but I can’t +help begging you to consider the consequences of sending out invitations +to hear this strange woman hold forth in Mrs. Poynsett’s own house, +in your husband’s absence.”</p> +<p>“Thank you for your solicitude,” said Cecil, dropping +in her envelope the instant the obstructive hand was removed, and going +on her way with dignified self-possession; while Rosamond, in a tumult +of indignation, which made her scarcely comprehensible, rushed up to +her husband at his writing, and poured out her story.</p> +<p>Clio advocating female supremacy in Mrs. Poynsett’s own house, +without notice to her! Should she be warned in time to stop the +letters? Should Raymond be written to? Rosamond was for +both, Julius for neither. He said that either way would begin +a system that could never be forgiven; and that they had better consider +themselves as practically at the Rectory, and not interfere.</p> +<p>“How can you be so cold-blooded?” cried she.</p> +<p>“I do not want to do worse harm. My mother will learn +what is to happen sooner or later; and then she can put a stop to it +in any way she chooses.”</p> +<p>“I wish she would send in Mrs. Crabtree with her tawse!” +said Rosamond. “But is it right by Raymond to let his wife +bring this Yankee muse to talk her nonsense in his very rooms?”</p> +<p>“You have argued with her?”</p> +<p>“Or with a block—a stock—a stone!” raved +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Then depend upon it, to inform against her would be far worse +than letting any amount of absurdity be talked. I should like +to know how you would get over being so served!”</p> +<p>“Don’t make comparisons, sir! Poor things! they +would not be the worse for a little of our foolishness!”</p> +<p>Things settled themselves according to Julius’s prediction; +for Mr. Bowater, coming up with his son Herbert to see his old friend, +said, “What grand doings are you having here? What is Raymond’s +wife up to? Ladies’ <i>conversazione</i>—that’s +a new thing in these parts!”</p> +<p>“I gave such matters up to her,” said Mrs. Poynsett. +“Young people like a little freedom of action; and there are changes +in the neighbourhood since I was laid up.” It was a temporizing +speech, to avoid showing her total ignorance.</p> +<p>Mr. Bowater cleared his throat. “Young folk may like +freedom of action, but it don’t always follow that it is good +for them. I hope she won’t get Raymond into a scrape, that’s +all—committing him and herself to a course of lectures by that +Yankee woman on woman’s rights.”</p> +<p>“It does not commit him; it is before he comes home, on Wednesday,” +said Herbert.</p> +<p>“Never mind that; what a woman does her husband does. +Look here, Mrs. Poynsett, I brought over Jenny’s note in my pocket; +see, here are two—one to accept, and one to refuse, just as you +choose.”</p> +<p>“Oh! accept, by all means,” cried Mrs. Poynsett; “don’t +leave the wrong one!”</p> +<p>Then she changed the conversation, so decidedly, that Mr. Bowater +could not resume his warning; but after taking leave of her, he met +Rosamond in the avenue, and could not help saying, “Pray, was +my old friend aware of Mrs. Raymond’s doings?”</p> +<p>“Have you told her? Oh! I am so glad!”</p> +<p>“Then it is as you said, Herbert. Mrs. Raymond had left +her in ignorance! The impudent baggage! That’s what +the world is coming to!”</p> +<p>“But what regular game Mrs. Poynsett was!” said Herbert. +“You could not make out in the least that she had been left in +the lurch; and I’m sure she has a plan, by the way in which she +desired Jenny and Edie to come.”</p> +<p>“Only make her understand that the Wil’sbro’ folks +are in a ticklish state,” said Mr. Bowater; “they are sulking +already, because they say the ladies have been stirring him up to put +them to expense about the drains.”</p> +<p>“Wil’sbro’ isn’t sweet,” said Herbert.</p> +<p>“There’s been nothing amiss in my time,” returned +his father. “Perfectly healthy in all reason! Ay! +you may laugh, young folks, but I never heard of any receipt to hinder +people from dying; and let well alone is a safe maxim.”</p> +<p>“If it be well,” said Rosamond. “However, +Raymond says whatever is done must be by general consent, and that small +private attempts do more harm than good.”</p> +<p>“He had better take care what he says. If they fancy +he is in league with that ridiculous Duncombe woman against their pockets, +Moy is on the watch to take advantage of it; and all the old family +interest will not save his seat.”</p> +<p>When Rosamond reached home she found Anne beside her mother-in-law, +provided with a quire of note-paper and pile of envelopes. “My +dear, I want your help,” she said. “Till my accident +I always had a children’s party at Christmas; and now I have so +many young people to manage it for me, I think we might try again, and +combine it with Cecil’s ladies’ party, on Wednesday.”</p> +<p>“Hurrah!” cried Rosamond. “You mean that +we should have plenty of fun—and, in fact, drum out the rights +of woman.”</p> +<p>“At any rate, present a counter attraction. You and Charlie +and your brothers, with the Bowaters, might do something?”</p> +<p>“Trust me!” cried Rosamond. “Oh! I am so +thankful to Mr. Bowater. Julius and I had our blood boiling; and +I said as much or more to Cecil than woman could, but she minded me +no more than the old white cockatoo; and Julius said our telling would +only make more mischief.”</p> +<p>“He was quite right,” said his mother. “Let +there not be one word of opposition, you know; only swamp it. +You could get up some charades, and have something going on all the +evening.”</p> +<p>“Trust me for that! Oh! if my darling Aileen were but +here! But Tom is the very model of an actor, and Terry is grand, +if only we can keep him out of the high tragedy line. King Lear +is the mildest thing he condescends to!”</p> +<p>“Could you manage a Christmas-tree? The taking up a room +beforehand is inconvenient; but I should like to offer some little substantial +bait, even to the grown-up;” and her eyes twinkled merrily.</p> +<p>“I know a better thing,” said Rosamond; “an enchanted +grove with a beneficent witch. We did it at St. Awdry’s, +with bon-bons and trumpery, in a little conservatory, hardly large enough +to turn round in. If I may have the key of the conservatory, I’ll +manage.”</p> +<p>“You shall have what you please; and perhaps you would kindly +go and choose the things at Backsworth. There is a very good fancy +shop there.”</p> +<p>“Thank you, thank you! How sweet!—Now, Anne, you +will see what you shall see!”</p> +<p>“Is there to be dancing?” asked Anne, humbly yet resolutely.</p> +<p>“There shall not be, my dear, if it will spoil the evening +for you,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“I promised,” said Anne.</p> +<p>At that moment the servants came in with the preparations for the +afternoon tea, closely followed by the ever punctual Cecil.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett asked her whether she would require the barouche on +the morrow, since Rosamond and Anne would want it to go to Backsworth, +to obtain requisites for a children’s entertainment to take place +on Wednesday.</p> +<p>“Some friends of mine are coming on Wednesday,” said +Cecil</p> +<p>“Indeed! In Raymond’s absence?”</p> +<p>“This is not a dinner, but a ladies’ party.”</p> +<p>“Then it will combine the better.”</p> +<p>“Certainly not,” replied Cecil. “Mine is +simply intellectual—only a few intelligent women to meet Mrs. +Tallboys in the library. It will be quite apart from any amusements +Rosamond may like to have for the children in the drawing-room.”</p> +<p>“Pray, will they require nothing but this feast of reason and +flow of soul?—for the housekeeper will need warning.”</p> +<p>“They will have dined. Nothing but coffee will be wanted.”</p> +<p>“For how many?”</p> +<p>“About twelve or fourteen, thank you. Excuse me—I +have something to finish in my own room.”</p> +<p>They were very glad to excuse her, and the following note was concocted +to serve both for those she might have invited and those she might not; +and it was copied by the two daughters for all the acquaintance who +had young folks in their houses. An appearance of want of unanimity +was carefully avoided, and it stood thus:—</p> +<p>“I am desired by Mrs. Poynsett to say that the ladies’ +party already proposed for the 3rd is to undergo a little expansion, +and that she much hopes to see you and ---, at 7 p.m., disposed for +a few Christmas amusements.”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XVI<br /> +The Drive To Backsworth</h2> +<blockquote><p>She was betrothed to one now dead,<br /> +Or worse, who had dishonoured fled.—SCOTT</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The party set out for Backsworth early in the day. It included +Julius, who had asked for a seat in the carriage in order to be able +to go on to Rood House, where lived Dr. Easterby, whom he had not seen +since he had been at Compton.</p> +<p>“The great light of the English Church,” said Rosamond, +gaily; while Anne shuddered a little, for Miss Slater had told her that +he was the great fountain-head of all that distressed her in Julius +and his curates. But Julius merely said, “I am very glad +of the opportunity;” and the subject dropped in the eager discussion +of the intended pastimes, which lasted beyond the well-known Wil’sbro’ +bounds, when again Julius startled a Anne by observing, “No dancing? +That is a pity.”</p> +<p>“There, Anne!” exclaimed Rosamond.</p> +<p>“It was out of kindness to me,” said Anne: and then, +with a wonderful advance of confidence, she added, “Please tell +me how you, a minister, can regret it?”</p> +<p>“Because I think it would be easier to prevent mischief than +when there has to be a continual invention of something original. +There is more danger of offence and uncharitableness, to speak plainly.”</p> +<p>“And you think that worse than dancing?” said Anne, thoughtfully.</p> +<p>“Why is dancing bad at all, Anne?” asked Rosamond.</p> +<p>Anne answered at once, “It is worldly.”</p> +<p>“Not half so worldly as driving in a carriage with fine horses, +and liveries, and arms, and servants, and all,” said Rosamond +from her comfortable corner, nestling under Miles’s racoon-skin +rug; “I wonder you can do that!”</p> +<p>“The carriage is not mine,” said Anne.</p> +<p>“The worldliness would be in sacrificing a duty to the luxury +and ostentation of keeping one,” said Julius. “For +instance, if I considered it due to my lady in the corner there to come +out in this style, and put down a curate and a few such trifles with +that object. To my mind, balls stand on the same ground; they +are innocent as long as nothing right is given up for them.”</p> +<p>“You would not dance?” said Anne.</p> +<p>“Wouldn’t he?” said Rosamond. “I’ve +seen him. It was at St. Awdry’s at a Christmas party, in +our courting days. No, it wasn’t with me. Oh no! +That was the cruel cut! It was with little Miss Marks, whose father +had just risen from the ranks. Such a figure she was, enough to +set your teeth on edge; when, behold! this reverend minister extracts +her from the wall-flowers, and goes through the Lancers with her in +first-rate style, I assure you. It had such an effect, do you +know, that what does my father do but go and ask her next; and I heard +an old lady remarking that there were only two gentlemen in the room, +Mr. Charnock and Lord Rathforlane. So you see it was all worldliness +after all, Anne.”</p> +<p>“I suppose it was good-nature,” said Anne.</p> +<p>“Indignation, I fancy,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“Now, was he very wicked for it, Anne?”</p> +<p>“N—no, if dancing be not wrong.”</p> +<p>“But why should it?”</p> +<p>“All the bad people danced in the Bible.”</p> +<p>“Miriam—King David, eh?”</p> +<p>“That was part of their religious service.”</p> +<p>“The welcome to the prodigal son?” further suggested +Julius. “Does not this prove that the exercise is not sinful +in itself?”</p> +<p>“But you would not do it again?” repeated Anne.</p> +<p>“I certainly should not make a practice of it, nor go to balls +any more than I would be a sportsman or a cricketer, because I am bound +to apply my whole self to the more direct service; but this does not +show that there is evil necessarily connected with these amusements, +or that they may not safely be enjoyed by those who have time, and who +need an outlet for their spirits, or by those who wish to guard these +pleasures by presiding over them.”</p> +<p>“Don’t persuade me!” exclaimed Anne. “I +gave my word to Mr. Pilgrim that nothing should induce me to dance or +play at cards.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Pilgrim had no right—” began Rosamond; but +Julius hushed her, saying, “No one wishes to persuade you, Anne. +Your retirement during Miles’s absence is very suitable and becoming.”</p> +<p>“Till we live in the Bush, out of the way of it all,” +said Anne.</p> +<p>“I wish you could have seen one of our real old Christmas parties; +but those can never be again, without mother herself or Mrs. Douglas.”</p> +<p>“Do tell me about those Douglases,” said Rosamond. +“Cecil hinted at some romance, but seemed to think you had suppressed +the connection because he was an attorney.”</p> +<p>“Not exactly,” said Julius, smiling; “but it is +a sad story, though we have no doubt he bore the guilt of others.”</p> +<p>“Something about two thousand pounds!”</p> +<p>“Yes. It was the year that my mother and Raymond were +abroad. She had been buying some property near, and sent home +an order from Vevay. It did not come, and was inquired for; but +as it was an order, not a draft, it was not stopped at the bank; and +in about a fortnight more it was presented by a stranger, and paid without +hesitation, as it was endorsed “Proudfoot and Moy.” +Old Proudfoot was away at Harrogate, and came home to investigate; young +Proudfoot denied all knowledge of it, and so did his brother-in-law +Moy; but Raymond, working at the other end, found that the waiter at +the hotel at Vevay had forgotten to post the letter for more than a +week, and it was traced through the post to Wil’sbro’, where +the postman remembered delivering a foreign-looking letter to Archie +Douglas at the door of the office. It came alone by the afternoon +post. His account was this: They were all taking it rather easy +in old Proudfoot’s absence; and when a sudden summons came to +take the old farmer’s instructions for his will, Archie, as the +junior, was told off to do it. He left George Proudfoot and Moy +in a private room at the office, with Tom Vivian leaning over the fire +talking, as he had a habit of doing in old Proudfoot’s absence. +As he opened the office door the postman put the letter into his hand; +and recognizing the writing, he ran back, and gave it in triumph to +George Proudfoot, exclaiming that there it was at last, but he was in +danger of being late for the train, and did not wait to see it opened; +and when he came back he was told that it had been merely a letter of +inquiry, with nothing in it, and destroyed at once. That was his +account; but Proudfoot, Moy, and Vivian all denied any knowledge of +this return of his, or of the letter. The night of this inquiry +he was missing. Jenny Bowater, who was with an aunt in London, +heard that a gentleman had called to see her while she was out for a +couple of days; and a week later we saw his name among the passengers +lost in the <i>Hippolyta</i> off Falmouth.”</p> +<p>“Poor Jenny! Was she engaged to him?”</p> +<p>“On sufferance. On her death-bed Mrs. Douglas had wrung +from Mr. Bowater a promise that if Archie did well, and ever had means +enough, he would not refuse consent; but he always distrusted poor Archie, +because of his father, and I believe he sent Jenny away to be out of +his reach. If any of us had only been near, I think we could have +persuaded him to face it out, and trust to his innocence; but Raymond +was abroad, Miles at sea, I at Oxford, and nothing like a counsellor +was near. If Jenny had but seen him!”</p> +<p>“And has nothing happened to clear him?”</p> +<p>“No. Raymond hurried home, and did his best, but all +in vain. George Proudfoot was indeed known to have been in debt +to Vivian; but Moy, his brother-in-law, an older man, was viewed as +a person whose word was above all question, and they both declared the +signature at the back of the order not to be genuine. Archie’s +flight, you see, made further investigation impossible; and there was +no putting on oath, no cross-examination.”</p> +<p>“Then you think those three had it?”</p> +<p>“We can think nothing else, knowing Archie as we did. +Raymond showed his suspicions so strongly, that old Proudfoot threw +up all agencies for our property, and there has been a kind of hostility +ever since. Poor Vivian, as you know, came to his sad end the +next year, but he had destroyed all his papers; and George Proudfoot +has been dead four or five years, but without making any sign. +Moy has almost risen above the business, and—see, there’s +Proudfoot Lawn, where he lives with the old man. He claims to +compete with the county families, and would like to contest Wils’bro’ +with Raymond.”</p> +<p>“And Jenny?” asked Anne. “Did she bear it +as a Christian? I know she would.”</p> +<p>“She did indeed—most nobly, most patiently. Poor +girl! at her own home she knew she stood alone in her faith in Archie’s +innocence; but they were kind and forbearing, and kept silence, and +the knowledge of our trust in him has bound her very close to us.”</p> +<p>“Was that call, when she did not see him, all she ever heard +of him?”</p> +<p>“All! except that he left a fragment of paper with the servant, +with the one pencil scrawl, ‘A Dieu!’—a capital D +to mark the full meaning. She once showed it to me—folded +so as to fit into the back of a locket with his photograph.”</p> +<p>“Dear Jenny! And had you traced him on board this ship?”</p> +<p>“No, but his name was in the list; and we knew he had strong +fancy for South Africa, whither the <i>Hippolyta</i> was bound. +In fact he ought to have been a sailor, and only yielded to his mother’s +wishes.”</p> +<p>“We knew a Mr. Archibald Douglas once,” said Anne; “he +came and outspanned by us when he was going north after elephants. +He stayed a fortnight, because his wagon had to be mended.”</p> +<p>“O, Julius! if we could but find him for her again!” +cried Rosamond.</p> +<p>“I am afraid Archibald Douglas is not much more individual +a name than John Smith,” said Julius, sadly.</p> +<p>“That tells as much against the <i>Hippolyta</i> man,” +said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Poor Archie would not be difficult to identify,” said +Julius; “for his hair was like mine, though his eyes were blue, +and not short-sighted.”</p> +<p>“That is all right, then,” cried Anne; “for we +had a dispute whether he were young or old, and I remember mamma saying +he had a look about him as if his hair might have turned white in a +single night.”</p> +<p>“Julius! Now won’t you believe?” cried Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Had he a Scotch accent?” said Julius.</p> +<p>“No; I recollect papa’s telling him he never should have +guessed him to be a Scot by his tongue; and he said he must confess +that he had never seen Scotland.”</p> +<p>“Now, Julius!” pleaded Rosamond, with clasped hands, +as if Jenny’s fate hung on his opinion.</p> +<p>“How long ago was this?” asked he.</p> +<p>“Four years,” said Anne, with a little consideration. +“He came both in going and returning, and Alick was wild to join +him if he ever passed our way again. My father liked him so much +that he was almost ready to consent; but he never came again. +Ivory hunters go more from Natal now.”</p> +<p>“You will trace him! There’s a dear Anne!” +exclaimed Rosamond.</p> +<p>“I will write to them at home; Alick knows a good many hunters, +and could put Miles into the way of making inquiries, if he touches +at Natal on his way home.”</p> +<p>“Miles will do all he can,” said Julius; “he was +almost broken-hearted when he found how Archie had gone. I think +he was even more his hero than Raymond when we were boys, because he +was more enterprising; and my mother always thought Archie’s baffled +passion for the sea reacted upon Miles.”</p> +<p>“He will do it! He will find him, if he is the Miles +I take him for! How old was he—Archie, I mean?”</p> +<p>“A year older than Raymond; but he always seemed much younger, +he was so full of life and animation—so unguarded, poor fellow! +He used to play tricks with imitating hand-writing; and these, of course, +were brought up against him.”</p> +<p>“Thirty-four! Not a bit too old for the other end of +the romance!”</p> +<p>“Take care, Rosie. Don’t say a word to Jenny till +we know more. She must not be unsettled only to be disappointed.”</p> +<p>“Do you think she would thank you for that, you cold-blooded +animal?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know; but I think the suspense would be far +more trying than the quiet resigned calm that has settled down on her. +Besides, you must remember that even if Archie were found, the mystery +has never been cleared up.”</p> +<p>“You don’t think that would make any difference to Jenny?”</p> +<p>“It makes all the difference to her father; and Jenny will +never be a disobedient daughter.”</p> +<p>“Oh! but it will—it must be cleared! I know it +will! It is faithless to think that injustice is not always set +right!”</p> +<p>“Not always here,” said Julius, sadly. “See, +there’s the Backsworth race-ground, the great focus of the evil.”</p> +<p>“Were racing debts thought to have any part in the disaster?”</p> +<p>“That I can’t tell; but it was those races that brought +George Proudfoot under the Vivian influence; and in the absence of all +of us, poor Archie, when left to himself after his mother’s death, +had become enough mixed up in their amusements to give a handle to those +who thought him unsteady.”</p> +<p>“As if any one must be unsteady who goes to the races!” +cried Rosamond. “You were so liberal about balls, I did +expect one little good word for races; instead of which, you are declaring +a poor wretch who goes to them capable of embezzling two thousand pounds, +and I dare say Anne agrees with you!”</p> +<p>“Now, did I ever say so, Anne?”</p> +<p>“You looked at the course with pious horror, and said it justified +the suspicion!” persisted Rosamond.</p> +<p>“That’s better,” said Julius; “though I never +even said it justified the suspicion, any more than I said that balls +might not easily be overdone, especially by <i>some</i> people.”</p> +<p>“But you don’t defend races?” said Anne.</p> +<p>“No; I think the mischief they do is more extensive, and has +less mitigation than is the case with any other public amusement.”</p> +<p>“H’m!” said Rosamond. “Many a merry +day have I had on the top of the regimental drag; so perhaps there’s +nothing of which you would not suspect me.”</p> +<p>“I’ll tell you what I more than suspect you of,” +said Julius, “of wearing a gay bonnet to be a bait and a sanction +to crowds of young girls, to whom the place was one of temptation, though +not to you.”</p> +<p>“Oh, there would be no end to it if one thought of such things.”</p> +<p>“Or the young men who—”</p> +<p>“Well,” broke in Rosamond, “it was always said +that our young officers got into much less mischief than where there +was a straight-laced colonel, who didn’t go along with them to +give them a tone.”</p> +<p>“That I quite believe. I remember, too, the intense and +breathless sense of excitement in the hush and suspense of the multitude, +and the sweeping by of the animals—”</p> +<p>“Then you’ve been!” cried his wife.</p> +<p>“As a boy, yes.”</p> +<p>“Not since you were old enough to think it over?” said +Anne eagerly.</p> +<p>“No. It seemed to me that the amount of genuine interest +in the sport and the animals was infinitesimal compared with the fictitious +excitement worked up by betting.”</p> +<p>“And what’s the harm of betting when you’ve got +the money?”</p> +<p>“And when you haven’t?”</p> +<p>“That’s another question.”</p> +<p>“Do you approve it at the best?”</p> +<p>“It’s a man’s own concern.”</p> +<p>“That’s arguing against your better sense.”</p> +<p>“Can’t be helped, with two such solemn companions! +There would be no bearing you if I didn’t take you down sometimes, +when you get so didactic, and talk of fictitious excitement, indeed! +And now you are going to Rood House, what will you be coming back?”</p> +<p>Rood House stood about two miles on the further side of Backsworth. +It was an ancient almshouse, of which the mastership had been wisely +given to Dr. Easterby, one of the deepest theological scholars, holiest +men, and bravest champions of the Church, although he was too frail +in health to do much, save with his pen, and in council with the numerous +individuals who resorted to him from far and wide, and felt the beautiful +old fragment of a monastic building where he dwelt a true court of peace +and refreshment, whence they came forth, aided by prayer and counsel, +for their own share of the combat.</p> +<p>Julius Charnock had, happily for himself, found his way thither when +his character and opinions were in process of formation, and had ever +since looked to Rood House for guidance and sympathy. To be only +fourteen miles distant had seemed to him one great perfection of Compton +Poynsett; but of course he had found visits there a far more possible +thing to an unoccupied holiday son of the great house than to a busy +parish priest, so that this opportunity was very valuable to him.</p> +<p>And so it proved; not so much for the details as for the spirit in +which he was aided in looking at everything, from the mighty questions +which prove the life of the Church by the vehement emotion they occasion, +down to the difficulties of theory and practice that harassed himself—not +named, perhaps, but still greatly unravelled.</p> +<p>Those perpetual questions, that have to be worked out again and again +by each generation, were before him in dealing with his parish; and +among them stood in his case the deeper aspects of the question that +had come forward on the drive, namely, the lawfulness and expedience +of amusement.</p> +<p>Granting the necessity of pastimes and recreation for most persons, +specially the young, there opened the doubtful, because ever-varying, +question of the kind and the quantity to be promoted or sanctioned, +lest restraint should lead to reaction, and lest abstinence should change +from purity and spirituality to moroseness or hypocrisy. And if +Julius found one end of the scale represented by his wife and his junior +curate, his sister-in-law and his senior curate were at the other. +Yet the old recluse was far more inclined to toleration than he had +been in principle himself, though the spur of the occasion had led him +to relaxations towards others in the individual cases brought before +him, when he had thought opposition would do more harm than the indulgence. +His conscience had been uneasy at this divergence, till he could discuss +the subject.</p> +<p>The higher the aspiration of the soul, the less, of course, would +be the craving for diversion, the greater the shrinking from those evil +accompaniments that soon mar the most innocent delights. Some +spirits are austere in their purity, like Anne; some so fervent in zeal, +as to heed nothing by the way, like Mr. Bindon; but most are in an advanced +stage of childhood, and need play and pleasure almost as much as air +or food; and these instincts require wholesome gratification, under +such approval as may make the enjoyment bright and innocent; and yet +there should be such subduing of their excess, such training in discipline, +as shall save them from frivolity and from passing the line of evil, +prevent the craving from growing to a passion, and where it has so grown, +tone it back to the limits of obedience and safety.</p> +<p>Alas! perhaps there lay the domestic difficulty of which Julius could +not speak; yet, as if answering the thought, Dr. Easterby said, “After +all, charity is the true self-acting balance to many a sweet untaught +nature. Self-denials which spring out of love are a great safeguard, +because they are almost sure to be both humble and unconscious.”</p> +<p>And Julius went away cheered as he thought of his Rosamond’s +wells of unselfish affection, confident that all the cravings for variety +and excitement, which early habit had rendered second nature, would +be absorbed by the deeper and keener feelings within, and that these +would mount higher as time went on, under life’s great training.</p> +<p>Pleasant it was to see the triumphant delight of the two sisters +over their purchases. Such a day’s English shopping was +quite a new experience to Anne; and she had not been cautioned against +it, so her enjoyment was as fresh and vivid as a child’s; and +they both chattered all the way home with a merriment in which Julius +fully shared, almost surprised to see Anne so eager and lively, and—as +her cheeks glowed and her eyes brightened—beginning to understand +what had attracted Miles.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett had not had quite so pleasant a day, for Cecil knocked +at her door soon after luncheon with an announcement that Lady Tyrrell +wished for admission. Expecting an exposition of the Clio scheme, +she resigned herself, looking with some curiosity at the beautiful contour +of face and drooping pensive loveliness, that had rather gained than +lost in grace since the days when she had deemed them so formidable.</p> +<p>“This is kind, dear Mrs. Poynsett,” said the soft voice, +while the hand insisted on a pressure. “I have often wished +to come and see you, but I could not venture without an excuse.”</p> +<p>“Thank you,” was the cold reply.</p> +<p>“I have more than an excuse—a reason, and I think we +shall be fully agreed; but first you must let me have the pleasure of +one look to recall old times. It is such a treat to see you so +unchanged. I hope you do not still suffer.”</p> +<p>“No, thank you.”</p> +<p>“And are you always a prisoner here? Ah! I know +your patience.”</p> +<p>“What was the matter on which you wanted to speak to me?” +said Mrs. Poynsett, fretted beyond endurance by the soft, caressing +tone.</p> +<p>“As I said, I should hardly venture if I did not know we agreed—though +perhaps not for the same reasons. We do agree in our love and +high opinion of your dear Frank!”</p> +<p>“Well!” repressing a shudder at the ‘dear.’</p> +<p>“I am afraid we likewise agree that, under all circumstances, +our two young people are very unfortunately attached, and that we must +be hard-hearted, and let it go no further.”</p> +<p>“You mean your sister?”</p> +<p>“My dear Lena! I cannot wonder! I blame myself +excessively, for it was all through my own imprudence. You see, +when dear Frank came to Rockpier, it was so delightful to renew old +times, and they both seemed such children, that I candidly confess I +was off my guard; but as soon as I had any suspicion, I took care to +separate them, knowing that, in the state of my poor father’s +affairs, it would be most unjustifiable to let so mere a youth be drawn +into an attachment.”</p> +<p>“Frank is no prize,” said his mother with some irony.</p> +<p>“I knew you would say that, dear Mrs. Poynsett. Pecuniarily +speaking, of course, he is not; though as to all qualities of the heart +and head, he is a prize in the true sense of the word. But, alas! +it is a sort of necessity that poor Lena, if she marry at all, should +marry to liberal means. I tell you candidly that she has not been +brought up as she ought to have been, considering her expectations or +no expectations. What could you expect of my poor father, with +his habits, and two mere girls? I don’t know whether the +governess could have done anything; but I know that it was quite time +I appeared. I tell you in confidence, dear Mrs. Poynsett, there +was a heavy pull on my own purse before I could take them away from +Rockpier; and, without blaming a mere child like poor dear Lena you +can see what sort of preparation she has had for a small income.”</p> +<p>It is hard to say which tried Mrs. Poynsett’s patience most, +the ‘dears’ or the candour; and the spirit of opposition +probably prompted her to say, “Frank has his share, like his brothers.”</p> +<p>“I understand, and for many girls the provision would be ample; +but poor Lena has no notion of economizing—how should she? +I am afraid there is no blinking it, that, dear children as they both +are, nothing but wretchedness could result from their corning together; +and thus I have been extremely sorry to find that the affair has been +renewed.”</p> +<p>“It was not an unnatural result of their meeting again.”</p> +<p>“Ah! there I was to blame again; but no one can judge whether +an attachment be real between such children. I thought, too, that +Frank would be gone out into the world, and I confess I did not expect +to find that he had absolutely addressed her, and kept it secret. +That is what my poor father feels so much. Eleonora is his special +darling, and he says he could have overlooked anything but the concealment.”</p> +<p>Maternal affection assumed the defensive; and, though the idea of +concealment on the part of one of her sons was a shock, Mrs. Poynsett +made no betrayal of herself, merely asking, “How did it come to +light?”</p> +<p>“I extorted the confession. I think I was justified, +standing in a mother’s position, as I do. I knew my vigilance +had been eluded, and that your son had walked home with her after the +skating; and you know very well how transparent young things are.”</p> +<p>The skating! The mother at once understood that Frank was only +postponing the explanation till after his examination; and besides, +she had never been ignorant of his attachment, and could not regard +any display thereof more or less as deception towards herself. +The very fact that Lady Tyrrell was trying to prejudice her beforehand, +so as to deprive him of the grace of taking the initiative towards his +own mother, enlisted her feelings in his defence, so she coldly answered, +“I am sorry if Sir Harry Vivian thinks himself unfairly treated; +but I should have thought my son’s feelings had been as well known +in the one family as in the other.”</p> +<p>“But, <i>dear</i> Mrs. Poynsett,” exclaimed Lady Tyrrell, +“I am sure you never encouraged them. I am quite enough +aware—whatever I may once have been—of the unfortunate contrast +between our respective families.”</p> +<p>Certainly there was no connection Mrs. Poynsett less wished to encourage; +yet she could not endure to play into Camilla’ hands, and made +reply, “There are many matters in which young men must judge for +themselves. I have only once see Miss Vivian, and have no means +of estimating my son’s chance of happiness with her.”</p> +<p>Her impenetrability ruffled Lady Tyrrell; but the answer was softer +than ever. “Dear Mrs. Poynsett, what a happy mother you +are, to be able so freely to allow your sons to follow their inclinations! +Well! since you do not object, my conscience is easy on that score; +but it was more than I durst hope.”</p> +<p>To have one’s approval thus stolen was out of the question +and Mrs. Poynsett said, “Regret is one thing, opposition another. +Sir Harry Vivian need not doubt that, when my son’s position is +once fixed, he will speak openly and formally, and it will then be time +to judge.”</p> +<p>“Only,” said Lady Tyrrell, rising, “let this be +impressed on your son. Eleonora cannot marry till she is of age, +and my father cannot sanction any previous entanglement. Indeed +it is most unfortunate, if her affections have been tampered with, for +me, who have outgrown romance, and know that, in her position, a wealthy +match is a necessity. I have spoken candidly,” she repeated; +“for I like Frank too well to bear that he should be trifled with +and disappointed.”</p> +<p>“Thank you!”</p> +<p>The ladies parted, liking one another, if possible, less than before.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett’s instinct of defence had made her profess much +less distaste to the marriage than she really felt; she was much concerned +that another son should be undergoing Raymond’s sad experiences, +but she had no fear that Lady Tyrrell would ever allow it to come to +a marriage, and she did not think Frank’s poetical enthusiasm +and admiration for beauty betokened a nature that would suffer such +an enduring wound as Raymond’s had done.</p> +<p>So she awaited his return, without too much uneasiness for amusement +in Rosamond’s preparations. One opening into the conservatory +was through her room, so that every skilful device, or gay ornament, +could be exhibited to her; and she much enjoyed the mirth that went +on between the queen of the revels and her fellow-workers.</p> +<p>Cecil did not interfere, being indeed generally with her friends +at Sirenwood, Aucuba Villa, or the working-room, in all of which she +had the pleasure of being treated as a person of great consideration, +far superior to all her natural surroundings, and on whom hinged all +the plans for the amelioration of Willansborough.</p> +<p>Sometimes, however, it happens that the other side of a question +is presented; and thus it was on the day before the entertainment, when +Rosamond had taken her brother Tom to have his hair cut, and to choose +some false moustaches, and the like requisites for their charades.</p> +<p>They went first to Pettitt’s, the little hair-dresser, where +Tom was marvellously taken with the two Penates, and could hardly be +dragged into the innermost recesses, where in the middle of a sheet, +with a <i>peignoir</i> on his shoulders, he submitted to the clipping +of his raven-black locks, as Mr. Pettitt called them, on the condition +of his sister looking on.</p> +<p>Presently they heard some feet enter the outer shop, and Mrs. Duncombe’s +voice asking for Mr. Pettitt; while his mother replied that he would +wait on her immediately, but that he was just now engaged with the Honourable +Mr. De Lancey. “Could she show them anything?”</p> +<p>“Oh no, thank you, we’ll wait! Don’t let +us keep you, Mrs. Pettitt, it is only on business.”</p> +<p>“Ay!” said the other voice—female, and entirely +untamed. “He’s your great ally about your gutters +and drains, isn’t he?”</p> +<p>“The only landowner in Wil’sbro’ who has a particle +of public spirit!” said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>Whereat good-natured Lady Rosamond could not but smile congratulation +to the hair-cutter, who looked meekly elevated, while Tom whispered, +“Proverb contradicted.”</p> +<p>But the other voice replied, “Of course—he’s a +perfumer, learned in smells! You’d better drop it, Bessie! +you’ll never make anything of it.”</p> +<p>“I’ll never drop what the health and life of hundreds +of my fellow-creatures depend on! I wish I could make you understand, +Gussie!”</p> +<p>“You’ll never do anything with my governor, if that’s +your hope—you should hear him and the mum talking! ‘It’s +all nonsense,’ he says; ‘I’m not going to annoy my +tenants, and make myself unpopular, just to gratify a fashionable cry.’ +‘Well,’ says mumsey, ‘it is not what was thought the +thing for ladies in my time; but you see, if Gussie goes along with +it, she will have the key to all the best county society.’ +‘Bother the county society!’ says I. ‘Bessie +Duncombe’s jolly enough—but such a stuck-up set as they +all are at Compton, I’ll not run after, behaving so ill to the +governor, too!’ However—”</p> +<p>“There’s a proverb about listeners!” said Rosamond, +emerging when she felt as if she ought to hearken no longer, and finding +Mrs. Duncombe leaning with her back to the counter, and a tall girl, +a few degrees from beauty, in a riding-habit, sitting upon it.</p> +<p>They both laughed; and the girl added, “If you had waited a +moment, Lady Rosamond, you would have heard that you were the only jolly +one of all the b’iling!”</p> +<p>“Ah! we shall see where you are at the end of Mrs. Tallboys’ +lectures!” said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“On what?” asked Rosamond. “Woman’s +rights, or sanitary measures? for I can’t in the least understand +why they should be coupled up together.”</p> +<p>“Nor I!” said Miss Moy. “I don’t see +why we shouldn’t have our own way, just as well as the men; but +what that has to do with drains and gutters, I can’t guess.”</p> +<p>“I’m the other way,” said Rosamond. “I +think houses and streets ought to be made clean and healthy; but as +for woman’s rule, I fancy we get more of it now than we should +the other way.”</p> +<p>“As an instance,” said Mrs. Duncombe, “woman is +set on cleansing Wil’sbro’. Man will not stir. +Will it ever be done till woman has her way?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps, if woman would be patient, man would do it in the +right way, instead of the wrong!” quoth Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Patient! No, indeed! Nothing is to be done by +that! Let every woman strive her utmost to get the work done as +far as her powers go, and the crusade will be accomplished for very +shame!”</p> +<p>Just then Tom, looking highly amused, emerged, followed by Mr. Pettitt, +the only enlightened landlord on whom Mrs. Duncombe had been able to +produce the slightest impression. He had owned a few small tenements +in Water Lane, which he was about to rebuild, and which were evidently +the pivot of operations.</p> +<p>At the door they met Cecil, and Rosamond detained her a moment in +the street to say, “My dear Cecil, is <i>that</i> Miss Moy coming +on Wednesday?”</p> +<p>“Of course she is. We greatly want to move her father. +He has the chief house property there.”</p> +<p>“It is too late now,” said Rosamond; “but do you +think it can be pleasant to Jenny Bowater to meet her?”</p> +<p>“I know nothing of the old countrified animosities and gossipings, +which you have so heartily adopted,” replied Cecil, proudly. +“Firstly, I ignore them as beneath me; secondly, I sacrifice them +all to a great cause. If Miss Bowater does not like my guests, +let her stay away.”</p> +<p>Here Mrs. Duncombe stood on the step, crying out, “Well, Cecil, +how have you sped with Mrs. Bungay?”</p> +<p>“Horrid woman!” and no more was heard, as Cecil entered +Mr. Pettitt’s establishment.</p> +<p>“That might be echoed,” said Tom, who was boiling over +at the speech to his sister. “I knew that ape was an intolerable +little prig of a peacock, but I didn’t think she could be such +a brute to you, Rosie! Is she often like that, and does your parson +stand such treatment of you?”</p> +<p>“Nonsense, Tom!” said Rosamond; “it doesn’t +often happen, and breaks no bones when it does. It’s only +the ignorance of the woman, and small blame to her—as Mrs. M’Kinnon +said when Corporal Sims’s wife threw the red herring’s tail +at her!”</p> +<p>“But does Julius stand it?” repeated Tom, fiercely, as +if hesitating whether to call out Julius or Mrs. Charnock Poynsett.</p> +<p>“Don’t be so ridiculous, Tom! I’d rather +stand a whole shower of red herrings’ tails at once than bother +Julius about his brother’s wife. How would you and Terry +like it, if your wives took to squabbling, and setting you together +by the ears? I was demented enough to try it once, but I soon +saw it was worse than anything.”</p> +<p>“What? He took her part?”</p> +<p>“No such thing! Hold your tongue, Tommy, and don’t +talk of married folk till you’re one yourself!”</p> +<p>“Papa never meant it,” repeated the indignant Tom. +“I’ve a great mind to write and tell him how you are served!”</p> +<p>“Now, Tom,” cried Rosamond, stopping short, “if +you do that, I solemnly declare I’ll never have you here again! +What could papa do? Do you think he could cure Raymond’s +wife of being a ridiculous little prig? And if he could—why, +before your letter got to Meerut, she will be gone up to London; and +by the time she comes back we’ll be safe in our own Rectory. +Here, come in, and get our string and basket at Mrs. Bungay’s.”</p> +<p>“I’ll pay her out!” muttered Tom, as he followed +his sister into Mrs. Bungay’s shop, one of much smaller pretensions, +for the sale of baskets, brushes, mats, &c.</p> +<p>The mistress, a stout, red-faced woman, looked as if she had been +‘speaking a bit of her mind,’ and was at first very gruff +and ungracious, until she found they were real customers; and moreover, +Tom’s bland Irish courtesy perfectly disarmed her, when Rosamond, +having fixed her mind on a box in the very topmost pigeon-hole, they +not only apologized for the trouble they were giving, but Tom offered +to climb up and bring it down, when she was calling for the errand-boy +in vain.</p> +<p>“It’s no trouble, sir, thank you; I’d think nothing +of that for you, my lady, nor for Mr. Charnock—which I’m +sure I’ll never forget all he did for us at the fire, leading +my little Alferd out like a lamb! I beg your ladyship’s +pardon, ma’am, if I seemed a bit hasty; but I’ve been so +put about—and I thought at first you’d come in on the same +matter, which I’m sure a lady like you wouldn’t ever do—about +the drains, and such like, which isn’t fit for no lady to speak +of! As if Water Lane weren’t as sweet and clean as it has +any call to be, and as if we didn’t know what was right by our +tenants, which are a bad lot, and don’t merit no money to be laid +out on them!”</p> +<p>“So you have houses in Water Lane, Mrs. Bungay? I didn’t +even know it!”</p> +<p>“Yes, Lady Rosamond! My husband and I thought there was +no better investment than to buy a bit of land, when the waste was inclosed, +and run ’em up cheap. Houses always lets here, you see, +and the fire did no damage to that side. But of course you didn’t +know, Lady Rosamond; a real lady like you wouldn’t go prying into +what she’s no call to, like that fine decked-out body Duncombe’s +wife, which had best mind her own children, which it is a shame to see +stravaging about the place! I know it’s her doing, which +I told young Mrs. Charnock Poynsett just now, which I’m right +sorry to see led along by the like of her, and so are more of us; and +we all wish some friend would give her a hint, which she is but young—and +’tis doing harm to Mr. Charnock Poynsett, Lady Rosamond, which +all of us have a regard for, as is but right, having been a good customer, +and friend to the town, and all before him; but we can’t have +ladies coming in with their fads and calling us names for not laying +out on what’s no good to nobody, just to satisfy them! As +if Wil’sbro’ hadn’t been always healthy!”</p> +<p>Tom was wicked enough to put in a good many notes of sympathy, at +the intervals of the conjunctive <i>whiches</i>, and to end by declaring, +“Quite right, Mrs. Bungay! You see how much better we’ve +brought up my sister! I say—what’s the price of that +little doll’s broom?”</p> +<p>“What do you want of it, Tom?”</p> +<p>“Never you mind!”</p> +<p>“No mischief, I hope?”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XVII<br /> +The Enchantments</h2> +<blockquote><p>“It seems a shame,” the Walrus said,<br /> + “To play them such a trick,<br /> +After we’ve brought them out so far,<br /> + And made them trot so quick.”<br /> +The carpenter said nothing, but<br /> + “The butter’s spread too thick.”—LEWIS +CARROLL</p> +</blockquote> +<p>A telegram arrived from Frank, in the midst of the preparations on +Wednesday, announcing that ‘he was all right, and should be at +Hazlitt’s Gate at 8.10 p.m.’</p> +<p>At 6.30 children of all sizes, with manes of all colours, were arriving, +and were regaled in the dining-room by Anne, assisted by Jenny and Charlie. +Anne had a pretty pink colour in her cheeks, her flaxen locks were bound +with green ribbons, and green adorned her white dress, in which she +had a gracious, lily-like look of unworldly purity. She thoroughly +loved children, was quite equal to the occasion, and indeed enjoyed +it as much as the recent Christmas-tree in the village school.</p> +<p>Such of Cecil’s guests as were mothers for the most part came +with their children; but Lady Tyrrell, her sister, and others, who were +unattached, arrived later, and were shown to the library, where she +entertained them on the specified refreshment, biscuits and coffee, +and enthroned Mrs Tallboys in the large arm-chair, where she looked +most beautiful and gorgeous, in a robe of some astonishing sheeny sky-blue, +edged with paly gold, while on her head was a coronal of sapphire and +gold, with a marvellous little plume. The cost must have been +enormous, and her delicate and spirituelle beauty was shown to the greatest +advantage; but as the audience was far too scanty to be worth beginning +upon, Cecil, with a sigh at the folly of maternal idolatry, went to +hunt up her ladies from gazing at the babyish amusements of their offspring; +and Miss Moy, in spite of her remonstrance, jumped up to follow her; +while Mrs. Duncombe, the only <i>good</i> mother in this new sense, +remained, keeping guard lest curiosity, and the echo of piano music, +which now began to be heard, should attract away any more of the ladies.</p> +<p>Cecil was by no means prepared for the scene. The drawing-room +was crowded—chiefly indeed with ladies and children, but there +was a fair sprinkling of gentlemen—and all had their faces turned +towards the great glass doors opening into the conservatory, which was +brilliantly lighted and echoing with music and laughter. Cecil +tried to summon some of the ladies of her own inviting, announcing that +Mrs. Tallboys was arrived; but this appeared to have no effect. +“Yes, thank you,” was all she heard. Penetrating a +little farther, “Mrs. Tallboys is ready.” “Thank +you, I’ll come; but my little people are so anxious to have me +with them.”—“Mrs. Tallboys is waiting!” to the +next; who really did not hear, but only responded, “Did you ever +see anything more charming?”</p> +<p>By this time Cecil could see over the heads of the front rank of +children. She hardly knew the conservatory. All the veteran +camellia and orange-trees, and a good many bay and laurel boughs besides, +were ranged along the central alley, gorgeous with fairy lamps and jewels, +while strains of soft music proceeded from some unseen quarter. +“Very pretty!” said Cecil, hastily, trying another of her +intended guests with her intelligence. “Really—yes, +presently, thank you,” was the absent answer. “There +is some delightful mystery in there.”</p> +<p>Cecil found her attempts were vain, and was next asked, as one of +the household, what delicious secret was going on there; and as it hurt +her feelings to be left out, she pressed into the conservatory, with +some vague intention of ordering Anne, if not Rosamond, to release her +grown-up audience, and confine their entertainment to the children; +but she found herself at once caught by the hand by a turbaned figure +like a prince in the <i>Arabian Nights</i>, who, with a low salaam, +waved her on.</p> +<p>“No, thank you. I’m looking for—”</p> +<p>But retreat was impossible, for many were crowding up in eager curiosity; +moreover, a muslin bandage descended-on her eyes. “Don’t!” +she expostulated; “I’m not at play—I’m—” +but her words were lost.</p> +<blockquote><p>“Hush! the Peri’s cave is near,<br /> +No one enters scatheless here;<br /> +Lightly tread and lowly bend,<br /> +Win the Peri for your friend,”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>sung a voice to the mysterious piano accompaniment; and Cecil found +both hands taken, and was forced to move on, as she guessed the length +of the conservatory, amid sounds of suppressed laughter that exceedingly +annoyed her, till there was a pause and repetition of the two last lines +with an attempt to make her obey them. She was too impatient and +angry to perceive that it would have been much better taste to enter +into the humour of the thing; and she only said with all her peculiar +cold petulance, just like sleet, “Let me go, if you please; I +am engaged. I am waited for.”</p> +<blockquote><p>“Peri gracious,<br /> +She’s contumacious;<br /> +Behold, every hair shall bristle<br /> +When she hears the magic whistle!”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>and a whistle, sharp, long, and loud, sounded behind her, amid peals +of merriment. She turned sharply round, but still the whistle +was behind her, and rang out again and again, till she was half deafened, +and wholly irate; while the repetition of</p> +<blockquote><p>“Bend, bend, lowly bend,<br /> +Win the Peri for your friend,”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>forced on her the conviction that on no other condition should she +be set free, though the recognition of Terry’s voice made the +command doubly unpalatable, and as she made the stiffest and most reluctant +of courtesies, a voice said,</p> +<blockquote><p>“Homage done, you may be<br /> +Of this merry company;”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>and with a last blast of the whistle the bandage was removed, and +she found herself in the midst of a half circle of laughing children +and grown people; in front of her a large opening, like a cavern, hung +with tiny lamps of various colours, in the midst of which stood the +Peri, in a Persian pink robe, white turban, and wide white trousers, +with two oriental genies attendant upon her.</p> +<p>A string was thrust into Cecil’s hand, apparently fastened +to her, and accounting for some sharp pulls she had felt during the +whistling. She drew it in front in sharp haste, to be rid of the +obnoxious instrument; but instead of a whistle, she found in her hand +a little dust-pan and brush, fit for a baby-house, drawn through a ring, +while the children eagerly cried, “What have you got? What +have you got?”</p> +<p>“Some nonsense. I do not approve of practical jokes,” +began Cecil; but the song only replied,</p> +<blockquote><p>“Away, away,<br /> +In the cave no longer stay;<br /> +Others come to share our play;”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>and one of the genies drew her aside, while another blindfolded victim +was being introduced with the same rites, only fare more willingly. +The only way open to here was that which led to the window of the dining-room, +where she found Anne with the children who had had their share, and +were admiring their prizes. Anne tried to soothe her by saying, +“You see every one is served alike. They thought it would +be newer than a tree.”</p> +<p>“Did you mean to <i>give</i> me <i>this</i>?” asked a +little girl, in whose hands Cecil had thrust her dust-pan, without a +glance at it.</p> +<p>“Oh the ring!” said Anne. “You must keep +that, Mrs. Poynsett thought you would like it. It is a gem—some +Greek goddess, I think.”</p> +<p>“Is this her arrangement?” asked Cecil, pointing to the +dust-pan.</p> +<p>“Oh no! she knew nothing about that, nor I; but you see every +one has something droll. See what Mr. Bowater has!”</p> +<p>And Herbert Bowater showed that decidedly uncomplimentary penwiper, +where the ass’s head declares “There are two of us;” +while every child had some absurdity to show; and Miss Moy’s shrieks +of delight were already audible at a tortoise-shell pen-holder disguised +as a hunting-whip.</p> +<p>“I must go to my friends,” said Cecil, vouchsafing no +admiration of the ring, though she had seen enough to perceive that +it was a beautifully engraved ruby; and she hurried back to the library, +but only to find all her birds flown, and the room empty! Pursuing +them to the drawing-room, she saw only the backs of a few, in the rearmost +rank of the eager candidates for admission to the magic cave.</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell alone saw her, and turned back from the eager multitude, +to say in her low, modulated voice, “Beaten, my dear. Able +strategy on <i>la belle mère</i>’<i>s</i> part.”</p> +<p>“Where’s Mrs. Tallboys?”</p> +<p>“Don’t you see her blue feather, eagerly expectant? +Just after you were gone, Edith Bowater came in, and begged us to come +and see the conservatory lighted up; and then came a rush of the Brenden +children after their aunt, exclaiming wildly it was delicious—lights, +and a fairy, and a secret, and every one got something, if they were +ever so old. Of course, after that there was nothing but to follow +the stream.”</p> +<p>“It is a regular plot for outwitting us! Rosamond is +dressed up for the fairy. They are all in league.”</p> +<p>“Well, we must put a good face on it for the present,” +said Lady Tyrrell. “Don’t on any account look as if +you were not in perfect accordance. You can show your sentiments +afterwards, you know.”</p> +<p>Cecil saw she must acquiesce, for Mrs. Tallboys was full in the midst. +With an infinitely better grace than her hostess, she yielded herself +to the sports, bowed charmingly to the Peri, whirled like a fairy at +the whistling, and was rewarded with a little enamel padlock as a brooch, +and two keys as ear-rings; indeed she professed, with evident sincerity, +that she was delighted with these sports of the old country, and thought +the two genies exquisite specimens of the fair, useless, gentle English +male aristocracy.</p> +<p>Mrs. Duncombe, too, accepted the inevitable with considerable spirit +and good-humour, though she had a little passage-at-arms with Julius; +when showing him the ivory card-case that had fallen to her lot, she +said, “So this is the bribe! Society stops the mouth of +truth.”</p> +<p>“That is as you choose to take it,” he said.</p> +<p>“Exactly. When we want to go deep into eternal verities +you silence us with frivolous din and dainty playthings for fear of +losing your slaves.”</p> +<p>“I don’t grant that.”</p> +<p>“Then why hinder an earnest discussion by all this hubbub?”</p> +<p>“Because this was not the right place or time.”</p> +<p>“It never is the right time for the tyrants to let their slaves +confer, or to hear home-truths.”</p> +<p>“On the contrary, my curiosity is excited. I want to +hear Mrs. Tallboys’ views.”</p> +<p>“Then when will you dine with us? Next Wednesday?”</p> +<p>“Thank you. Wednesday has an evening service.”</p> +<p>“Ah! I told you it was never the right time! Then +Thursday? And you’ll trust your wife with us?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, certainly.”</p> +<p>“It is a bargain, then? Seven o’clock, or there +will be no time.”</p> +<p>Julius’s attention suddenly wandered. Was not a whisper +pervading the room of a railway accident? Was not Frank due by +that night’s train?</p> +<p>There were still so many eager to visit the magic cave, that Julius +trusted his wife would remain there sheltered from the report; Jenny +Bowater was behind a stand of trees, acting orchestra; but when Terry +came to the outskirts of the forest in search of other knights of the +whistle, Julius laid a hand on him, and gave instructions in case any +rumour should reach Rosamond to let her know how vague it was, tell +her that he was going to ascertain the truth, and beg her to keep up +the game and cause no alarm.</p> +<p>Next encountering Anne, he begged her to go to his mother and guard +her from any alarm, until there was some certainty.</p> +<p>“Can’t we send all these people away?” she asked.</p> +<p>“Not yet. We had better make no unnecessary disturbance. +There will be time enough if anything be amiss. I am going down +to Hazlitt’s Gate.”</p> +<p>Anne was too late. Charlie had not outgrown the instinct of +rushing to his mother with his troubles; and he was despairingly telling +the report he had heard of a direful catastrophe, fatal to an unknown +quantity of passengers, while she, strong and composed because he gave +way, was trying to sift his intelligence. No sooner did he hear +from Anne that Julius was going to the station, than he started up to +accompany him—the best thing he could do in his present state. +Hardly, however, had he closed the door, before he returned with fresh +tears in his eyes, leading in Eleonora Vivian, whom he had found leaning +against the wall outside, white and still, scarce drawing her breath.</p> +<p>“Come,” he said; and before she knew what he was doing, +she was at Mrs. Poynsett’s side. “Here, mother,” +he said, “take her.” And he was gone.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett stretched out her arms. The hearts of the two +women who loved Frank could not help meeting. Eleonora sank on +her knees, hiding her face on the mother’s breast, with two tender +arms clasped round her.</p> +<p>Anne was kneeling too, but she was no longer the meek, shy stranger. +Now, in the hour of trouble, she poured forth, in a voice fervent and +sweet, a prayer for protection and support for their beloved one, so +that it might be well with him, whatever might be his Heavenly Father’s +Will.</p> +<p>As she paused, Mrs. Poynsett, in a choked voice, said, “Thank +you, dear child;” when there were steps in the hall. Anne +started up, Lenore buried her face on Mrs. Poynsett’s bosom, the +mother clasped her hands over her convulsively, then beheld, as the +door opened, a tall figure, with a dark bright face full of ineffable +softness and joy. Frank himself, safe and sound, with his two +brothers behind him. They stayed not to speak, but hastened to +spread the glad tidings; while he flung himself down, including both +his mother and Lenore in one rapturous embrace, and carrying his kiss +from one to the other—conscious, if no one else was, that this +first seal of his love was given in his mother’s arms.</p> +<p>Lenore did indeed extricate herself, and stand up as rosy red as +she had been pale; but she had no room for any thought beyond his mother’s +trembling “Not hurt, my dear?”</p> +<p>“Not hurt! Not a scratch! Thank God! Oh! +thank God!” answered Frank, quivering all over with thankfulness, +though probably far more at the present joy than the past peril.</p> +<p>“Yes—oh, thanks for His mercy!” echoed Anne, giving +fervent hand and tearful cheek to the eager salutation, which probably +would have been as energetic to Clio or old Betty at that moment!</p> +<p>“But there’s blood on your wristband,” cried the +mother. “You are hurt!”</p> +<p>“No; it’s not mine. I didn’t know it. +It is from the poor fellow I helped to carry into the public-house at +Knoll, just this side Backsworth, a good deal hurt, I’m afraid. +Something had got on the lines, I believe. I was half asleep, +and knew nothing till I found ourselves all crushed up together in the +dark, upside-down, my feet above my head. There was but one man +in my carriage, and we didn’t get foul of one another, and found +we were all right, when we scrambled out of the window. So we +helped out the others, and found that, besides the engineer and stoker—who +I don’t suppose can live, poor fellows!—there was only this +man much damaged. Then, when there seemed no more to be done, +I took my bag and walked across country, to reach home before you heard. +But oh, this is worth anything!”</p> +<p>He had to bend down for another embrace from his mother whose heart +was very full as she held his bright young healthful face between her +hands, though all she said was, “You have walked eleven miles +and more! You must be half starved!—Anne, my dear, pray +let him have something. He can eat it here.”</p> +<p>“I’ll see,” said Anne, hastening away.</p> +<p>“Oh, don’t go, Lenore,” cried Frank, springing +up. “Stay, I’ve not seen you!—Mother, how sweet +of you! But I forgot! You don’t know! I was +only waiting till I was through.”</p> +<p>“I understand, my dear boy.”</p> +<p>“But how? How did you find out? Was it only that +you knew she was the precious darling of my heart? and now you see and +own why,” cries Frank, almost beside himself with excitement and +delight.</p> +<p>“It was Lady Tyrrell who told me,” said Mrs. Poynsett, +sympathizing too much with the lovers to perceive that her standpoint +of resistance was gone from her.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Lenore. “She knew of our walk, +and questioned me so closely that I could not conceal anything without +falsehood.”</p> +<p>“After she met me at Aucuba Villa?” asked Frank.</p> +<p>“Yes. Did you tell her anything?”</p> +<p>“I thought she knew more than I found afterwards that she did,” +said Frank; “but there’s no harm done. It is all coming +now.”</p> +<p>“She told my father,” said Eleonora, sadly, “and +he cannot understand our delay. He is grieved and displeased, +and thinks I have not been open with him.”</p> +<p>“Oh! that will be all right to-morrow,” said Frank. +“I’ll have it out with a free heart, now there’s no +fear but that I have passed; and I’ve got the dearest of mothers! +I feel as if I could meet him if he were a dozen examiners rolled into +one, instead of the good old benevolent parent that he is! Ha! +Anne—Susan—Jenkins—thank you—that’s splendid! +May I have it here? Super-excellent! Only here’s half +the clay-pit sticking to me! Let me just run up and make myself +decent. Only don’t let her run away.”</p> +<p>Perhaps Clio would have scorned the instinct that made a Charnock +unable to enjoy a much-needed meal in the presence of mother and of +love till the traces of the accident and the long walk had been removed. +His old nurse hurried after—ostensibly to see that his linen was +at hand, but really to have her share of the petting and congratulation; +and Lenore stood a little embarrassed, till Mrs. Poynsett held out her +arms, with the words, “My dear child!” and again she dropped +on her knee by the couch, and nestled close in thankful joy.</p> +<p>Presently however, she raised herself, and said sadly, almost coldly, +“I am afraid you have been surprised into this.”</p> +<p>“I must love one who so loves my boy,” was the ardent +answer.</p> +<p>“I couldn’t help it!” said the maiden, again abandoning +herself to the tenderness. “Oh! it is so good of you!”</p> +<p>“My dear, dear daughter!”</p> +<p>“Only please give me one mother’s kiss! I have +so longed for one.”</p> +<p>“Poor motherless child! My sweet daughter!”</p> +<p>Then after a pause Eleonora said, “Indeed, I’ll try to +deserve better; but oh! pray forgive me, if I cost him much more pain +and patience than I am worth.”</p> +<p>“He thinks you well worth anything, and perhaps I do,” +said Mrs Poynsett, who was conquered, won over, delighted more than +by either of the former brides, in spite of all antecedents.</p> +<p>“Then will you always trust me?” said Eleonora, with +clasped hands, and a wondrous look of earnest sincerity on her grave +open brow and beautiful pensive dark blue eyes.</p> +<p>“I <i>must</i>, my dear.”</p> +<p>“And indeed I don’t think I could help holding to <i>him</i>, +because he seems my one stay and hope here; and now I know it is all +right with you, indeed it is such happiness as I never knew.”</p> +<p>She laid her head down again in subdued joy and rest: but the pause +was broken by Frank’s return; and a moment after, in darted the +Peri in her pink cashmere costume, with a glow transforming her usually +colourless face. “Dear, dear Frank, I’m so glad!” +she cried, bestowing her kiss; while he cried in amazement, “Is +it Rose? Is there a fancy ball?”</p> +<p>“Only Aladdin’s Cave. I’m just out of it; +and while Jenny is keeping up games, and Edith is getting up a charade, +I could dash in to see that Frank was all there, and more too. +The exam, is safe, eh?”</p> +<p>“I trust so,” said Frank; “the list will not come +just yet; but I am told I am certain of a pass—indeed, that I +stand high as to numbers.”</p> +<p>“That’s noble!—Now, Mrs. Poynsett, turn him out +as soon as he has eaten his dinner. We want any one who can keep +up a respectable kind of a row. I say, will you two do Ferdinand +and Miranda playing at chess? You look just like it.”</p> +<p>“Must we go?” asked Frank, reluctantly; and there was +something in the expression of his face, a little paler than usual, +that reminded his mother that the young man had for the first time seen +sudden and violent death that day, and that though his present gladness +was so great, yet that he had gone through too much in body and mind +for the revels of the evening not either to jar, or to produce a vehement +reaction, if he were driven into them. So she answered by pleading +the eleven miles’ walk; and the queen of the sports was merciful, +adding, “But I must be gone, or Terry will be getting up his favourite +tableau of the wounded men of Clontarf, or Rothesay, or the Black Bull’s +Head, or some equally pleasing little incident.”</p> +<p>“Is it going on well?” asked Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“Sweetly! Couldn’t be better. They have all +amalgamated and are in the midst of the ‘old family coach,’ +with Captain Duncombe telling the story. He is quite up to the +trick, and enjoys turning the tables on his ladies.”</p> +<p>“And Camilla?” asked Lenore, in a hesitating, anxious +tone</p> +<p>“Oh! she’s gone in for it. I think she is the springs! +I heard her ask where you were, and Charley told her; so you need not +be afraid to stay in peace, if you have a turn that way. Good-bye; +you’d laugh to see how delighted people are to be let off the +lecture.” And she bent over Lenore with a parting kiss, +full of significance of congratulation.</p> +<p>She returned, after changing her dress, to find a pretty fairy tableau, +contrived by the Bowater sisters, in full progress, and delighting the +children and the mothers. Lady Vivian contrived to get a word +with her as she returned.</p> +<p>“Beautifully managed, Lady Rosamond. I tell Cecil she +should enjoy a defeat by such strategy.”</p> +<p>“It is Mrs. Poynsett’s regular Christmas party,” +said Rosamond, not deigning any other reply.</p> +<p>“I congratulate her on her skilful representatives,” +said Lady Tyrrell. “May I ask if we are to see the hero +of the day? No? What! you would say better employed? +Poor children, we must let them alone to-night for their illusion, though +I am sorry it should be deepened; it will be only the more pain by and +by.”</p> +<p>“I don’t see that,” said Rosamond, stoutly.</p> +<p>“Ah! Lady Rosamond, you are a happy young bride, untaught +what is <i>l’impossible</i>.” Rosamond could not help +thinking that no one understood it better than she, as the eldest of +a large family with more rank and far more desires than means; but she +disliked Lady Tyrrell far too much for even her open nature to indulge +in confidences, and she made a successful effort to escape from her +neighbourhood by putting two pale female Fullers into the place of honour +in front of the folding doors into the small drawing-room, which served +as a stage, and herself hovered about the rear, wishing she could find +some means of silencing Miss Moy’s voice, which was growing louder +and more boisterous than ever.</p> +<p>The charade which Rosamond had expected was the inoffensive, if commonplace, +<i>Inspector</i>, and the window she beheld, when the curtain drew up, +was, she supposed, the bar of an inn. But no; on the board were +two heads, ideals of male and female beauty, one with a waxed moustache, +the other with a huge chignon, vividly recalling Mr. Pettitt’s +Penates. Presently came by a dapper professor, in blue spectacles +and a college cap, who stood contemplating, and indulging in a harangue +on entities and molecules, spirit and matter, affinities and development, +while the soft deep brown eyes of the chignoned head languished, and +the blue ones of the moustached one rolled, and the muscles twitched +and the heads turned till, by a strong process of will explained by +the professor, they bent their necks, erected themselves, and finally +started into life and the curtain fell on them with clasped hands!</p> +<p>It rose to show the newly-animated pair, Junius Brutus and Barberina +his wife, at the breakfast table, with a boar’s head of brawn +before them, while the Lady Barberina boldly asserted her claims to +the headship of the house. Had she not lately been all head?</p> +<p>The pathetic reply was, “Would it were so still, my dear. +All head and no tongue, like our present meal.”</p> +<p>The lady heaved up the boar’s head to throw at him, and the +scene closed.</p> +<p>Next, Brutus was seen awkwardly cleaning his accoutrements, having +enlisted, as he soliloquized, to escape from woman.</p> +<p>Enter a sergeant with a rich Irish brogue, and other recruits, forming +the awkward squad. The drill was performed with immense spirit, +but only one of the soldiers showed any dexterity; but while the sergeant +was upholding him as ‘the very moral of a patthern to the rest,’ +poor Brutus was seized with agonizing horror at the recognition of Barberina +in this disguise!</p> +<p>“Why not?” she argued. “Why should not woman +learn to use the arms of which man has hitherto usurped the use?”</p> +<p>Poor Brutus stretched out his arms in despair, and called loudly +for the professor to restore him to his original state of silent felicity +in the barber’s window.</p> +<p>“Ye needn’t do that, me boy,” quoth the sergeant +with infinite scorn. “Be ye where ye will, ye’ll never +be aught but a blockhead.”</p> +<p>Therewith carriages were being announced to the heads of families; +and with compliments and eager thanks, and assurances that nothing could +have been more delightful, the party broke up.</p> +<p>Captain Duncombe, while muffling his boys, declared that he never +saw a cleverer hit in his life, and that those two De Lancey brothers +ought to be on the stage; while Miss Moy loudly demanded whether he +did not feel it personal; and Mrs. Tallboys, gracefully shaking hands +with Anne and Rosamond, declared it a grand challenge where the truth +had been unconsciously hit off. Cecil was nowhere to be seen.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XVIII<br /> +Demonstrations</h2> +<blockquote><p>Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.—BURNS</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The hours of the <i>soirée</i> had been early; but the breakfast +was so irregular and undecided as to time, that no one took much notice +of an intimation which Jenkins had received from the grim Mrs. Grindstone +that Mrs, Charnock Poynsett would take breakfast in her own room. +Indeed, they all felt glad that her views of etiquette did not bind +them to their places; for Frank was burning to be off to Sirenwood, +forgetting that it was far easier to be too early than too late for +Sir Harry Vivian, who was wont to smoke till long after midnight, and +was never visible till the midday repast.</p> +<p>And thus it was Lady Tyrrell who came to Frank alone. “Early +afoot,” she said; “you foolish, impatient fellow! +You <i>will</i> outrun my best advice.”</p> +<p>“Ah! but I’m armed. I always told you we might +trust to my mother, and it is all right. She loves Lenore with +all her heart, and consents freely and gladly.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! Well, the dear child has made her conquest!”</p> +<p>“I always knew she would when once reserve was broken down.”</p> +<p>“Did you get up the alarm on purpose?”</p> +<p>“Really, one would think I had done so. One such moment +was worth years of ordinary meetings! Half the battle is won!”</p> +<p>“Have you seen your mother this morning?”</p> +<p>“No; but she knew I was coming.”</p> +<p>“Then you do not know what her feelings are on cooler reflection?”</p> +<p>“My mother would never retract what she has once assured me +of,” said Frank, haughtily.</p> +<p>“Forgive me—of what has she assured you?”</p> +<p>“That she regards Eleonora as a dear daughter, and that implies +doing the same for me as for my brothers. If Sir Harry would but +be so good as to come and see her—’</p> +<p>“Stay, Frank, you have not come that length. You forget +that if you have, as you say, gained half the battle, there is another +half; and that my father very reasonably feels hurt at being the last +to be favoured with the intelligence.”</p> +<p>“Dear Lady Tyrrell, you can see how it was. There was +no helping it when once I could speak to Lenore; and then no one would +have let me utter a word till I had gone through the examination. +We never meant to go on a system of concealment; but you know how every +one would have raved and stormed if I had betrayed a thought beyond +old Driver, and yet it was only being at rest about Lenore that carried +me through without breaking down. Can’t you see?”</p> +<p>“You special pleader! May you win over my father; but +you must remember that we are a fallen house, unable to do all we wish.”</p> +<p>“If I might see Sir Harry! I must make him forgive me.”</p> +<p>“I will see whether he is ready.”</p> +<p>Could Frank’s eyes have penetrated the walls, he would have +seen Lady Tyrrell received with the words, “Well, my dear, I hope +you have got rid of the young man—poor fellow!”</p> +<p>“I am afraid that cannot be done without your seeing him yourself.”</p> +<p>“Hang it! I hate it! I can’t abide it, Camilla. +He’s a nice lad, though he is his mother’s son; and Lenore’s +heart is set on him, and I can’t bear vexing the child.”</p> +<p>“Lena cares for him only because she met him before she knew +what life is like. After one season she will understand what five +hundred a year means.”</p> +<p>“Well, you ought to know your sister best; but if the lad has +spoken to her, Lena is not the girl to stand his getting his <i>congé</i> +so decidedly.”</p> +<p>“Exactly; it would only lead to heroics, and deepen the mischief.”</p> +<p>“Hang it! Then what do you want me to say?”</p> +<p>“Stand up for your rights, and reduce him to submission by +displeasure at not having been consulted. Then explain how there +can be no engagement at once; put him on his honour to leave her free +till after her birthday in November.”</p> +<p>“What! have him dangling after her? That’s no way +to make her forget him.”</p> +<p>“She never will under direct opposition—she is too high-spirited +for that; but if we leave it alone, and they are unpledged, there is +a fair chance of her seeing the folly both for her and for him.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know that. Lena may be high-flown; but +things go deep with the child—deeper than they did with you, Camilla!”</p> +<p>Perhaps this was a stab, for there was bitterness in the answer. +“You mean that she is less willing to give up a fancy for the +family good. Remember, it is doubly imperative that Lena should +marry a man whose means are in his own power, so that he could advance +something. This would be simply ruin—throwing up the whole +thing, after all I have done to retrieve our position.”</p> +<p>“After all, Camilla, I am growing an old man, and poor Tom +is gone. I don’t know that the position is worth so much +to me as the happiness to her, poor child!” said Sir Harry, wistfully.</p> +<p>“Happiness!” was the scornful answer. “If +you said ‘her own way,’ it would be nearer the truth. +A back street in London—going about in a cab—and occasional +holidays on sufferance from Mrs. Poynsett.”</p> +<p>However little happiness either father or daughter had derived from +their chosen ways, this idea was abhorrent to both; and Lady Tyrrell +pressed her advantage. “If we keep him waiting much longer +he will be rushing after Lena, and if you show the least sign of relenting +he will insist on dragging you to an interview with his mother.”</p> +<p>The threat was effectual; for Sir Harry had had passages-at arms +enough with Mrs. Poynsett to make him dread her curt dry civility far +more than either dun or bailiff, and he was at once roused to the determination +to be explicit.</p> +<p>Frank met him, with crimson face and prepared speech. “Good +morning, Sir Harry! I am afraid you may think that you have reason +to complain of my not having spoken to you sooner; but I trusted to +your previous knowledge of my feelings, and I was anxious to ascertain +my position before laying it before you, though I don’t believe +I should have succeeded unless my mind had been set at rest.”</p> +<p>Soft-hearted Sir Harry muttered, “I understand, but—”</p> +<p>The pause at that ‘but’ was so long that Frank ventured +on going on. “I have not had an official communication, +but I know privately that I have passed well and stand favourably for +promotion, so that my income will go on increasing, and my mother will +make over to me five thousand pounds, as she has done to Miles and Julius, +so that it can be settled on Eleonora at once.”</p> +<p>“There, there, that’s enough!” said Sir Harry, +coerced by his daughter’s glances; “there’s plenty +of time before coming to all that! You see, my dear boy, I always +liked you, and had an immense respect for your—your family; but, +you see, Eleonora is young, and under the circumstances she ought not +to engage herself. She can’t any way marry before coming +of age, and—considering all things—I should much prefer +that this should go no further.”</p> +<p>“You ought both to be free!” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“That I can never be!”</p> +<p>“Nor do you think that she can—only it sounds presumptuous,” +smiled Lady Tyrrell. “Who can say? But things have +to be proved; and considering what young untried hearts are, it is safer +and happier for both that there should be perfect freedom, so that no +harm should be done, if you found that you had not known your own minds.”</p> +<p>“It will make no difference to me.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, we know that!” laughed Sir Harry. “Only +suppose you changed your mind, we could not be angry with you.”</p> +<p>“You don’t think I could!”</p> +<p>“No, no,” said Lady Tyrrell; “we think no such +thing. Don’t you see, if we did not trust your honour, we +could not leave this in suspense. All we desire is that these +matters may be left till it is possible to see our way, when the affairs +of the estate are wound up; for we can’t tell what the poor child +will have. Come, don’t repeat that it will make no difference. +It may not to you; but it must to us, and to your mother.”</p> +<p>“My mother expects nothing!” said Frank, eagerly; but +it was a false step.</p> +<p>Sir Harry bristled up, saying, “Sir, my daughter shall go into +no family that—that has not a proper appreciation of—and +expectations befitting her position.”</p> +<p>“Dear papa,” exclaimed Lady Tyrrell, “he means +no such thing. He is only crediting his mother with his own romantic +ardour and disinterestedness.—Hark! there actually is the gong. +Come and have some luncheon, and contain yourself, you foolish boy!”</p> +<p>“I am sorry I said anything that seemed unfitting,” said +Frank, meekly. “You know I <i>could</i> not mean it!”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes, yes, I bear no malice; only one does not like to +see one’s own child courted without a voice in the matter, and +to hear she is to be taken as a <i>favour</i>, expecting nothing. +But, there, we’ll say no more. I like you, Frank Charnock! +and only wish you had ten thousand a year, or were any one else; but +you see—you see. Well, let’s eat our luncheon.”</p> +<p>“Does she know this decision?” asked Frank, aside, as +he held open the door for Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Yes, she knows it can go no further; though we are too merciful +to deny you the beatific vision, provided you are good, and abstain +from any more little <i>tendresses</i> for the present.—Ah!”—enter +Cecil—“I thought we should see you to-day, my dear!”</p> +<p>“Yes; I am on my way to meet my husband at the station,” +said Cecil, meeting her in the hall, and returning her kiss.</p> +<p>“Is Raymond coming home to-day?” said Frank, as he too +exchanged greetings. “Ah! I remember; I did not see +you at breakfast this morning.”</p> +<p>“No!” and there was signification in the voice; but Frank +did not heed it, for coming down-stairs was Eleonora, her face full +of a blushing sweetness, which gave it all the beauty it had ever lacked.</p> +<p>He could do no more than look and speak before all the rest; the +carriage was ordered for the sisters to go out together, and he lingered +in vain for a few words in private, for Sir Harry kept him talking about +Captain Duncombe’s wonderful colt, till Cecil had driven off one +way, and their two hostesses the other; and he could only ride home +to tell his mother how he had sped.</p> +<p>Better than Rosamond, better even than Charlie, was his mother as +a confidante; and though she had been surprised into her affectionate +acceptance of Eleonora, it was an indescribable delight to mother and +son to find themselves once more in full sympathy; while he poured out +all that had been pent up ever since his winter at Rockpier. She +almost made common cause with him in the question, what would Raymond +say? And it proved to be news to her that her eldest son was to +be immediately expected at home. Cecil had not come to see her, +and had sent her no message; but ungracious inattention was not so uncommon +as to excite much remark from one who never wished to take heed to it; +and it was soon forgotten in the praise of Eleonora.</p> +<p>Cecil meanwhile was receiving Raymond at the station. He was +pleased to see her there in her pony-carriage, but a little startled +by the brief coldness of her reply to his inquiry after his mother, +and the tight compression of her lips all the time they were making +their way through the town, where, as usual, he was hailed every two +or three minutes by persons wanting a word with him. When at last +there was a free space, she began: “Raymond, I wish to know whether +you mean me to be set at naught, and my friends deliberately insulted?”</p> +<p>“What?”</p> +<p>A gentleman here hurried up with “I’ll not detain you +a minute.”</p> +<p>He did, however, keep them for what seemed a great many, to the chafing +spirit which thought a husband should have no ears save for his wife’s +wrongs; so she made her preface even more startling—“Raymond, +I cannot remain in the house any longer with Lady Rosamond Charnock +and those intolerable brothers of hers!”</p> +<p>“Perhaps you will explain yourself,” said Raymond, almost +relieved by the evident exaggeration of the expressions.</p> +<p>“There has been a conspiracy to thwart and insult me—a +regular conspiracy!”</p> +<p>“Cecil! let me understand you. What can have happened?”</p> +<p>“When I arranged an evening for my friends to meet Mrs. Tallboys, +I did not expect to have it swamped by a pack of children, and noisy +nonsensical games, nor that both she and I should be insulted by practical +jokes and a personal charade.”</p> +<p>“A party to meet Mrs. Tallboys?”</p> +<p>“A ladies’ party, a <i>conversazione</i>.”</p> +<p>“What—by my mother’s wish?”</p> +<p>“I was given to understand that I had <i>carte blanche</i> +in visiting matters.”</p> +<p>“You did not ask her consent?”</p> +<p>“I saw no occasion.”</p> +<p>“You did not?”</p> +<p>“No.”</p> +<p>“Then, Cecil, I must say that whatever you may have to complain +of, you have committed a grave act of disrespect.”</p> +<p>“I was told that I was free to arrange these things!”</p> +<p>“Free!” said Raymond, thoroughly roused; “free +to write notes, and order the carriage, and play lady of the house; +but did you think that made you free to bring an American mountebank +of a woman to hold forth absurd trash in my mother’s own drawing-room, +as soon as my back was turned?”</p> +<p>“I should have done the same had you been there.”</p> +<p>“Indeed!” ironically; “I did not know how far you +had graduated in the Rights of Women. So you invited these people?”</p> +<p>“Then the whole host of children was poured in on us, and everything +imaginable done to interrupt, and render everything rational impossible. +I know it was Rosamond’s contrivance, she looked so triumphant, +dressed in an absurd fancy dress, and her whole train doing nothing +but turning me into ridicule, and Mrs. Tallboys too. Whatever +you choose to call her, you cannot approve of a stranger and foreigner +being insulted here. It is that about which I care—not myself; +I have seen none of them since, nor shall I do so until a full apology +has been made to my guest and to myself.”</p> +<p>“You have not told me the offence.”</p> +<p>“In the first place, there was an absurd form of Christmas-tree, +to which one was dragged blindfold, and sedulously made ridiculous; +and I—I had a dust-pan and brush. Yes, I had, in mockery +of our endeavours to purify that unhappy street.”</p> +<p>“I should have taken it as a little harmless fun,” said +Raymond. “Depend on it, it was so intended.”</p> +<p>“What, when Mrs. Tallboys had a padlock and key? I see +you are determined to laugh at it all. Most likely they consulted +you beforehand.”</p> +<p>“Cecil, I cannot have you talk such nonsense. Is this +all you have to complain of?”</p> +<p>“No. There was a charade on the word Blockhead, where +your brother Charles and the two De Lanceys caricatured what they supposed +to be Mrs. Tallboys’ doctrines.”</p> +<p>“How did she receive it?”</p> +<p>“Most good-humouredly; but that made it no better on their +part.”</p> +<p>“Are you sure it was not a mere ordinary piece of pleasantry, +with perhaps a spice of personality, but nothing worth resenting?”</p> +<p>“You did not see it. Or perhaps you think no indignity +towards me worth resentment?”</p> +<p>“I do not answer that, Cecil; you will think better of those +words another time,” said Raymond, sternly. “But when +you want your cause taken up, you have to remember that whatever the +annoyance, you brought it upon yourself and her, by your own extraordinary +proceeding towards my mother—I will not say towards myself. +I will try to smooth matters. I think the De Lanceys must have +acted foolishly; but the first step ought to be an expression of regret +for such conduct towards my mother.”</p> +<p>“I cannot express regret. I ought to have been told if +there were things forbidden.”</p> +<p>“Must I forbid your playing Punch and Judy, or dancing on the +tight-rope?” cried Raymond, exasperated.</p> +<p>Cecil bit her lip, and treated the exclamation with the silent dignity +of a deeply injured female; and thus they reached home, when Raymond +said, “Come to your senses, Cecil and apologize to my mother. +You can explain that you did not know the extent of your powers.”</p> +<p>“Certainly not. They all plotted against me, and I am +the person to whom apology is due.”</p> +<p>Wherewith she marched up-stairs, leaving Raymond, horribly perplexed, +to repair at once to his mother’s room, where Frank still was; +but after replying about his success in the examination, the younger +brother retreated, preferring that his story should be told by his mother; +but she had not so much as entered on it when Raymond demanded what +had so much disturbed Cecil.</p> +<p>“I was afraid she would be vexed,” said Mrs. Poynsett; +“but we were in a difficulty. We thought she hardly knew +what she had been led into, and that as she had invited her ladies, +it would do less harm to change the character of the party than to try +to get it given up.”</p> +<p>“I have no doubt you did the best you could,” said Raymond, +speaking with more like censure of his mother than he had ever done +since the hot days of his love for Camilla Vivian; “and you could +have had nothing to do with the personalities that seem to have been +the sting.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett, true boy-lover that she was, had been informed of +the success of Tom’s naughtiness—not indeed till after it +was over, when there was nothing to be done but to shake her head and +laugh; and now she explained so that her son came to a better understanding +of what had happened.</p> +<p>As to the extinguishing Women’s Rights in child’s play, +he saw that it had been a wise manœuvre of his mother, to spare +any appearance of dissension, while preventing what she disapproved +and what might have injured his interests; but he was much annoyed with +the De Lanceys for having clogged the measure with their own folly; +and judging of cause by effect, he would hear of no excuse for Rosamond +or her brothers, and went away resolved that though nothing should induce +him to quarrel with Julius, yet he should tell him plainly that he must +restrain his wife and her brothers from annoying Cecil by their practical +jokes. He was, as usual, perfectly gentle to his mother, and thanked +her for her arrangement. “It was not her fault that it had +not turned out better,” he said; and he did not seem to hear her +exoneration of Rosamond.</p> +<p>He had scarcely gone when Rosamond came in from the village, asking +whether he had arrived, as she had seen his hat in the hall.</p> +<p>“Yes, Rosamond. You did not tell me of Cecil’s +vexation!”</p> +<p>“Cecil? Have I seen her since? No, I remember now. +But is she angry? Was it the dust-pan? Oh! Tom, Tom!”</p> +<p>“That and the Blockhead. Did Tom say anything very cutting?”</p> +<p>“Why it was an old stock charade they acted two years ago! +I had better tell her so.”</p> +<p>“If you would it would be an immense relief, my dear. +Raymond is very much annoyed; she says she will speak to nobody till +she has had an apology.”</p> +<p>“Then she can be as great a goose as I! Why, the Yankee +muse and Mrs. Duncombe took all in good part; but Cecil has not atom +of fun in her. Don’t you think that was the gift the fairies +left out at the christening of the all-endowed princess?”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett laughed, but anxiously. “My dear, if you +can make peace, it will be a family blessing.”</p> +<p>“I! I’ll eat any dirt in the world, and make Tom +eat it too, rather than you should be vexed, or make discord in the +house,” cried Rosamond, kissing her, and speeding away to Cecil’s +door.</p> +<p>It was Raymond who opened it, looking perturbed and heated, but a +good deal amazed at seeing his intended scapegoat coming thus boldly +to present herself.</p> +<p>“Let me in,” she breathlessly said. “I am +come to tell Cecil how sorry I am she was so much vexed; I really did +not know it before.”</p> +<p>“I am ready to accept any proper apology that is offered me,” +said Cecil, with cold dignity; “but I cannot understand your profession +that you did not know I was vexed. You could have intended nothing +else.”</p> +<p>“But, Cecil, you misunderstood—” began Rosamond.</p> +<p>“I never misunderstand—”</p> +<p>“No human creature can say that!” interposed Raymond, +immensely thankful to Rosamond—whatever her offence—for +her overtures, and anxious they should be accepted.</p> +<p>“I could not,” continued Cecil, “misunderstand +the impertinent insults offered to my friends and to myself; though +if Lady Rosamond is willing to acknowledge the impropriety I will overlook +it.”</p> +<p>Raymond’s face and neck crimsoned, but Raymond’s presence +helped her to rein in her temper; and she thought of Julius, and refrained +from more than a “Very well. It was meant as a harmless +joke, and—and if you—you did not take it so, I am very sorry.”</p> +<p>Raymond saw the effort, and looked at his wife for softening; but +as he saw none, he met the advance by saying kindly, “I am sure +it was so meant, though the moment was unfortunate.”</p> +<p>“Indeed it was so,” cried Rosamond, feeling it much easier +to speak to him, and too generous to profess her own innocence and give +up Tom. “It was just a moment’s idle fancy—just +as we’ve chaffed one another a hundred times; and for the Blockhead, +it is the boys’ pet old stock charade that they’ve acted +scores of times. It was mere thoughtlessness; and I’ll do +or say anything Cecil pleases, if only she won’t bother Julius +or Mrs. Poynsett about our foolishness.” And the mist of +tears shone in the dark lashes as she held out her hand.</p> +<p>“I cannot suppose it mere thoughtlessness—” began +Cecil; but Raymond cut her short with angry displeasure, of which she +had not supposed him capable. “This is not the way to receive +so kind an apology. Take Rosamond’s hand, and respond properly.”</p> +<p>To respond <i>properly</i> was as little in Cecil’s power as +her will; but she had not been an obedient daughter for so large a proportion +of her life without having an instinct for the voice of real authority, +and she did not refuse her hand, with the words, “If you express +regret I will say no more about it.”</p> +<p>And Rosamond, thinking of Julius and his mother, swallowed the ungraciousness, +and saying “Thank you,” turned to go away.</p> +<p>“Thank you most heartily for this, my dear Rosamond,” +said Raymond, holding out his hand as he opened the door for her; “I +esteem it a very great kindness.”</p> +<p>Rosamond, as she felt the strong pressure of his hand, looked up +in his face with a curious arch compassion in her great gray eyes. +He shut the door behind her, and saw Cecil pouting by the mantelpiece, +vexed at being forced into a reconciliation, even while she knew she +could not persist in sending all the family except Frank to Coventry. +He was thoroughly angry at the dogged way in which she had received +this free and generous peace-making, and he could not but show it. +“Well,” he said, “I never saw an apology made with +a better grace nor received with a worse one.”</p> +<p>Cecil made no reply. He stood for a minute looking at her with +eyes of wondering displeasure, then, with a little gesture of amazement, +left the room.</p> +<p>Cecil felt like the drowning woman when she gave the last scissor-like +gesture with her fingers. She was ready to fall into a chair and +cry. A sense of desolateness was very strong on her, and that +look in his dark eyes had seemed to blast her.</p> +<p>But pride came to her aid. Grindstone was moving about ready +to dress her for dinner. No one should see that she was wounded, +or that she took home displeasure which she did not merit. So +she held up her head, and was chilling and dignified all dinner-time; +after which she repaired to Lady Tyrrell’s <i>conversazione.</i></p> +<h2>CHAPTER XIX<br /> +The Monstrous Regiment of Women</h2> +<blockquote><p>Descend, my muse!</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Raymond had been invited by one of his fellow-guests to make a visit +at his house, and this was backed up on the morning after his return +by a letter containing a full invitation to both himself and his wife. +He never liked what he called “doing nothing in other people’s +houses,” but he thought any sacrifice needful that might break +up Cecil’s present intimacies, and change the current of her ideas; +and his mother fully agreed in thinking that it would be well to being +a round of visits, to last until the Session of Parliament should have +begin. By the time it was over Julius and Rosamond would be in +their own house, and it might be easier to make a new beginning.</p> +<p>The friends whom he could reckon on as sure to welcome him and his +bride were political acquaintances of mark, far above the Dunstone range, +and Cecil could not but be gratified, even while Mrs. Duncombe and her +friend declared that they were going to try to demoralize her by the +seductions of the aristocracy.</p> +<p>After all, Cecil was too much of an ingrained Charnock to be very +deeply imbued with Women’s Rights. All that she wanted was +her own way, and opposition. Lady Tyrrell had fascinated her and +secured her affection, and she followed her lead, which was rather that +of calm curiosity and desire to hear the subject ventilated than actual +partisanship, for which her ladyship was far too clever, as well as +too secure in her natural supremacy. They had only seemed on that +side because other people were so utterly alien to it, and because of +their friendship with the really zealous Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>The sanitary cause which had become mixed with it was, however, brought +strongly before their minds by Mrs. Tallboys’ final lecture, at +which she impressed on the ladies’ minds with great vehemence +that here they might lead the way. If men would not act as a body, +the ladies should set the example, and shame them, by each doing her +very utmost in the cleansing of the nests of disease that reeked in +the worn-out civilization of the cities of the old country. The +ladies listened: Lady Tyrrell, with a certain interest in such an eager +flow of eloquence; Eleonora, with thoughts far away. Bessie Duncombe +expressed a bold practical determination to get one fragment, at least, +of the work done, since she knew Pettitt, the hair-dresser, was public-spirited +enough to allow her to carry out her ideas on his property, and Cecil, +with her ample allowance, as yet uncalled for, in the abundance of her +trousseau, promised to supply what the hair-dresser could not advance, +as a tangible proof of her sincerity.</p> +<p>She held a little council with Mrs. Duncombe at the working society, +when she resigned her day into that lady’s hands on going away. +“I shall ask Mrs. Miles Charnock,” said that lady. +“You don’t object?”</p> +<p>“Oh no, only don’t ask her till I’m gone, and you +know she will only come on condition of being allowed to expound.”</p> +<p>“We must have somebody, and now the thing has gone on so long, +and will end in three months, the goody element will not do much harm, +and, unluckily, most women will not act without it.”</p> +<p>“You have been trying to train Miss Moy.”</p> +<p>“I shall try still, but I can’t get her to take interest +in anything but the boisterous side of emancipation.”</p> +<p>“I can’t bear the girl,” said Cecil; “I am +sure she comes only for the sake of the horses.”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid so; but she amuses Bob, and there’s +always a hope of moving her father through her, though she declares +that the Three Pigeons is his tenderest point, and that he had as soon +meddle with it as with the apple of his eye. I suppose he gets +a great rent from that Gadley.”</p> +<p>“Do you really think you shall do anything with her?” +said Cecil, who might uphold her at home, but whose taste was outraged +by her.</p> +<p>“I hope so! At any rate, she is not conventional. +Why, when I was set free from my school at Paris, and married Bob three +months later, I hadn’t three ideas in my head beyond horses and +balls and soldiers. It has all come with life and reading, my +dear.”</p> +<p>And a very odd ‘all’ it was, so far; but there was this +difference between Bessie Duncombe and Cecil Charnock Poynsett, that +the ‘gospel of progress’ was to the one the first she had +ever really known, and became a reaching forward to a newly-perceived +standard of benevolence and nobleness: to the other it was simply retrograding, +and that less from conviction than from the spirit of rivalry and opposition.</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell with her father and sister were likewise going to leave +home, to stay among friends with whom Sir Harry could hunt until the +London campaign, when Eleonora was to see the world. Thus the +bazaar was postponed until the return of the ladies in the summer, when +the preparations would be more complete and the season more suitable. +The church must wait for it, for nothing like a sufficient amount of +subscription had been as yet promised.</p> +<p>There was still, however, to come that select dinner-party at Mrs. +Duncombe’s, to which Julius, moved by her zeal and honesty, as +well as by curiosity, had promised his presence with Rosamond, “at +his peril,” as she said.</p> +<p>They were kept so long at the door of Aucuba Villa that they had +begun to doubt if they had not mistaken the day, until the Sirenwood +carriage crashed up behind them; and after the third pull at the bell +they were admitted by an erect, alert figure,—a remnant of Captain +Duncombe’s military life.</p> +<p>He marshalled them into the drawing-room, where by dim firelight +they could just discern the Professor and a certain good-natured horsey +friend of the Captain’s, who sprang up from easy-chairs on the +opposite sides of the fire to greet them, while the man hastily stirred +up the fire, lighted the gas, dashed at the table, shutting up an open +blotting-book that lay on it, closing an ink-bottle, and gathering up +some torn fragments or paper, which he would have thrown into the scrap-basket +but that it was full of little books on the hundred ways of dressing +a pumpkin. Then he gave a wistful look at the <i>ami de la maison</i>, +as if commending the guests to him, and receiving a nod in return, retired.</p> +<p>“I fear we are too early,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Fact is,” said the familiar, whose name Julius was trying +to remember, “there’s been a catastrophe; cook forgot to +order the turkey, went to bed last night in hysterics, and blew out +the gas instead of turning it off. No, no”—as the +guests expecting fatal consequences, looked as if they thought they +had better remove themselves: “she came round, and Duncombe has +driven over to Backsworth to bring home the dinner. He’ll +soon be back.”</p> +<p>This not appearing greatly to reassure the visitors, the Professor +added, “No, no, ladies. Mrs. Duncombe charged me to say +that she will be perfectly fixed in a short time, and I flatter myself +that my wife is equal to any emergency.”</p> +<p>“It is very kind in her,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“I confess,” said Professor Tallboys, “that I am +not sorry that such an occasion should occur of showing an American +lady’s domestic powers. I flatter myself they do not discredit +her cause.”</p> +<p>Just then were heard the wheels of the drag, and in rushed one of +the boys, grasping Eleonora’s skirts, and proclaiming, “We’ve +got the grub! Oysters and a pie! Oh my!”</p> +<p>“Satisfactory!” said the friend. “But let +go, Ducky, you are rumpling Miss Vivian.”</p> +<p>“She’s coming to see the quarion! You promised, +Lena! Here’s a jolly crayfish! He’ll pinch!”</p> +<p>There was a small conservatory or glazed niche on one side of the +room, into which the boy dragged Lenore, and Julius followed, dimly +sensible of what the quarion might be, and hoping for a word with the +young lady, while he trusted to his wife to occupy her sister.</p> +<p>The place contained two desolate camellias, with leaves in the same +proportion as those on trees in the earlier ages of illumination, and +one scraggy, leafless geranium, besides a green and stagnant tank, where +a goldfish moved about, flapping and gasping, as the boy disturbed it +in his search for the crayfish. He absorbed all the conversation, +so that Julius could only look back into the room, where an attempt +at artistic effect was still dimly visible through accumulated litter. +The Venus of Milo stood on a bracket, with a riding-whip in her arms, +and a bundle of working society tickets behind her, and her <i>vis-à-vis</i>, +the Faun of Praxiteles, was capped by a glove with one finger pointing +upwards, and had a ball of worsted tangled about his legs; but further +observation was hindered by the man-servant’s voice at the outer +door, “Master Ducky, where are you? Your ma says you are +to go to bed directly.”</p> +<p>“No, no, I’ll put myself to bed!”</p> +<p>“Come, sir, please do, like a good boy—Master Pinney +won’t go without you, and I must put him to bed while they are +dishing up. Come, sir, I’ve got a mince-pie for you.”</p> +<p>“And some oysters—Bobby said I should have some oysters!”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes; come along, sir.”</p> +<p>And Master Ducky submitted to his fate, while Julius looked his wonder, +and asked, “Is he nursery-maid?”</p> +<p>“Just now, since the bonne went,” said Lenore. +“He is a most faithful, attached servant, who will do anything +for them. <i>She</i> does attach people deeply when the first +shock is over.”</p> +<p>“I am coming to believe so,” he answered. “There +seem to me to be excellent elements.”</p> +<p>“I am so glad!” said Lenore; “she is so thorough, +so true and frank; and much of this oddness is really an inconsistent +struggle to keep out of debt.”</p> +<p>“Well! at any rate I am thankful to her for this opportunity +of seeing you,” said Julius. “We have both been longing +to speak our welcome to you.”</p> +<p>“Thank you. It is so kind,” she fervently whispered; +“all the kinder for the state of things that is insisted on—though +you know that it can make no real difference,” she added, apparently +addressing the goldfish.</p> +<p>“Frank knows it,” said Julius, in a low voice.</p> +<p>“I trust he does, though I cannot see him to assure him—you +will?” she added, looking up at him with a shy brightness in her +eye and a flush on her cheek.</p> +<p>“Yes, indeed!” he said, laying his hand on hers for a +moment. “I fear you may both have much to pull through, +but I think you are of a steadfast nature.”</p> +<p>“I hope so—I think I am, for none of my feelings seem +to me ever to change, except that I get harder, and, I am afraid, bitterer.”</p> +<p>“I can understand your feeling that form of trial.”</p> +<p>“Oh, if you could, and would help me!”</p> +<p>“As a brother; if I may.”</p> +<p>Again she laid a hand on his, saying, “I have longed to talk +openly to you ever since we met in the cow-shed; but I could not make +any advance to any of you, because,” she whispered in haste, “I +thought it my duty to hold back from Frank. And now, till we go +away, Camilla watches me and occupies me every minute, will not even +let me ride out with papa. I wonder she lets me talk to you now.”</p> +<p>“We know each other,” said Julius, shortly.</p> +<p>It was so. Once, in the plain-spoken days of childhood, Miles +and Julius had detected Camilla Vivian in some flagrant cheating at +a game, and had roundly expressed their opinion. In the subsequent +period of Raymond’s courtship, Miles had succumbed to the fascination, +but Julius had given one such foil, that she had never again attempted +to cajole him.</p> +<p>“I have seen that you did from the first,” said Lenore. +“And it would make it much easier to talk to you than to any outsider, +who would never understand, even if it were possible for me to explain, +how hard it is to see which way my duty lies—especially filial.”</p> +<p>“Do you mean in general, or in this special matter?”</p> +<p>“Both. You see, in her hands he is so different from +what he was before she came home, that I don’t feel as if I was +obeying him—only her; and I don’t think I am bound to do +that. Not in the great matter, I am clear. Nobody can meddle +with my real sincere pledge of myself to Frank, nobody!” she spoke +as if there was iron in her lips. “But as far as overt acts +go, they have a right to forbid me, till I am of age at least, and we +must bear it.”</p> +<p>“Yes, you are right there.”</p> +<p>“But there are thousands of other little cases of right and +wrong, and altogether I have come to such a spirit of opposition that +I find it easier to resist than to do anything with a good grace.”</p> +<p>“You cannot always tell when resistance is principle, and when +temper or distaste.”</p> +<p>“There’s distaste enough always,” said poor Lenore.</p> +<p>“To gaieties?” he said, amazed as one habituated to his +wife’s ravenous appetite for any sort of society or amusement.</p> +<p>“Of course,” she answered sadly. “A great +deal of trouble just for a little empty babble. Often not one +word worth remembering, and a general sense of having been full of bad +feelings.”</p> +<p>“No enjoyment?” he asked in surprise.</p> +<p>“Only by the merest chance and exception,” she answered, +surprised at his surprise; “what is there to enjoy?”</p> +<p>The peculiar-looking clergyman might have seemed more likely to ask +such a question than the beautiful girl, but he looked at her anxiously +and said, “Don’t nourish morbid dislike and contempt, my +dear Lena, it is not a safeguard. There are such things as perilous +reactions. Try to weigh justly, and be grateful for kindness, +and to like what is likeable.”</p> +<p>At that moment, after what had been an interval of weary famine to +all but these two, host and hostess appeared, the lady as usual, picturesque, +though in the old black silk, with a Roman sash tied transversely, and +holly in her hair; and gaily shaking hands—“That’s +right, Lady Rosamond; so you are trusted here! Your husband hasn’t +sent you to represent him?”</p> +<p>“I’m afraid his confidence in me did not go so far,” +said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Ah! I see—Lady Tyrrell, how d’ye do—you’ve +brought Lena? Well, Rector, are you prepared?”</p> +<p>“That depends on what you expect of me.”</p> +<p>“Have you the convinceable spot in your mind?”</p> +<p>“We must find it. It is very uncommon, and indurates +very soon, so we had better make the most of our opportunity,” +said the American lady, who had entered as resplendent as before, though +in so different a style that Rosamond wondered how such a wardrobe could +be carried about the world; and the sporting friend muttered, “Stunning! +she has been making kickshaws all day, and looks as if she came out +of a bandbox! If all women were like that, it might pay.”</p> +<p>It was true. Mrs. Tallboys was one of those women of resource +whose practical powers may well inspire the sense of superiority, and +with the ease and confidence of her country.</p> +<p>The meal was a real success. That some portion had been procured, +ready dressed, at Backsworth, was evident, but all that had been done +at home had a certain piquant Transatlantic flavour, in which the American +Muse could be detected; and both she and her husband were polished, +lively, and very agreeable, in spite of the twang in their voices. +Miss Moy, the Captain and his friend, talked horses at one end of the +table, and Rosamond faltered her woman’s horror for the rights +of her sex, increased by this supposed instance.</p> +<p>When the ladies rose at dessert, Mrs. Duncombe summoned him: “Come, +Rector!—come, Professor! you’re not to sit over your wine.”</p> +<p>“We rise so far above the ordinary level of manhood!” +said Julius, obediently rising.</p> +<p>“Once for all, Mr. Charnock,” said Mrs. Duncombe, turning +on him with flashing eyes and her Elizabethan majesty, “if you +come prepared to scoff, we can have nothing to do with you.”</p> +<p>Rosamond’s eyes looked mischievous, and her brow cocked, but +Julius answered in earnest, “Really, I assure you I have not come +in a spirit of sarcasm; I am honestly desirous of hearing your arguments.”</p> +<p>“Shall I stay in your stead?” added Miss Moy. “They’ll +be much more amusing here!”</p> +<p>“Come, Gussie, you’re on your good behaviour,” +said Mrs. Duncombe. “Bob kept you to learn the right way +of making a sensation.”</p> +<p>As they entered the drawing-room two more guests arrived, namely, +Joanna Bowater, and Herbert, who walked in with a kind of grim submission, +till he saw Lady Tyrrell, when he lighted up, and, on a little gracious +gesture with her hand, he sat down on the sofa beside her; and was there +solaced by an occasional remark in an undertone; for indeed the boy +was always in a trance wherever she was, and she had a fair amount of +by-play wherewith to entertain herself and him during the discussion.</p> +<p>“You are just in time, Jenny,” said Rosamond; “the +great question is going to be started.”</p> +<p>“And it is—?”</p> +<p>“The Equality of the Sexes,” pronounced Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“<i>Ex cathedrâ</i>?” said Julius, as the graceful +Muse seated herself in a large red arm-chair. “This scene +is not an easy one in which to dispute it.”</p> +<p>“You see, Bessie,” said Mrs. Tallboys, “that men +are so much afraid of the discussion that they try to elude it with +empty compliment under which is couched a covert sneer.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps,” returned Julius, “we might complain +that we can’t open our lips without compliments and sneers being +detected when we were innocent of both.”</p> +<p>“Were you?” demanded Mrs. Tallboys.</p> +<p>“Honestly, I was looking round and thinking the specimens before +us would tell in your favour.”</p> +<p>“What a gallant parson!” cried Miss Moy.</p> +<p>But a perfect clamour broke out from others.</p> +<p>“Julius, that’s too bad! when you know—”</p> +<p>“Mr Charnock, you are quite mistaken. Bob is much cleverer +than I, in his own line—”</p> +<p>“Quite true, Rector,” affirmed Herbert; “Joan has +more brains than all the rest of us—for a woman, I mean.”</p> +<p>“For a woman!” repeated Mrs. Tallboys. “Let +a human being do or be what she will, it is disposed of in a moment +by that one verdict, ‘Very well for a woman!’”</p> +<p>“How is it with the decision of posterity?” said Jenny. +“Can you show any work of woman of equal honour and permanence +with that of men?”</p> +<p>“Because her training has been sedulously inferior.”</p> +<p>“Not always,” said Jenny; “not in Italy in the +cinque cento, nor in England under Elizabeth.”</p> +<p>“Yes, and there were names—!”</p> +<p>“Names, yes, but that is all. The lady’s name is +remembered for the curiosity of her having equalled the ordinary poet +or artist of her time, but her performances either are lost or only +known to curious scholars. They have not the quality which makes +things permanent.”</p> +<p>“What do you say to Sappho?”</p> +<p>“There is nothing of her but a name, and fragments that curious +scholars read.”</p> +<p>“Worse luck to her if she invented Sapphics,” added Herbert.</p> +<p>“One of womankind’s torments for mankind, eh?” +said his neighbour.</p> +<p>“And there are plenty more such,” asserted Mrs. Duncombe, +boldly (for these were asides). “It is only that one can’t +recollect—and the men have suppressed them.”</p> +<p>“I think men praised them,” said Jenny, “and that +we remember the praise, not the works. For instance, Roswitha, +or Olympia Morata, or Vittoria Colonna. Vittoria’s sonnets +are extant, but we only value them as being hers, more for what she +<i>was</i> than for their intrinsic merit.”</p> +<p>“And,” added Eleonora, “men did not suppress Hannah +More, or Joanna Baillie. You know Scott thought Miss Baillie’s +dramas would rank with Shakespeare’s.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Tallboys was better read in logic and mathematics than in history, +and did not follow Jenny, but she turned her adversary’s argument +to her own advantage, by exclaiming, “Are the gentlemen present +familiar with these bright lights?”</p> +<p>“I confess my ignorance of some of them,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“But my youngest brother knows all that,” said Rosamond +at a brave venture.</p> +<p>“Macaulay’s school-boy,” murmured Lady Tyrrell, +softly.</p> +<p>“Let us return to the main point,” said Mrs. Tallboys, +a little annoyed. “It is of the present and future that +I would speak, not of the past.”</p> +<p>“Does not the past give the only data on which to form a conclusion?” +said Julius.</p> +<p>“Certainly not. The proposition is not what a woman or +two in her down-trodden state may have exceptionally effected, but her +natural equality, and in fact superiority, in all but the physical strength +which has imposed an unjust bondage on the higher nature.”</p> +<p>“I hardly know where to meet you if you reject all arguments +from proved facts,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“And the Bible. Why don’t you say the Bible?” +exclaimed his wife in an undertone; but Mrs. Tallboys took it up and +said, “The precepts of Scripture are founded on a state of society +passed away. You may find arguments for slavery there.”</p> +<p>“I doubt that,” said Julius. “There are practical +directions for an existing state of things, which have been distorted +into sanction for its continuance. The actual precepts are broad +principles, which are for all times, and apply to the hired servant +as well as to the slave. So again with the relations of man and +wife; I can nowhere find a command so adapted to the seclusion and depression +of the Eastern woman as to be inapplicable to the Christian matron. +And the typical virtuous woman, the valiant woman, is one of the noblest +figures anywhere depicted.”</p> +<p>“I know,” said Mrs. Tallboys, who had evidently been +waiting impatiently again to declaim, “that men, even ministers +of religion, from Paul if you like downwards, have been willing enough +to exalt woman so long as they claim to sit above her. The higher +the oppressed, so much higher the self-exaltation of the oppressor. +Paul and Peter exalt their virtuous woman, but only as their own appendage, +adorning themselves; and while society with religious ministers at the +head of it call on woman to submit, and degrade the sex, we shall continue +to hear of such disgraces to England as I see in your police reports—brutal +mechanics beating their wives.”</p> +<p>“I fear while physical force is on the side of the brute,” +said Julius, “no abstract recognition of equality would save her.”</p> +<p>“Society would take up her cause, and protect her.”</p> +<p>“So it is willing to do now, if she asks for protection.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” broke in Rosamond, “but nothing would induce +a woman worth sixpence to take the law against her husband.”</p> +<p>“There I think Lady Rosamond has at once demonstrated the higher +nature of the woman,” said Mrs. Tallboys. “What man +would be capable of such generosity?”</p> +<p>“No one denies,” said Julius, “that generous forbearance, +patience, fortitude, and self-renunciation, belong almost naturally +to the true wife and mother, and are her great glory; but would she +not be stripped of them by self-assertion as the peer in power?”</p> +<p>“Turning our flank again with a compliment,” said Mrs. +Duncombe. “These fine qualities are very convenient to yourselves, +and so you praise them up.”</p> +<p>“Not so!” returned Julius, “because they are really +the higher virtues!”</p> +<p>“Patience!” at once exclaimed the American and English +emancipators with some scorn.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Julius, in a low tone of thorough earnest. +“The patience of strength and love is the culmination of virtue.”</p> +<p>Jenny knew what was in his mind, but Mrs. Tallboys, with a curious +tone, half pique, half triumph, said, “You acknowledge this which +you call the higher nature in woman—that is to say, all the passive +qualities,—and you are willing to allow her a finer spiritual +essence, and yet you do not agree to her equal rights. This is +the injustice of the prejudice which has depressed her all these centuries.”</p> +<p>“Stay,” broke in Jenny, evidently not to the lady’s +satisfaction. “That does not state the question. Nobody +denies that woman is often of a higher and finer essence, as you say, +than man, and has some noble qualities in a higher degree than any but +the most perfect men; but that is not the question. It is whether +she have more force and capacity than man, is in fact actually able +to be on an equality.”</p> +<p>“And, I say,” returned Mrs. Tallboys, “that man +has used brute force to cramp woman’s intellect and energy so +long, that she has learnt to acquiesce in her position, and to abstain +from exerting herself, so that it is only where she is partially emancipated, +as in my own country, that any idea of her powers can be gained.”</p> +<p>“I am afraid,” said Julius, “that more may be lost +to the world than is gained! No; I am not speaking from the tyrant +point of view. I am thinking whether free friction with the world +way not lessen that sweetness and tender innocence and purity that make +a man’s home an ideal and a sanctuary—his best earthly influence.”</p> +<p>“This is only sentiment. Innocence is worthless if it +cannot stand alone and protect itself!” said Mrs. Tallboys.</p> +<p>“I do not mean innocence unable to stand alone. It should +be strong and trustworthy, but should have the bloom on it still, not +rubbed off by contact or knowledge of evil. Desire of shielding +that bloom from the slightest breath of contamination is no small motive +for self-restraint, and therefore a great preservative to most men.”</p> +<p>“Women purify the atmosphere wherever they go,” said +the lady.</p> +<p>“Many women do,” returned Julius; “but will they +retain that power universally if they succeed in obtaining a position +where there will be less consideration for them, and they must be exposed +to a certain hardening and roughening process?”</p> +<p>“If so,” exclaimed Mrs. Tallboys, “if men are so +base, we would soon assert ourselves. We are no frail morning +glories for you to guard and worship with restraint, lest forsooth your +natural breath should wither us away.”</p> +<p>As she spoke the door opened, and, with a strong reek of tobacco, +in came the two other gentlemen. “Well, Rector, have you +given in?” asked the Captain. “Is Lady Rosamond to +mount the pulpit henceforth?”</p> +<p>“Ah! wouldn’t I preach you a sermon,” returned +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“To resume,” said Mrs. Tallboys, sitting very upright. +“You still go on the old assumption that woman was made for you. +It is all the same story: one man says she is for his pleasure, another +for his servant, and you, for—for his refinement. You would +all have us adjectives. Now I defy you to prove that woman is +not a substantive, created for herself.”</p> +<p>“If you said ‘growed,’ Mrs. Tallboys, it would +be more consistent,” said Jenny. “Her creation and +her purpose in the world stand upon precisely the same authority.”</p> +<p>“I wonder at you, Miss Bowater,” said Mrs. Tallboys. +“I cannot understand a woman trying to depreciate her sex.”</p> +<p>“No,” thrust in Gussie Moy; “I want to know why +a woman can’t go about without a dowager waddling after her” +(“Thank you,” breathed Lady Tyrrell into Herbert’s +ear), “nor go to a club.”</p> +<p>“There was such a club proposed in London,” said Captain +Duncombe, “and do you know, Gussie, the name of it?”</p> +<p>“No!”</p> +<p>“The Middlesex Club!”</p> +<p>“There! it is just as Mrs. Tallboys said; you will do nothing +but laugh at us, or else talk sentiment about our refining you. +Now, I want to be free to amuse myself.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think those trifling considerations will be +great impediments in your way,” said Lady Tyrrell in her blandest +tone. “Is that actually the carriage? Thank you, Mrs. +Tallboys. This is good-bye, I believe. I am sorry there +has not been more time for a fuller exposition to-night.”</p> +<p>“There would have been, but I never was so interrupted,” +said Mrs. Tallboys in an undertone, with a displeased look at Jenny +at the other end of the room.</p> +<p>Declamation was evidently more the Muse’s forte than argument, +but her aside was an aside, and that of the jockey friend was not. +“So you waited for us to give your part of the lecture, Miss Moy?”</p> +<p>“Of course. What’s the use of talking to a set +of women and parsons, who are just the same?”</p> +<p>Poor Herbert’s indignant flush infinitely amused the party +who were cloaking in the hall. “Poor Gussie; her tongue +runs fast,” said Mrs. Duncombe.</p> +<p>“Emancipated!” said Jenny. “Good-bye, Mrs. +Duncombe. Please let us be educated up to our privileges before +we get them.”</p> +<p>“A Parthian shot, Jenny,” said Julius, as they gave her +a homeward lift in the carriage. “You proved yourself the +fittest memberess for the future parliament to-night.”</p> +<p>“To be elected by the women and parsons,” said Jenny, +with little chuckle of fun. “Poor Herbert!”</p> +<p>“I only wish that girl was a man that I might horsewhip her,” +the clerical sentiment growled out from Herbert’s corner of the +carriage. “Degradation of her sex! She’s a standing +one!”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XX<br /> +Vivienne</h2> +<blockquote><p>Of all the old women that ever I saw,<br /> +Sweet bad luck to my mother in law.—Irish Song</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The Parliamentary Session had reached the stage that is ended by +no power save that of grouse, and the streets were full of vans fantastically +decorated with baths, chairs, bedsteads, and nursery gear.</p> +<p>Cecil could see two before different house-doors as she sat behind +her muslin curtains, looking as fresh and healthful as ever, and scarcely +more matronly, except that her air of self-assertion had become more +easy and less aggressive now that she was undisputed mistress of the +house in London.</p> +<p>There was no concern on her part that she was not the mother of either +of the two latest scions of the house of Charnock. Certainly she +did not like to be outdone by Rosamond; but then it was only a girl, +and she could afford to wait for the son and heir; indeed, she did not +yet desire him at the cost of all the distinguished and intellectual +society, the concerts, <i>soirées</i>, and lectures that his +non-arrival left her free to enjoy. The other son and heir interested +her nearly, for he was her half-brother. There had been something +almost ludicrous in the apologies to her. His mother seemed to +feel like a traitor to her, and Mr. Charnock could hardly reconcile +his darling’s deposition with his pride in the newcomer. +Both she and Raymond had honestly rejoiced in their happiness and the +continuance of the direct line of Dunstone, and had completed the rejoicing +of the parents by thorough sympathy, when the party with this unlooked-for +addition had returned home in the spring. Mrs. Charnock had insisted +on endowing his daughter as largely as he justly could, to compensate +for this change in her expectations, and was in doubt between Swanmore, +an estate on the Backsworth side of Willansborough, and Sirenwood itself, +to purchase and settle on her. Raymond would greatly have preferred +Sirenwood, both from its adjoining the Compton property and as it would +be buying out the Vivians; but there were doubts about the involvements, +and nothing could be done till Eleonora’s majority. Mr. +Charnock preferred Swanmore as an investment, and Raymond could, of +course, not press his wishes.</p> +<p>A short visit had been made at Dunstone to join in the festivities +in honour of the little heir, but Cecil had not been at Compton since +Christmas, though Raymond had several times gone home for a Sunday when +she had other companionship. Charlie had been with them preparing +his outfit for India whither he had been gone about a month; and Frank, +though living in lodgings, was the more frequently at his sister-in-law’s +service, because wherever she was the Vivian sisters might be looked +for.</p> +<p>No sooner had Raymond taken the house in --- Square than Lady Tyrrell +had engaged the opposite one, so that one household could enjoy evening +views of the other’s interior, and Cecil had chiefly gone into +society under her friend’s auspices. Her presentation at +Court had indeed been by the marchioness; she had been staying with +an old friend of Mrs. Poynsett’s, quite prepared to be intimate +with Raymond Poynsett’s wife, if only Cecil would have taken to +her. But that lady’s acceptance of any one recommended in +this manner was not to be thought of, and besides, the family were lively, +merry people, and Cecil was one of those who dislike and distrust laughter, +lest it should be at themselves. So she remained on coldly civil +terms with that pleasant party, and though to a certain degree following +her husband’s lead as to her engagements, all her ways were moulded +by her friend’s influence. Nor was the effect otherwise +than becoming. Nothing could be in better taste than all in Mrs. +Charnock Poynsett’s establishment, and London and Lady Tyrrell +together had greatly improved her manners. All her entertainments +went off well, and she filled her place in the world with grace and +skill, just as she had always figured herself doing.</p> +<p>Yet there was a sense of disappointment and dissatisfaction, which +increased upon her as the time drew nearer for returning to be again +only a guest in her married home. It was a tangible grievance +on which her mind could fix itself. Surely it was hard on her +that her husband should require it of her, and yet she perceived that +he could not avoid it, since his mother was mistress. She knew +too that he was unfailingly kind, attentive, and indulgent, except on +that one occasion when he had sharply reproved her for her behaviour +in the Tallboys matter; and strange to say, a much stronger feeling +towards him had been setting in ever since that one time when she had +seen him thoroughly angry. She longed and craved to stir that +even, gentle courtesy to frowns or smiles; and yet there was a perversity +in her nature that seem to render it impossible to her to attempt to +win a smile from him, far more so to lay aside any device or desire +of her own to gratify him. All she did know was, that to be all +that her ambition had sought, a Charnock by marriage as well as birth, +and with a kind, considerate husband, was not enough to hinder a heartsickness +she had never known or supposed possible.</p> +<p>Presently, through the flowers in her balcony, Cecil saw the opening +and closing of the opposite house-door, and a white parasol unfurled, +and she had only time to finish and address her letter to Mrs. Duncombe +before Lady Tyrrell was announced.</p> +<p>“Here I am after a hard morning’s work, winding up accounts, +&c.”</p> +<p>“You go to-morrow?”</p> +<p>“Yes, trusting that you will soon follow; though you might +be a cockney born, your bloom is town-proof.”</p> +<p>“We follow as soon as the division on the Education Question +is over, and that will not be for ten days. You are come to look +at my stores for the bazaar; but first, what are you going to do this +afternoon?”</p> +<p>“What are your plans?”</p> +<p>“I must leave cards at half-a-dozen people’s at the other +end of the park. Will you come with me? Where is Lenore?”</p> +<p>“She is gone to take leave of the Strangeways’ party; +Lady Susan insisted on having her for this last day. Poor Frank! +I confess impartially that it does not look well for him.”</p> +<p>“Poor Frank!” repeated Cecil, “he does look very +forlorn when he hears where she is.”</p> +<p>“When, after all, if the silly boy could only see it, it is +the most fortunate thing that could happen to him, and the only chance +of keeping his head above water. I have made Lady Susan promise +me two of her daughters for the bazaar. They thoroughly know how +to make themselves useful. Oh, how pretty!”</p> +<p>For Cecil was producing from the shelves of various pieces of furniture +a large stock of fancy articles—Swiss carvings, Spa toys, Genevese +ornaments, and Japanese curiosities, which, as Lady Tyrrell said, “rivalled +her own accumulation, and would serve to carry off the housewives and +pen-wipers on which all the old maids of Wil’sbro’ were +employed.”</p> +<p>“We must put out our programmes,” Cecil added; “people +will not work in earnest till the day is fixed and they know the sellers.”</p> +<p>“Yes, the lady patronesses are most important,” said +Lady Tyrrell, writing them down: “Mrs. Raymond Charnock Poynsett; +Lady Rosamond, eh?”</p> +<p>“Oh no, Julius won’t hear of it.”</p> +<p>“And opposition is sweet: so we lose her romantic name, and +the stall of the three brides. Mrs. Miles Charnock is too much +out of the world to be worth asking. Then myself—Mrs. Duncombe, +Mrs. Fuller, as a matter of necessity, Mrs. Moy.”</p> +<p>“Oh!”</p> +<p>“Needful, my dear, to propitiate that set. Also that +mayoress, Mrs. Truelove, isn’t she? Six. We’ll +fill up with country people!”</p> +<p>Six more distinguished names were soon supplied of ladies who would +give their patronage, provided neither toil nor care was required of +them; and still consulting, the two friends took their seats in the +carriage. The time of the bazaar was to be fixed by the opening +of the town-hall, which was to take place on the 12th of September—a +Thursday, the week before the races; and the most propitious days appeared +to be the Tuesday and Wednesday before the Great Backsworth Cup Day, +since the world would then be in an excited, pleasure-seeking state, +favourable to their designs.</p> +<p>“I shall have a party in the house,” said Lady Tyrrell: +“shall you be able?”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell; you know it does not depend on me, and +I certainly shall not ask it as a favour. Camilla, did I tell +you that I tried to make my father understand the state of things, and +speak to Raymond? But he would only say, that while I am so young +and inexperienced, it is a great advantage for me to live with Mrs. +Poynsett, and that I must be the greatest comfort to her. Papa +is an intense believer in Mrs. Poynsett, and when he once has taken +up a notion nothing will convince him.”</p> +<p>“You can’t even make capital of this purchase of a house +of your own?”</p> +<p>“I don’t like to do that.”</p> +<p>“My dear, I see your delicacy and forbearance, and I would +not urge you, if I did not see how deeply your happiness is concerned. +Of course I don’t mean merely the authority over the <i>wirthschaft</i>, +though somehow the cares of it are an ingredient in female contentment; +but forgive me, Cecil, I am certain that you will never take your right +place—where you care for it more—till you have a home of +your own.”</p> +<p>“Ah!” The responsive sound burst from the very +depths of Cecil’s heart, penetrated as they had never been before; +but pride and reserve at once sprang up, and she answered coldly, “I +have no reason to complain.”</p> +<p>“Right, my dear Cecil, I like you the better;” and she +pressed her hand.</p> +<p>“It is quite true,” said Cecil, withdrawing hers.</p> +<p>“Quite, absolutely true. He would die rather than give +you any reason for the slightest murmur; but, Cecil, dearest, that very +heedfulness shows there is something he cannot give you.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know why you should say so,” answered +a proud but choked voice.</p> +<p>“I say so,” replied the clear tones, firmly, though with +a touch of pity, “because I see it. Cecil, poor child, they +married you very young!”</p> +<p>“I missed nothing,” exclaimed Cecil; but she felt that +she could only say so in the past, and her eyes burnt with unshed tears.</p> +<p>“No, my dear, you were still a girl, and your deeper woman’s +heart had not grown to perceive that it was not met.”</p> +<p>“He chose me,” she faintly said.</p> +<p>“His mother needed a daughter. It was proper for him +to marry, and you were the most eligible party. I will answer +for it that he warned you how little he could give.”</p> +<p>“He did,” cried Cecil. “He did tell me that +he could not begin in freshness and warmth, like a young man; but I +thought it only meant that we were too sensible to care about nonsense, +and liked him for it. He always must have been staid and reserved—he +could never have been different, Camilla. Don’t smile in +that way! Tell me what you mean.”</p> +<p>“My dear Cecil, I knew Raymond Poynsett a good many years before +you did.”</p> +<p>“And—well? Then he had a first love?” said +Cecil, in a voice schooled into quiet. “Was he different +then? Was he as desperate as poor Frank is now?”</p> +<p>“Frank is a very mild copy of him at that age. He overbore +every one, wrung consent from all, and did everything but overcome his +mother’s calm hostility and self-assertion.”</p> +<p>“Did that stop it? She died of course,” said Cecil. +“She could not have left off loving him.”</p> +<p>“She did not die, but her family were wearied out by the continual +objections to their overtures, and the supercilious way of treating +them. They thought it a struggle of influence, and that he was +too entirely dominated for a daughter-in-law to be happy with her. +So they broke it off.”</p> +<p>“And she—” Cecil looked up with searching eyes.</p> +<p>“She had acutely felt the offence, the weakness, the dutifulness, +whatever you may choose to call it, and in the rebound she married.”</p> +<p>“Who is she?” gasped Cecil.</p> +<p>“It is not fair to tell you,” was the gentle answer, +with a shade of rebuke. “You need not look for her. +She is not in the county.”</p> +<p>“I hope I shall never see her!”</p> +<p>“You need not dread doing so if you can only have fair play, +and establish the power that belongs rightly to you. She would +have no chance with you, even if he had forgiven her.”</p> +<p>“Has not he?”</p> +<p>“Never!”</p> +<p>“And he used up all his heart?” said Cecil in a low, +musing tone.</p> +<p>“All but what his mother absorbed. She was a comparatively +young and brilliant woman, and she knew her power. It is a great +ascendancy, and only a man’s honest blindness could suppose that +any woman would be content under it.”</p> +<p>Cecil’s tongue refused to utter what oppressed her heart—those +evenings beside the sofa, those eager home expeditions for Sunday, the +uniform maintenance of his mother’s supremacy.</p> +<p>“And you think absence from her would lessen her influence?”</p> +<p>“I am sure of it. There might be a struggle, but if I +know Mr. Charnock Poynsett rightly, he is too upright not to be conscious +of what is due to you, and be grieved not to be able to give you more—that +is, when his mother is not holding him in her grasp. Nor can there +be any valid objection, since Mrs Miles Charnock is always at her service.”</p> +<p>“She will return to Africa. I don’t know why she +and Rosamond have been always so much more acceptable.”</p> +<p>“They are not her rivals; besides, they have not your strength. +She is a woman who tries to break whatever she cannot bend, and the +instant her son began to slip from her grasp the contest necessarily +began. You had much better have it over once and for ever, and +have him on your side. Insist on a house of your own, and when +you have made your husband happy in it, then, then—Ah! Good +morning—Sir George!”</p> +<p>She had meant to say, “Then you win his heart,” but the +words would not come, and a loathing hatred of the cold-hearted child +who had a property in Raymond so mastered her that she welcomed the +interruption, and did not return to the subject.</p> +<p>She knew when she had said enough, and feared to betray herself; +nor could Cecil bear to resume the talk, stunned and sore as she was +at the revelation, though with no suspicion that the speaker had been +the object of her husband’s affection. She thought it must +have been the other sister, now in India, and that this gave the key +to many allusions she had heard and which she marvelled at herself for +not having understood. The equivocation had entirely deceived +her, and she little thought she had been taking counsel with the rival +who was secretly triumphing in Raymond’s involuntary constancy, +and sowing seeds of vengeance against an ancient enemy.</p> +<p>She could not settle to anything when she came home. Life had +taken a new aspect. Hitherto she had viewed herself as born to +all attention and deference, and had taken it as a right, and now she +found herself the victim of a <i>mariage de convenance</i> to a man +of exhausted affections, who meant her only to be the attendant of his +domineering mother. The love that was dawning in her heart did +but add poignancy to the bitterness of the revelation, and fervour to +her resolve to win the mastery over the heart which was her lawful possession.</p> +<p>She was restless till his return. She was going to an evening +party, and though usually passive as to dress, she was so changeable +and difficult to satisfy that Grindstone grew cross, and showed it by +stern, rigid obedience. And Cecil well knew that Grindstone; who +was in authority in the present house, hated the return to be merely +the visitor of Alston and Jenkins.</p> +<p>In the drawing-room Cecil fluttered from book to window, window to +piano again, throwing down her occupation at every sound and taking +up another; and when at last Raymond came in, his presence at first +made her musings seem mere fancies.</p> +<p>Indeed it would have been hard to define what was wanting in his +manner. He lamented his unavoidable delay, and entertained her +with all the political and parliamentary gossip he had brought home, +and which she always much enjoyed as a tribute to her wisdom, so much +that it had been an entire, though insensible cure for the Rights of +Woman. Moreover, he was going with her to this ‘drum,’ +though he would greatly have preferred the debate, and was to be summoned +in case of a division. She knew enough of the world to be aware +that such an attentive and courteous husband was not the rule. +But what was courtesy to one who longed for unity?</p> +<p>“Is Frank to be there this evening?” he asked.</p> +<p>“Yes, I believe so.”</p> +<p>“I thought he was to have gone with us.”</p> +<p>“He told me not to depend on him. He had made an engagement +to ride into the country with Sir Harry Vivian.” And she +added, though the proud spirit so hated what seemed to her like making +an advance that it sounded like a complaint, “So you can’t +avoid going with me?”</p> +<p>“I should any way have gone with you, but I may have to leave +you to Frank to see you away,” he said. “And I had +rather have Frank here than with that set.”</p> +<p>“Breaking up one of our few <i>tête-à-tête</i> +evenings, and they are becoming few enough!”</p> +<p>This murmur gratified him, and he said, “We shall be more alone +together now. The Rectory is almost ready, and Julius means to +move in another week, and I suppose Miles will carry Anne off before +the year is over.”</p> +<p>“Yes, we are the only ones with no home.”</p> +<p>“Rather, we hold fast to the old home.”</p> +<p>“Not my old home.”</p> +<p>“Does not mine become yours?”</p> +<p>“Not while—.” She paused and started afresh. +“Raymond, could we not live at Swanslea, if it is bought for us?”</p> +<p>“Swanslea! Five miles off! Impossible.”</p> +<p>Cecil was silent.</p> +<p>“My dear Cecil,” he said, after a few moments’ +consideration, “I can understand that you felt unfortunately crowded +last year, but all that is over, and you must see that we are necessary +to my mother, and that all my duties require me to live at home.”</p> +<p>“You could attend to the property from Swanslea.”</p> +<p>“The property indeed! I meant my mother!”</p> +<p>“She has Anne.”</p> +<p>“Anne will soon be in Africa—even if she were more of +a companion. I am sorry it is a trial to you; for my proper place +is clearly with my mother, the more in her helpless state, and with +my brothers gone out into the world. Now that the numbers are +smaller, you will find it much easier to take the part that I most earnestly +wish should be yours.”</p> +<p>“I cannot get on with her.”</p> +<p>“Do not say so! Do not think so! To have Rosamond +there with her Irish ease, and her reserve, kept you in the background +before; I say it, but I could not help it; and now there will be no +hindrance to your drawing together. There is nothing I so desire.”</p> +<p>If the carriage had not stopped as he spoke Cecil would not have +uttered the thought that smote her, namely, that his desire was on behalf, +not of his wife, but of his mother, to whom he was ready to sacrifice +her happiness without a pang. She did not see that he could imagine +no greater happiness for her than a thorough love of his mother.</p> +<p>They certainly were not the happiest couple present as they walked +up-stairs, looking like a model husband and wife, with their name echoing +from landing to landing.</p> +<p>If any expression savouring of slang could possibly be applied to +Raymond, he might be said to be struck all of a heap by his wife’s +proposition. He had never even thought of the possibility of making +a home anywhere but at Compton Poynsett, or of his wife wishing that +he should do so; and proverbial sayings about the incompatability of +relatives-in-law suddenly assumed a reasonableness that he could not +bear to remember.</p> +<p>But his courtesy and sense of protection, trained by a woman of the +old school, would not suffer him to relax his attention to his wife. +Though he was very anxious to get back to the house, he would not quit +her neighbourhood till he had found Frank and intrusted her to him.</p> +<p>He was not happy about Frank. The youth was naturally of an +intellectual and poetical temperament, and had only cared for horses +and field-sports as any healthy lad growing up in a country house must +enjoy them; and Raymond had seen him introduced to the style of men +whom he thought would be thoroughly congenial to him, and not unlikely +to lead him on to make a mark in the world.</p> +<p>But that unfortunate Vivian attachment stood in the way; Sir Harry +and his elder daughter ignored it entirely, but did not forbid Frank +the house; though Lady Tyrrell took care, as only she could do, that +Eleonora should never have ten minutes private conversation with him, +either at home or abroad. Even in a crowd, a ball, or garden-party, +the vigilant sister had her means of breaking into any kind of confidence; +and Frank was continually tantalized by the pursuit. It could +not but unsettle him, and draw him into much more gaiety than was compatible +with the higher pursuits his mother had expected of him; and what was +worse, it threw him into Sir Harry Vivian’s set, veteran <i>roués</i>, +and younger men who looked up to their knowingness and listened to their +good stories.</p> +<p>What amount of harm it was doing Raymond could not guess. He +had known it all himself, and had escaped unscathed, but he did not +fear the less for his younger brother, and he only hoped that the inducement +to mingle with such society would be at an end before Frank had formed +a taste for the habits that there prevailed.</p> +<p>Eleonora Vivian had been much admired at first, but her cold manner +kept every one at a distance, and her reserve was hardly ever seen to +relax. However, her one friendship with the Strangeways family +gave Raymond hopes that her constancy was not proof against the flattering +affection, backed by wealth, that seemed to await her there. The +best he could wish for Frank was that the infatuation might be over +as soon as possible, though he pitied the poor fellow sincerely when +he saw him, as he did to-night, waiting with scarcely concealed anxiety +while Miss Vivian stood listening to a long discourse about yachting +from an eager pair of chattering girls.</p> +<p>Then some break occurred, and Frank moved up to her. “Your +last evening! How little I have seen of you!”</p> +<p>“Little indeed!”</p> +<p>“I called, but you were at the Strangeways’.”</p> +<p>“They are very kind to me. When is your holiday?”</p> +<p>“Not till spring, but I may get a few days in the autumn: you +will be at home?”</p> +<p>“As far as I know.”</p> +<p>“If I thought for a moment you cared to see me; but you have +shown few signs of wishing it of late.”</p> +<p>“Frank—if I could make you understand—”</p> +<p>They were walking towards a recess, when Lady Tyrrell fastened upon +Raymond. “Pray find my sister; she forgets that we have +to be at Lady Granby’s—Oh! are you there, Lenore! +Will you see her down, Mr. Poynsett? Well, Frank, did you get +as far as you intended?”</p> +<p>And she went down on his arm, her last words being, “Take care +of yourself till we meet at home. For this one year I call Sirenwood +home—then!”</p> +<p>Raymond and Lenore said no more to one another. The ladies +were put into the carriage. The elder brother bade Frank take +care of Cecil, and started for Westminster with the poor lad’s +blank and disappointed face still before his eyes, hoping at least it +was well for him, but little in love with life, or what it had to offer.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXI<br /> +Awfully Jolly</h2> +<blockquote><p>When life becomes a spasm,<br /> + And history a whiz,<br /> +If that is not sensation,<br /> + I don’t know what it is.—LEWIS CARROLL</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Is Lady Rosamond at home?”</p> +<p>“No, ma’am.”</p> +<p>“Nor Mrs. Charnock?”</p> +<p>“No, ma’am; they are both gone down to the Rectory.”</p> +<p>“Would you ask whether Mrs. Poynsett would like to see me?”</p> +<p>“I’ll inquire, ma’am, if you will walk in,” +said Mr. Jenkins moved by the wearied and heated looks of Miss Vivian, +who had evidently come on foot at the unseasonable visiting hour of +11.15 a.m.</p> +<p>The drawing-room was empty, but, with windows open on the shady side, +was most inviting to one who had just become unpleasantly aware that +her walking capacity had diminished under the stress of a London season, +and that a very hampering one. She was glad of the rest, but it +lasted long enough to be lost in the uncomfortable consciousness that +hers was too truly a morning call, and she would have risen and escaped +had not that been worse.</p> +<p>At last the door of communication opened, and to her amazement Mrs. +Poynsett was pushed into the room by her maid in a wheeled chair. +“Yes, my dear,” she said, in reply to Eleonora’s exclamation +of surprise and congratulation, “this is my dear daughters’ +achievement; Rosamond planned and Anne contrived, and they both coaxed +my lazy bones.”</p> +<p>“I am so very glad! I had no notion I should see you +out of your room.”</p> +<p>“Such is one’s self-importance! I thought the fame +would have reached you at least.”</p> +<p>“Ah, you don’t know how little I see of any one I can +hear from! And now I am afraid I have disturbed you too early.”</p> +<p>“Oh no, my dear; it was very good and kind, and I am only grieved +that you had so long to wait; but we will make the most of each other +now. You will stay to luncheon?”</p> +<p>“Thank you, indeed I am afraid I must not: papa would not like +it, for no one knows where I am.”</p> +<p>“You have taken this long walk in the heat, and are going back! +I don’t like it, my dear; you look fagged. London has not +agreed with you.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett rang her little hand-bell, and ordered in biscuits +and wine, and would have ordered the carriage but for Lenore’s +urgent entreaties to the contrary, amounting to an admission that she +wished her visit to be unnoticed at home. This was hardly settled +before there was a knock at the door, announcing baby’s daily +visit; and Miss Julia was exhibited by her grandmamma with great satisfaction +until another interruption came, in a call from the doctor, who only +looked in occasionally, and had fallen on this unfortunate morning.</p> +<p>“Most unlucky,” said Mrs. Poynsett. “I am +afraid you will doubt about coming again, and I have not had one word +about our Frankie.”</p> +<p>“He is very well. I saw him at a party the night before +we left town. Good-bye, dear Mrs. Poynsett.”</p> +<p>“You will come again?”</p> +<p>“If I can; but the house is to be full of visitors. If +I don’t, you will know it is because I can’t.”</p> +<p>“I shall be thankful for whatever you can give me. I +wish I could save you that hot walk in the sun.”</p> +<p>But as Mrs. Poynsett was wheeled into her own room some compensation +befell Eleonora, for she met Julius in the hall, and he offered to drive +her to the gates of Sirenwood in what he called ‘our new plaything, +the pony carriage,’ on his way to a clerical meeting.</p> +<p>“You are still here?” she said.</p> +<p>“Till Tuesday, when we go to the Rectory to receive the two +De Lancey boys for the holidays.”</p> +<p>“How Mrs. Poynsett will miss you.”</p> +<p>“Anne is a very efficient companion,” said Julius, speaking +to her like one of the family; “the pity is that she will be so +entirely lost to us when Miles claims her.”</p> +<p>“Then they still mean to settle in Africa?”</p> +<p>“Her heart has always been there, and her father is in treaty +for a farm for him, so I fear there is little hope of keeping them. +I can’t think what the parish will do without her. By the +bye, how does Joe Reynolds get on with his drawings?”</p> +<p>“I must show them to you. He is really very clever. +We sent him to the School of Art twice a week, and he has got on wonderfully. +I begin to believe in my academician.”</p> +<p>“So you don’t repent?”</p> +<p>“I think not. As far as I can judge he is a good boy +still. I make him my escort to church, so that I am sure of him +there. Renville would have taken him for a boy about his studio, +and I think he will go there eventually; but Camilla thinks he may be +an attraction at the bazaar, and is making him draw for it.”</p> +<p>“I was in hopes that the bazaar would have blown over, but +the Bishop has been demanding of Fuller and his churchwardens how soon +they mean to put the building in hand, and this seems to be their only +notion of raising money.”</p> +<p>“I am very glad of this opportunity of asking what you think +I had better do about it. Your wife takes no part in it?”</p> +<p>“Certainly not; but I doubt whether that need be a precedent +for you. I am answerable for her, and you could hardly keep out +of it without making a divided household.”</p> +<p>“I see the difference, and perhaps I have made myself quite +unpleasant enough already.”</p> +<p>“As the opposition?”</p> +<p>“And Camilla has been very kind in giving me much more freedom +than I expected, and pacifying papa. She let me go every Friday +evening to help Lady Susan Strangeways at her mothers’ meeting.”</p> +<p>“Lady Susan Strangeways! I have heard of her.”</p> +<p>“She has been my comforter and help all this time. She +is all kindness and heartiness,—elbow-deep in everything good. +She got up at five o’clock to finish the decorations at St. Maurice’s, +and to-day she is taking five hundred school-children to Windsor forest.”</p> +<p>“Is she the mother of the young man at Backsworth?”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Eleonora, in rather a different tone. +“Perhaps she goes rather far; and he has flown into the opposite +extreme, though they say he is improving, and has given up the turf, +and all that sort of thing.”</p> +<p>“Was he at home? I heard he was on leave.”</p> +<p>“He was said to be at home, but I hardly ever saw him. +He was always out with his own friends when I was there.”</p> +<p>“I should not suppose Lady Susan’s pursuits were much +in his line. Is not one of the daughters a Sister?”</p> +<p>“Yes, at St. Faith’s. She was my great friend. +The younger ones are nice girls, but have not much in them. Camilla +is going to have them down for the bazaar.”</p> +<p>“What, do they patronize bazaars?”</p> +<p>“Everything that is <i>doing</i> they patronize. I have +known them be everywhere, from the Drawing-room to a Guild-meeting in +a back slum, and all with equal appetite. That is one reason why +I fear I shall not see much of your mother; they are never tired, and +I shall never get out alone. The house is to be full of people, +and we are to be very gay.”</p> +<p>She spoke with a tone that betrayed how little pleasure she expected, +though it strove to be uncomplaining; and Julius, who had learnt something +of poor Frank’s state of jealous misery, heartily wished the Strangeways +family further, regarding the intimacy as a manœuvre of Lady Tyrrell’s, +and doubting how far all Eleonora’s evident struggles would keep +her out of the net; and though while talking to her he had not the slightest +doubt of her sincerity, he had not long set her down at the lodge before +he remembered that she was a Vivian.</p> +<p>Meantime Rosamond, carrying some medicament to old Betty Reynolds, +found the whole clan in excitement at the appearance of Joe in all his +buttons, looking quite as honest and innocent, though a good deal more +civilized, than when he was first discovered among the swine.</p> +<p>“Only to think,” said his great-grandmother, “that +up in London all they could gie to he was a bad penny.”</p> +<p>“It is the bronze medal, my lady,” said Joshua, with +a blush; “the second prize for crayons in our section.”</p> +<p>“Indeed,” cried Rosamond. “You are a genius, +Joe, worthy of your namesake. There are many that would be proud +to have the grandson you have, Betty.”</p> +<p>“Tubby sure,” added an aunt-in-law, “’tis +cheap come by. Such things to make a young lad draught. +They ought to be ashamed of themselves, they did oughter. Shut +it up, Josh; don’t be showing it to the lady—’tis +nothing but the bare back of a sweep.”</p> +<p>“My lady and Miss Vivian have seen it,” said Joshua, +blushing. “’Tis torso, my lady, from a cast from the +museum.”</p> +<p>“A black-looking draught,” repeated the grandmother. +“I tells Joe if he drawed like King Geaarge’s head up at +Wil’sbro’ on the sign, with cheeks like apples, and a gould +crown atop, he’d arn his bread.”</p> +<p>“All in good time, Betty. He can’t colour till +he can draw. I’m glad to see him looking so well.”</p> +<p>“Yes, my lady, he do have his health torrablish, though he +lives in a underground sort of a place; and they fine servants puts +upon he shameful.”</p> +<p>“Granny!” muttered Joshua, in expostulation.</p> +<p>“He’s a brave boy, and does not mind roughing it, so +he can get on,” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“And the ladies are very good to me,” said the boy.</p> +<p>“Show Lady Rosamond the draught you did of Miss Vivian, like +a hangel,” suggested the aunt.</p> +<p>The rising artist coloured, saying, “Please, my lady, don’t +name it to no one. I would not have shown it, but little Bess, +she pulled down all my things on the floor when I was not looking. +It is from memory, my lady, as she looks when she’s doing anything +for Sir Harry.”</p> +<p>It was a very lovely sketch—imperfect but full of genius, and +wonderfully catching, the tender, wistful look which was often on Eleonora’s +face, as she waited on her father. Rosamond longed that Frank +should see it; but the page was very shy about it, and his grandmother +contrasted it with the performances of the painter ‘who had draughted +all the farmers’ wives in gould frames for five pound a head; +but satin gownds and gold chains was extry.’</p> +<p>But Joe had brought her a pound of tea, and an ‘image’ +for her mantelpiece, which quite satisfied her, though the image, being +a Parian angel of Thorwaldsen’s, better suited his taste than +its surroundings.</p> +<p>The whole scene served Rosamond for a narrative in her most lively +style for Mrs. Poynsett’s amusement that evening. There +was the further excitement of a letter from Miles, and the assurance +that he would be at home in November. Anne had become far less +chary of communications from his letters than she had at first been, +but of this one she kept back so large a portion in public, that the +instant Mrs. Poynsett had bidden them good night and been wheeled away, +Rosamond put a hand on each shoulder, and looking into her face, said, +“Now, Anne, let us hear! Miles has found Archie Douglas. +It is no use pretending. Fie, Mrs. Anne, why can’t you tell +me?”</p> +<p>“I was not to tell any one but Julius.”</p> +<p>“Well, I’m Julius. Besides, wasn’t I at the +very bottom of the tracing him out? Haven’t I the best right +to know whether it is bad or good?”</p> +<p>“Not bad, I am sure,” said Julius, quickly and anxiously.</p> +<p>“Oh, no, not bad,” answered Anne. “He has +seen him—had him on board for a night.”</p> +<p>“Where?”</p> +<p>“Off Durban. But this whole sheet about it is marked +‘Private—only for Julius,’ so I could say nothing +about it before your mother. I have hardly glanced at it myself +as yet, but I think he says Mr. Douglas made him promise not to tell +her or Joanna Bowater.”</p> +<p>“Not tell Jenny!” cried Rosamond. “And you +said it was not bad. He must have gone and married!”</p> +<p>“I do not think that is it,” said Anne; “but you +shall hear. Miles says:—‘I have at last seen our poor +Cousin Archie. I told you I was following up your brother Sandie’s +hint about the agents for the hunters; and at last I fell in with a +merchant, who, on my inquiry, showed me an invoice that I could have +sworn to as in Archie’s hand, and described his white hair. +It seems he has been acting as manager on an ostrich farm for the last +three years, far up the country. So I lost no time in sending +up a note to him, telling him, if he had not forgotten old times, to +come down and see me while I was lying off Durban Bay. I heard +no more for ten days, and had got in the stores and was to sail the +next day, thinking he had given us all up, when a boat hailed us just +come over the bar. I saw Archie’s white head, and in ten +minutes I had him on deck. ‘For Heaven’s sake—am +I cleared, Miles?’ was the first thing he said; and when I could +not say that he was, it went to my heart to see how the eager look sank +away, and he was like a worn-down man of fifty. Poor fellow, I +found he had ridden two hundred miles, with the hope that I had brought +him news that his innocence was proved, and the revulsion was almost +more than he could bear. You see, he had no notion that we thought +him dead, and so he took the entire absence of any effort to trace him +as acquiescence in his guilt; and when he found out how it was, he laid +me under the strongest injunctions to disclose to no one that he is +living—not that he fears any results, but that he says it would +only disturb every one and make them wretched—”</p> +<p>“He must have gone and married. The wretch!” broke +in Rosamond.</p> +<p>“No, oh no!” cried Anne. “Only hear the rest. +‘I told him that I could not see that at all, and that there was +a very warm and tender remembrance of him among us all, and he nearly +broke down and said, ‘For Heaven’s sake then, Miles, let +them rest in that! There’s more peace for them so.’ +I suppose I looked—I am sure I did not speak—as though I +were a little staggered as to whether he were ashamed to be known; for +he drew himself up in the old way I should have known anywhere, and +told me there was no reason I should fear to shake hands with him; however +his name might be blasted at home, he had done nothing to make himself +unworthy of his mother and Jenny—and there was a sob again. +So I let him know that up to my last letters from home Jenny was unmarried. +I even remembered those descriptive words of yours, Nannie, ‘living +in patient peacefulness and cheerfulness on his memory.’”</p> +<p>“I was called on deck just then, so I gave him my home photograph-book, +and left him with it. I found him crying like a child over it +when I came back; I was obliged to strip it of all my best for him, +for I could not move him. We went through the whole of the old +story, to see if there were any hope; and when he found that Tom Vivian +was dead, and George Proudfoot too, without a word about him, he seemed +to think it hopeless. He believes that Proudfoot at least, if +not Moy, was deeply in debt to Vivian, though not to that extent, and +that Vivian probably incited them to ‘borrow’ from my mother’s +letter. He was very likely to undertake to get the draft cashed +for them, and not to account for the difference. It may have helped +to hasten his catastrophe. Moy I never should have suspected; +Archie says he should once have done so as little; but he was a plausible +fellow, and would do things on the sly, while all along appearing to +old Proudfoot as a mentor to George. Archie seemed to feel his +prosperity the bitterest pill of all—reigning like one of the +squirearchy at Proudfoot Lawn—a magistrate forsooth, with his +daughter figuring as an heiress. One thing worth note—Archie +says, that when it was too late, he remembered that the under-clerk, +Gadley, might not have gone home, and might have heard him explain that +the letter had turned up.’”</p> +<p>“Gadley? Why that’s the landlord of the ‘Three +Pigeons!’” exclaimed Rosamond. “It is Mr. Moy’s +house, and he supports him through thick and thin.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Julius, “the magistrates have been +on the point of taking away his license, but Moy always stands up for +him. There is something suspicious in that.”</p> +<p>“I heard Miss Moy, with my own ears, tell Mrs. Duncombe that +he was the apple of her father’s eye,” cried Rosamond.</p> +<p>“He’s bribed! he’s bribed! Oh, I see it all. +Well, go on, Anne. If Archie isn’t at home before he is +a year older—”</p> +<p>Anne went on. “‘He allowed that he would have done +more wisely in facing it out and standing his trial; but he said, poor +fellow, that he felt as if the earth had given way under him. +There was not a soul near who believed him; they brought his father’s +history against him, and moreover he had been at the races, and had +been betting, though in fact he had won, and not lost, and the 20<i>1</i>. +he had become possessed of was his capital, besides the little he could +draw out of the bank</p> +<p>“‘If he could only have seen Jenny in London she would +have turned him back. Indeed, that first stage was to consult +her, but he fancied he saw the face of the Wil’sbro’ Superintendent +in a cab, and the instinct of avoiding arrest carried him to Southampton, +where he got a steerage berth in a sailing vessel, and came out to the +Cape. He has lived hard enough, but his Scots blood has stood +him in good stead, and he has made something as an ivory-hunter, and +now has a partnership in an ostrich farm in the Amatongula country. +Still he held to it that it was better he should continue dead to all +here, since Mr. Bowater would never forgive him; and the knowledge of +his existence would only hinder Jenny’s happiness. You should +have seen the struggle with which he said that! He left me no +choice, indeed; forbade a word to any one, until I suggested that I +had a wife, and that my said wife and Julius had put me on the scent. +He was immensely struck to find that my sweet Nan came from Glen Fraser. +He said the evenings he spent there had done more to renew his home-sickness, +and made him half mad after the sight or sound of us, than anything +else had done, and I got him to promise to come and see us when we are +settled in the bush. What should you say to joining him in ostrich-hatching? +or would it be ministering too much to the vanities of the world? +However, I’ll do something to get him cleared, if it comes to +an appeal to old Moy himself, when I come home. Meantime, remember, +you are not at liberty to speak a word of this to any one but Julius, +and, I suppose, his wife. I hope—’ There, Rose, +I beg your pardon.”</p> +<p>“What does he hope?” asked Rosamond.</p> +<p>“He only hopes she is a cautious woman.”</p> +<p>“As cautious as his Nan, eh? Ah, Anne! you’re a +canny Scot, and maybe think holding your tongue as fine a thing as this +Archie does; but I can’t bear it. I think it is shocking, +just wearing out the heart of the best and sweetest girl in the world.”</p> +<p>“At any rate,” said Julius, “we must be silent. +We have no right to speak, however we may feel.”</p> +<p>“You don’t expect it will stay a secret, or that he’ll +go and pluck ostriches like geese, with Miles and Anne, and nobody know +it? ’Twould be taking example by their ostriches, indeed!”</p> +<p>“I think so,” said Julius, laughing; “but as it +stands now, silence is our duty by both Miles and Archie, and Anne herself. +We must not make her repent having told us.”</p> +<p>“It’s lucky I’m not likely to fall in with Jenny +just yet,” said Rosamond. “Don’t leave me alone +with her, either of you; if you do, it is at your peril. It is +all very well to talk of honour and secrets, but to see the look in +her eyes, and know he is alive, seems to me rank cruelty and heartlessness. +It is all to let Miles have the pleasure of telling when he comes home.”</p> +<p>“Miles is not a woman, nor an Irishwoman,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“But he’s a sailor, and he’s got a feeling heart,” +said Rosamond; “and if he stands one look of Jenny, why, I’ll +disown him for the brother-in-law I take him for. By the bye, +is not Raymond to know?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Anne; “here is a postscript forbidding +my telling him or Mrs. Poynsett.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! And I suppose Herbert knows nothing?”</p> +<p>“Nothing. He was a boy at school at the time. Say +nothing to him, Rose.”</p> +<p>“Oh, no; besides, his brain is all run to cricket.”</p> +<p>It was but too true. When the sun shone bright in April, and +the wickets were set up, Herbert had demonstrated that his influence +was a necessity on the village green; and it was true that his goodly +and animated presence was as useful morally to the eleven as it was +conducive to their triumphs; so his Rector suppressed a few sighs at +the frequency of the practices and the endless matches. Compton +had played Wil’sbro’ and Strawyers, Duddingstone and Woodbury; +the choir had played the school, the single the married; and when hay +and harvest absorbed the rustic eleven, challenges began among their +betters. The officers played the county—Oxonians, Cantabs—Etonians, +Harrovians—and wherever a match was proclaimed, that prime bowler, +the Reverend Herbert Bowater, was claimed as the indispensable champion +of his cause and country.</p> +<p>If his sister had any power to moderate his zeal, she had had little +chance of exercising it; for Mrs. Bowater had had a rheumatic fever +in March, and continued so much of an invalid all the summer that Jenny +seldom went far from home, only saw her brother on his weekly visits +to the sick-room, and was, as Rosamond said, unlikely to become a temptation +to the warm heart and eager tongue.</p> +<p>* * * * *</p> +<p>The week-day congregation were surprised one August morning at eight +o’clock by the entrance of three ladies in the most recent style +of fashionable simplicity, and making the most demonstrative tokens +of reverence. As the Rector came out he was seized upon at once +by the elder lady.</p> +<p>“Mr. Charnock! I must introduce myself; I knew your dear +mother so well when we were both girls. I am so delighted to find +such a church—quite an oasis; and I want to ascertain the best +hour for calling on her. Quite an invalid—I was so shocked +to hear it. Will the afternoon suit her? I am only here +for three days to deposit these two girls, while I take the other on +a round of visits. Three daughters are too great an affliction +for one’s friends, and Bee and Conny are so delighted to be near +their brother and with dear Lena Vivian, that I am very glad above all, +since I find there are real church privileges—so different from +the Vicar of Wil’sbro’. Poor man; he is a great trial.”</p> +<p>All this was said between the church and the lych-gate, and almost +took Julius’s breath away; but Mrs. Poynsett was prepared to welcome +her old friend with some warmth and more curiosity.</p> +<p>Lady Susan Strangeways was a high-bred woman, but even high breeding +could not prevent her from being overwhelming, especially as there was +a great deal more of her than there had been at the last meeting of +the friends, so that she was suggestive of Hawthorne’s inquiry, +whether a man is bound to so many more pounds of flesh than he originally +wedded. However, it was prime condition, and activity was not +impeded, but rather received impetus. She had already, since her +matutinal walk of more than a mile and back, overhauled the stores for +the bazaar, inspected the town-hall, given her advice, walked through +the ruins for the church, expressed herself strongly on the horrors +of the plan, and begun to organize shilling cards, all before Sir Harry +had emerged from his room.</p> +<p>She was most warm-hearted and good-natured, and tears glistened in +her honest gray eyes as she saw her old friend’s helpless state. +“You don’t know how much I have improved,” said Mrs. +Poynsett; “I feel quite at liberty in this chair, all owing to +my good daughters-in-law.”</p> +<p>“Ah! I have so pitied you for having no girls! +My dear daughters have been so entirely one with me—such a blessing +in all I have gone through.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett of course declared her complete comfort in her five +sons, but Lady Susan was sure that if she had had as many boys, instead +of one son and four daughters, she should have been worn out. +Lorimer was a dear, affectionate fellow. Those he loved could +guide him with a leash of gossamer, but young men in his position were +exposed to so many temptations! There ensued a little sighing +over the evils of wealth; and to see and hear the two ladies, no one +would have thought that Julia Poynsett had married a young man for love—Susan +Lorimer an old man for independence.</p> +<p>Possibly with her present principles she would not have done so; +but through the vista of a long and prosperous widowhood deficiencies +in the courtship were easily forgotten; and perhaps there was the more +romance and sentiment now because she had been balked of it in her youth. +She had freely allowed her eldest daughter to enter a sisterhood from +the purest, most unselfish motives, but there was compensation in talking +of her Margaret as a Sister of Mercy.</p> +<p>And ere long she was anxiously inquiring Mrs. Poynsett’s opinion +of Eleonora Vivian, and making confidences somewhat trying to the mother +of the young lady’s ardent lover.</p> +<p>She was quite aware that as to fortune there could hardly be a worse +match than Miss Vivian; but she was sensible enough to see that her +son had a sufficiency, and generous enough to like the idea of redeeming +the old estate. Her husband had spent his latter years in a vain +search for a faultless property, and his wealth was waiting for Lorimer’s +settling down. She had always regretted the having no vassals +rightfully her own, and had felt the disadvantages of being Lady Bountiful +only by tenant right. To save an old estate from entirely passing +out of a family, and relieve ‘a noble old wreck,’ like Sir +Harry, seemed to her so grand a prospect that she could not but cast +a little glamour over the manner of the shipwreck. Still, to do +her justice, her primary consideration was the blessing such a woman +as Lenore might be to her son.</p> +<p>She had not fathomed Lady Tyrrell. No woman could do so without +knowing her antecedents, but she understood enough to perceive that +Eleonora was not happy with her, and this she attributed to the girl’s +deep nature and religious aspirations. Rockpier was an ecclesiastical +paradise to Lady Susan, and a close bond with Lenore, to whom in London +she had given all the facilities that lay in her power for persevering +in the observances that were alien to the gay household at home. +She valued this constancy exceedingly, and enthusiastically dilated +on the young lady’s goodness, and indifference to the sensation +she had created. “Lorimer allows he never saw her equal +for grace and dignity.”</p> +<p>Allows! Fancy Frank <i>allowing</i> any perfection in his Lenore! +Was it not possible that a little passing encomium on unusual beauty +was being promoted and magnified by the mother into a serious attachment? +But Lady Tyrrell was playing into her hands, and Lenore’s ecclesiastical +proclivities were throwing her into the arms of the family!</p> +<p>It hardly seemed fair to feign sympathy, yet any adverse hint would +be treason, and Mrs. Poynsett only asked innocently whether her friend +had seen her son Frank.</p> +<p>“Oh yes, often; the handsomest of all your sons, is he not?”</p> +<p>“Perhaps he is <i>now</i>.”</p> +<p>“My girls rave about his beautiful brown eyes, just as you +used to do, Julia, five-and-thirty years ago.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett was sure that whatever she had thought of Miles Charnock’s +eyes five-and-thirty years ago, she had never raved about them to Susan +Lorimer, but she only said, “All my boys are like their father +except Charlie.”</p> +<p>“But Master Frank has no eyes for any one but Miss Vivian. +Oh yes, I see the little jealousies; I am sorry for him; but you see +it would be a shocking bad thing for a younger son like him; whereas +Lory could afford it, and it would be the making of him.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett held her peace, and was not sorry that her visitor +was called away while she was still deliberating whether to give a hint +of the state of the case.</p> +<p>Lady Susan was, however, more aware of it than she knew; Lady Tyrrell +had ‘candidly’ given her a hint that there had been ‘some +nonsense about Frank Charnock,’ but that he could never afford +such a marriage, even if his mother would allow it, all which she never +would. Besides, he had not fallen into a satisfactory set in London—why, +it was not needful to tell.</p> +<p>When, after the drive, Lady Tyrrell, fairly tired out by her visitor’s +unfailing conversation and superabundant energy, had gone to lie down +and recruit for the evening, Lady Susan pressed on Eleonora a warm invitation +to the house in Yorkshire which she was renting, and where Lorimer would +get as much shooting as his colonel would permit. The mention +of him made Lenore blush to the ears, and say, “Dear Lady Susan, +you are always so kind to me that I ought to be open with you. +Don’t fancy—”</p> +<p>“I understand, I understand, my dear,” broke in Lady +Susan. “You shall not be teased. Do not the girls +and I care for you for your own sake?”</p> +<p>“I hope so.”</p> +<p>The elder lady sprang up and embraced her. Affection was very +pleasant to the reserved nature that could do so little to evoke caresses. +Yet Eleonora clasped her Rockpier charm in her hand, and added, “I +must tell you that so far as I can without disobedience, I hold myself +engaged to Frank Charnock.”</p> +<p>“To Frank Charnock?” repeated Lady Susan, startled at +this positive statement. “My dear, are you quite sure of +his ways?—since he has been in town I mean.”</p> +<p>“I know him, and I trust him.”</p> +<p>“I’m sure he is a fine-looking young man, and very clever, +they say; dear Julia Poynsett’s son too, and they have all turned +out so well,” said honest Lady Susan; “but though you have +been used to it all your life, my dear, a taste for horses is very dangerous +in a young man who can’t afford to lose now and then, you know.”</p> +<p>“I have seriously made up my mind never to marry a man who +has anything to do with the turf,” said Eleonora.</p> +<p>“Ah, my poor dear, I can understand that,” said Lady +Susan, aware how ill this told for her Lory. “May I ask, +does he know it?”</p> +<p>“It would insult him to say it. None of the Charnocks +ever meddle with those things. Ah! I know your son saw him on +the Derby-day; but he went down with his eldest brother and his wife—and +<i>that</i> is a very different thing! I stayed at home, you remember—papa +had a fit of the gout.”</p> +<p>“My dear, I don’t want to accuse him. Don’t +bristle up; only I am sorry, both for my own little plan of having you +for my <i>very</i> own, and because I fear there is trouble in store +for you. It can’t be palatable.” Here Eleonora +shook her head, and her worn, wearied look went to the good-natured +heart. “Dear child, you have gone through a great deal. +You shan’t be worried or fretted about anybody or anything at +Revelrig.”</p> +<p>“I should be very glad,” said Lenore, who had no fears +of Lory personally, though she could not be invited on false pretences.</p> +<p>“You had better come when Bee and Conny meet me. Let +me see—will the retreat be over by that time? Are you going +to it? You are an associate of St. Faith.”</p> +<p>“Yes, but I don’t see how I could go to the retreat. +Oh, what a relief it would be to have such a week!”</p> +<p>“Exactly what I feel,” said Lady Susan, somewhat to her +surprise. “It strengthens and sets me right for the year. +Dr. Easterby conducts this one. Do you not know him? Is +not Rood House near Backsworth?”</p> +<p>“Yes on the other side, but he is utterly out of my reach. +Julius Charnock looks up to him so much; but his name—even more +than St. Faith’s—would horrify my father.”</p> +<p>“You could not go direct there,” said Lady Susan; “but +when once you are with me you are my charge, and I could take you.”</p> +<p>She considered a little. Both she and her friend knew that +all her religious habits were alien to Sir Harry, and that what he had +freely permitted, sometimes shared at Rockpier, was now only winked +at, and that if he had guessed the full extent of her observances he +would have stormily issued a prohibition. Could it be wrong to +spend part of her visit to Lady Susan with her hostess in a sisterhood, +when she had no doubt as to attending services which he absolutely never +dreamt of, and therefore did not forbid? The sacred atmosphere +and holy meditations, without external strife and constant watchfulness, +seemed to the poor girl like water to the thirsty; and she thought, +after all the harass and whirl of the bazaar and race week, she might +thus recruit her much-needed strength for the decisive conflicts her +majority would bring.</p> +<p>Lady Susan had no doubts. The ‘grand old wreck’ +was in his present aspect a hoary old persecutor, and charming Lady +Tyrrell a worldly, scheming elder sister. It was as much an act +of charity to give their victim an opportunity of devotion and support +as if she had been the child of abandoned parents in a back court in +East London. Reserve to prevent a prohibition was not in such +cases treachery or disobedience; and she felt herself doing a mother’s +part, as she told her daughters, with some enjoyment of the mystery. +Eleonora made no promise, hoping to clear her mind by consideration, +or to get Julius’s opinion. He and his wife dined at Sirenwood, +and found Joe Reynolds’s drawings laid out for inspection, while +Lady Susan was advising that, instead of selling them, there should +be an industrial exhibition of all curiosities of art and nature to +be collected in the neighbourhood, and promising her own set of foreign +photographs and coloured costumes, which had served such purposes many +and many a time.</p> +<p>After dinner the good dame tried to talk to Rosamond on what she +deemed the most congenial subjects; but my Lady Rose had no notion of +‘shop’ at a dinner-party, so she made languid answer that +she ‘left all that to the curates,’ and escaped to a frivolous +young matron on the other side of the room, looking on while her husband +was penned in and examined on his services, and his choir, and his system, +and his decorations, and his classes, and his schools, for all or any +of which Lady Susan pressed on him the aid of the two daughters she +was leaving at Sirenwood; and on his hint that this was beyond his parish, +she repeated her strong disapproval of the Vicar of Wil’sbro’, +whom she had met at dinner the night before, and besides, the school +there had numerous Sunday teachers.</p> +<p>Julius assented, for he had no redundance of the article, and his +senior curate had just started on a vacation ramble with a brother; +but a sort of misgiving crossed him as he heard Herbert Bowater’s +last comic song pealing out, and beheld the pleasingly plain face of +a Miss Strangeways on either side of him. Had he not fought the +Eton and Harrow match over again with one of them at dinner? and had +not a lawn tennis challenge already passed?</p> +<p>For Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. Charnock Poynsett were to have garden-parties +on alternate Wednesdays, and the whole neighbourhood soon followed suit.</p> +<p>“You’ll find nobody at home, Jenny,” said Julius, +coming out of a cottage opposite, as she rode up to Mrs. Hornblower’s, +on one of the last days of August. “Nobody—that is, +but my mother. Can you come up and see her?”</p> +<p>“With all my heart; but I must get down here; I’m sent +for one of Herbert’s shirts. The good boy lets mamma and +aunty manage them still! I believe their hearts would break outright +if he took to shop ones, like the rest of them. Hush, Tartar, +for shame! don’t you know me? Where’s your master?”</p> +<p>“At a garden-party at Duddingstone. Your mother is better, +I see.”</p> +<p>“Yes, thank you—out driving with papa. Good Rollo!” +as the dignified animal rose from the hearthrug to greet her, waving +his handsome tail, and calmly expelled a large tabby cat from the easy-chair, +to make room for his friends. “Well done, old Roll! +Fancy a cat in such company.”</p> +<p>“Herbert’s dogs partake his good-nature.”</p> +<p>“Mungo seems to be absent too.”</p> +<p>“Gone with him no doubt. He is the great favourite with +one of the Miss Strangeways.”</p> +<p>“Which—Herbert or Mungo?”</p> +<p>“Both! I might say, I know the young ladies best by one +being rapturous about Tartar and the other about Mungo. Rollo +treats both with equally sublime and indifferent politeness, rather +as Raymond does.”</p> +<p>“What sort of girls are they? Herbert calls them ‘awfully +jolly.’”</p> +<p>“I’m sorry to say I never can think of any other epithet +for them. For once it is really descriptive.”</p> +<p>“Is it either of them in particular?”</p> +<p>“Confess, Joan, that’s what brought you over.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps so. Edith heard some nonsense at Backsworth, +and mamma could not rest till she had sent me over to see about it; +but would there be any great harm in it if it were true? Is not +Lady Susan a super-excellent woman?”</p> +<p>“You’ve hit it again, Jenny. Couple the two descriptions.”</p> +<p>“I gather that you don’t think the danger great.”</p> +<p>“Not at present. The fascination is dual, and is at least +a counteraction to the great enchantress.”</p> +<p>“That <i>is</i> well! It was not wholesome!”</p> +<p>“Whereas, these two are hearty, honest, well-principled girls, +quite genuine.”</p> +<p>“Yet you don’t say it with all your heart.”</p> +<p>“I own I should like to find something they had left undone.”</p> +<p>“What, to reduce them to human nature’s daily food?”</p> +<p>“Daily indeed! There’s just no escaping them. +There they are at matins and evensong.”</p> +<p>“How shocking! What, gossip afterwards?”</p> +<p>“Ask Rollo whether Mungo and Tartar don’t stand at the +lych-gate, and if he finds it easy to put an end to the game at play.”</p> +<p>“Oh! and he said they never missed a Sunday service, or the +school. Do they distract him?”</p> +<p>“Whom would it not distract to see two figures walking in with +hunches on their backs like camels, and high-heeled shoes, and hats +on the back of their heads, and chains and things clattering all over +them?”</p> +<p>“Aren’t they lady-like?”</p> +<p>“Oh! they are quite that. Rose says it is all the pink +of fashion—only coming it strong—I declare they are infectious!”</p> +<p>“I believe so. I never heard so many nibbles at slang +from any of you five, as from the Rector of Compton in the last five +minutes. I gather that he is slightly bothered.”</p> +<p>“There’s so much of it. We are forced to have them +to all the meals on Sunday, and their lectures on functions have nearly +scared poor Anne to the Pilgrim level again. They have set upon +me to get up a choir-concert and a harvest-feast; but happily no one +has time for the first at this season, and as to the other, I doubted +whether to make this first start after such a rainy summer, and they +decide me against it. To have them decorating the church!”</p> +<p>“Awfully jolly,” suggested Jenny.</p> +<p>“Even so. They are, if you understand me, technically +reverent; they have startled the whole place with their curtsies and +crossings in church; but they gabble up to the very porch; and the familiarity +with which they discuss High Mass, as they are pleased to call it! +I was obliged to silence them, and I must say they took it nicely.”</p> +<p>“How do they suit Lena?”</p> +<p>“She likes them. Lady Susan was a great help to her in +London, and she feels the comfort of their honesty. They brought +her to church with them one or two mornings, but it knocked her up to +walk so early. Insensibly, I think they do Lady Tyrrell’s +work in shutting her up from any of us.”</p> +<p>“Spite of croquet, which seems perpetual.”</p> +<p>“Chronic and sporadic parties make it so. There are few +days without that or something else. Cricket or the band at the +barracks.”</p> +<p>“People say the neighbourhood has never been so gay since Camilla +Vivian’s marriage. I sometimes wonder whether anything can +be going to happen,” said Jenny with a sigh, not guessing at what +Julius was thinking of; then changing her tone: “Surely Herbert +does not go to it all, and leave you alone? O, Julius! you should +not let him.”</p> +<p>“Never mind, Jenny, there’s no more work now in the holidays +than I am sufficient for; and for him, it is quite as guileless play +as ever he had twenty years ago. It will soon be over, or I should +take it more seriously.”</p> +<p>“But it is at such a time!”</p> +<p>“Yes, that is the worst of it. I have thought it over; +but while he is in this mood, the making him feel victimized and interfered +with has a worse effect than the letting him have his swing.”</p> +<p>“What is he doing now, I wonder? Here’s his sermon-paper +on the table, and a Greek Testament, and <i>Hints on Decorating Churches</i>, +with ‘Constance Strangeways’ on the first leaf—no +other book. How long will this saturnalia last?”</p> +<p>“Up to the Ordination, I fear. You know the good people +have contrived to put bazaar, races, and ball, all into the Ember Week, +and they are the great object of the young ladies’ visit. +Could you have him home for a quiet week first?”</p> +<p>“It would not be a quiet week; Edith is in the way of most +of these affairs; besides, to open fire about these young ladies might +just be putting nonsense into an innocent head. Now, I’ve +not seen your Rectory!”</p> +<p>The said Rectory was in a decided state of fresh, not to say raw, +novelty outside, though the old trees and garden a little softened its +hard grays and strong reds; but it promised to look well when crumbling +and weather-stain had done their work. At the door they met the +pretty young nurse, with a delicate sea-green embroidered cashmere bundle +in her arms.</p> +<p>“Little Lady Green Mantle,” exclaimed Jenny.</p> +<p>“Erin-go-bragh,” said Julius. “Rose clung +to her colours in spite of all predictions about ‘the good people.’ +Asleep of course,” as Jenny took her and uncovered her face. +“She won’t exhibit her eyes, but they are quite <i>proper</i> +coloured.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I see she is like Raymond!”</p> +<p>“Do you? They all say she is a perfect Charnock, though +how they know I can’t guess. There,” after a little +more baby-worship, “you may take her Emma.”</p> +<p>“Is that the under-nurse?” asked Jenny, rather surprised +by her juvenility.</p> +<p>“The sole one. My mother and Susan are rather concerned, +but Rose asserts that experience in that department is always associated +with gin; and she fell in love with this girl—a daughter of John +Gadley’s, who is much more respectable than he of the ‘Three +Pigeons.’ I suppose it is not in the nature of things for +two women to have the same view of nursery matters, unless one have +brought up the other.”</p> +<p>“Or even if she have. Witness mamma’s sighs over +Mary’s nurses.”</p> +<p>“I thought it was the common lot. You’ve not seen +the dining-room.” And the full honours were done. +They were pleasant rooms, still unpapered, and the furniture chiefly +of amber-coloured varnished deal; the drawing-room, chiefly with green +furniture, with only a few brighter dashes here and there, and a sociable +amount of comfortable litter already. The study was full of new +shelves and old books, and across the window-sill lay a gray figure, +with a book and a sheet of paper.</p> +<p>“You here, Terry! I thought you were gone with Rose,” +said Julius, as the boy rose to greet Miss Bowater.</p> +<p>“She said I need not, and I hate those garden-parties,” +said Terry; and they relieved him of their presence as soon as Jenny +had paid her respects to the favourite prints and photographs on the +walls.</p> +<p>“He has a passion for the history of Poland just now,” +said Julius. “Sobieski is better company than he would meet +at Duddingstone, I suspect—poor fellow! Lord Rathforlane +has been so much excited by hearing of Driver’s successes as a +coach, as to desire Terry to read with him for the Royal Engineers. +The boys must get off his hands as soon as possible, he says, and Terry, +being cleverest, must do so soonest; but the boy has seen the dullest +side of soldiering, and hates it. His whole soul is set on scholarship. +I am afraid it is a great mistake.”</p> +<p>“Can’t you persuade him?”</p> +<p>“We have both written; but Rose has no great hopes of the result. +I wish he could follow his bent.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Jenny, lingering as she looked towards Church-house, +“the young instinct ought not to be repressed.”</p> +<p>Julius knew that she was recollecting how Archie Douglas had entreated +to go to sea, and the desire had been quashed because he was an only +son. His inclination to speak was as perilous as if he had been +Rosamond herself, and he did not feel it unfortunate that Jenny found +she must no longer stay away from home.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXII<br /> +Times Out of Joint</h2> +<blockquote><p>Alte der Meere,<br /> +Komm und höre;<br /> +Meine Frau, die Ilsebill,<br /> +Will nicht als ich will!</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Life at Compton Poynsett was different from what it had been when +the two youngest sons had been at home, and Julius and Rosamond in the +house. The family circle had grown much more stiff and quiet, +and the chief difference caused by Mrs. Poynsett’s presence was +that Raymond was deprived of his refuge in her room. Cecil had +taken a line of polite contempt. There was always a certain languid +amount of indifferent conversation, ‘from the teeth outward,’ +as Rosamond said. Every home engagement was submitted to the elder +lady with elaborate scrupulousness, almost like irony. Visitors +in the house or invitations out of it, were welcome breaks, and the +whirl of society which vaguely alarmed Joanna Bowater was a relief to +the inhabitants of the Hall.</p> +<p>Anne’s companionship was not lively for her mother-in-law, +but she was brightening in the near prospect of Miles’s return, +and they had established habits that carried them well through the evening. +Anne covered screens and made scrap-books, and did other work for the +bazaar; and Mrs. Poynsett cut out pictures, made suggestions, and had +associations of her own with the combinations of which Anne had little +notion. Or she dictated letters which Anne wrote, and through +all these was a kindly, peaceful spirit, most unlike the dreary alienation +in which Cecil persevered.</p> +<p>To Cecil this seemed the anxious desire for her lawful rights. +She had been used to spend the greater part of the evening at the piano, +but her awakened eyes perceived that this was a cover to Raymond’s +conversations at his mother’s sofa; so she sat tying knots in +stiff thread at her macrame lace pillow, making the bazaar a plea for +nothing but work. Raymond used to arm himself with the newspapers +as the safest <i>point d</i>’<i>appui</i>, and the talk was happiest +when it <i>only</i> languished, for it could do much worse.</p> +<p>“Shall you be at Sirenwood to-morrow, Cecil?” asked Mrs. +Poynsett, as she was wheeled to her station by the fire after dinner. +“Will you kindly take charge of a little parcel for me? +One of the Miss Strangeways asked me to look for some old franks, so +Anne and I have been turning out my drawers.”</p> +<p>“Are they for sale?” asked Raymond.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Cecil. “Bee Strangeways is collecting; +she will pay for all that are new to her, and sell any duplicates.”</p> +<p>“Has she many?” asked Mrs. Poynsett, glad of this safe +subject.</p> +<p>“Quantities; and very valuable ones. Her grandfather +knew everybody, and was in the Ministry.”</p> +<p>“Was he?” said Raymond, surprised.</p> +<p>“Lord Lorimer?” said Mrs. Poynsett. “Not +when I knew them. He was an old-fashioned Whig, with some peculiar +crotchets, and never could work with any Cabinet.”</p> +<p>“Beatrice told me he was,” said Cecil, stiffly.</p> +<p>“I rather think he was Master of the Buckhounds for a little +while in the Grey Ministry,” said Mrs. Poynsett, “but he +gave it up because he would not vote with ministers on the poor laws.”</p> +<p>“I knew I was not mistaken in saying he was in the Ministry,” +said Cecil.</p> +<p>“The Master of the Buckhounds is not in the Cabinet, Cecil,” +said her husband.</p> +<p>“I never said he was. I said he was in office,” +returned the infallible lady.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett thought it well to interrupt by handing in an envelope +franked by Sir Robert Peel; but Cecil at once declared that the writing +was different from that which Bee already owned.</p> +<p>“Perhaps it is not the same Sir Robert,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“She got it from the <i>Queen</i>, and they are all authenticated. +The <i>Queen</i> newspaper, of course” (rather petulantly).</p> +<p>“Indisputable,” said Raymond; “but this frank contained +a letter from the second Sir Robert to my father.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett made a sign of acquiescence, and Cecil pouted in her +dignified way, though Mrs. Poynsett tried to improve matters by saying, +“Then it appears that Miss Strangeways will have a series of Peel +autographs, all in fact but the first generation.”</p> +<p>Common sense showed she was right, but Cecil still felt discontented, +for she knew she had been resisted and confuted, and she believed it +was all Mrs. Poynsett’s doing instead of Raymond’s.</p> +<p>And she became as mute as Anne for the next half-hour, nor did either +Raymond or his mother venture on starting any fresh topic, lest there +might be fresh jarring.</p> +<p>Only Anne presently came up to Mrs. Poynsett and tenderly purred +with her over some little preparation for Miles.</p> +<p>Certainly Anne was the most improved in looks of all the three brides, +who had arrived just a year ago. The thin, scraggy Scotch girl, +with the flabby, washed-out look alternating with angular rigidity was +gone, but the softening and opening of her expression, the light that +had come into her eyes, and had made them a lovely blue instead of pale +gray; the rose-tint on her cheeks, the delicate rounded contour of her +face, the improved carriage of her really fine figure, the traces of +style in the braiding of her profuse flaxen hair, and the taste that +was beginning to conquer in the dress, were all due to the thought that +the <i>Salamanca</i> might soon be in harbour. She sat among them +still as a creature whose heart and spirit were not with them.</p> +<p>That some change must come was felt as inevitable by each woman, +and it was Mrs. Poynsett who began, one forenoon when her son had brought +a lease for her to sign. “Raymond,” said she, “you +know Church-house is to be vacant at Michaelmas. I wish you would +look at it, and see what repairs it wants, and if the drawing-room windows +could be made to open on the lawn.”</p> +<p>“Are you hoping to tempt Miles to settle there?”</p> +<p>“No, I fear there is no hope of that; but I do not think an +old broken-backed invalid ought to engross this great house.”</p> +<p>“Mother, I cannot hear you say so! This is your own house!”</p> +<p>“So is the other,” she said, trying to smile, “and +much fitter for my needs, with Susan and Jenkins to look after me.”</p> +<p>“There is no fit place for you but this. You said that +once.”</p> +<p>“Under very different circumstances. All the younger +boys were still under my wing, and needed the home, and I was strong +and vigorous. It would not have been acting right by them to have +given up the place; but now they are all out in the world, and I am +laid by, my stay here only interferes with what can be much better managed +without me or my old servants.”</p> +<p>“I do not see that. If any one moves, it should be ourselves.”</p> +<p>“You are wanted on the spot continually. If Sirenwood +were in the market, that might not be so much amiss.”</p> +<p>“I do not think that likely. They will delay the sale +in the hope of Eleonora’s marrying a rich man; besides, Mr. Charnock +has set his mind upon Swanslea. I hope <i>this</i> is from nothing +Cecil has said or done!”</p> +<p>“Cecil wishes to part then? She has said nothing to me, +but I see she has to you. Don’t be annoyed, Raymond; it +is in the nature of things.”</p> +<p>“I believe it is all Lady Tyrrell’s doing. The +mischief such a woman can do in the neighbourhood!”</p> +<p>“Perhaps it is only what any friend of Cecil would advise.”</p> +<p>“It is the very reverse of what I intended,” said Raymond, +shading his face.</p> +<p>“My dear Raymond, I know what you meant, and what you wish; +but I am also certain it is for no one’s happiness to go on in +this way.”</p> +<p>He groaned.</p> +<p>“And the wife’s right comes first.”</p> +<p>“Not to this house.”</p> +<p>“But to this man. Indeed I see more hope of your happiness +now than I did last year.”</p> +<p>“What, because she has delivered herself over bound hand and +foot to Camilla Vivian?”</p> +<p>“No, because she is altered. Last year she was merely +vexed at my position in the house. Now she is vexed at my position +with you.”</p> +<p>“Very unjustly.”</p> +<p>“Hardly so. I should not have liked your father to be +so much devoted to his mother. Remember, jealousy is a smoke that +cannot exist without some warmth.”</p> +<p>“If she had any proper feeling for me, she would show it by +her treatment of you.”</p> +<p>“That would be asking too much when she thinks I engross you.”</p> +<p>“Mother, while you show such marvellous candour and generosity, +and she—”</p> +<p>“Hush! Raymond, leave it unsaid! We cannot expect +her to see more than her own side of the question. She has been +put into an avowedly trying position, and does not deserve hard judgment +for not being happy in it. All that remains is to relieve her. +Whether by my moving or yours is the question. I prefer the Church-house +plan.”</p> +<p>“Either way is shame and misery to me,” broke out Raymond +in a choked voice.</p> +<p>“Nonsense,” said his mother, trying to be cheerful. +“You made an impracticable experiment, that’s all. +Give Cecil free scope, let her feel that she has her due, and all will +come right.”</p> +<p>“Nothing can be done till after the Wil’sbro’ business,” +said Raymond, glad of the reprieve. He could not bear the prospect +of banishment for his mother or himself from the home to which both +were rooted; and the sentence of detachment from her was especially +painful when she seemed his only consolation for his wife’s perverseness. +Yet he was aware that he had been guilty of the original error, and +was bound to give such compensation to his wife as was offered by his +mother’s voluntary sacrifice. He was slow to broach the +subject, but only the next morning came a question about an invitation +to a dull house.</p> +<p>“But,” said Cecil, “it is better than home.” +She spoke on purpose.</p> +<p>“I am sorry to hear you say so.”</p> +<p>“I can’t call it home where I am but a guest.”</p> +<p>“Well, Cecil, my mother offers to leave the home of her life +and retire into Church-house.”</p> +<p>Cecil felt as if the screw she had been long working had come off +in her hands. She frowned, she gazed, collecting her senses, while +Raymond added, “It is to my intense grief and mortification, but +I suppose you are gratified.”</p> +<p>“Uh, it would never do!” she exclaimed, to his surprise +and pleasure.</p> +<p>“Quite right,” he returned. “Just what I +felt. Nothing can make me so glad as to see that you think the +idea as socking as I do.”</p> +<p>“Our going to Swanslea would be much better—far more +natural, and no one could object. We could refurnish, and make +it perfect; whereas nothing can be done to this place, so inconveniently +built and buried in trees. I should feel much freer in a place +of my own.”</p> +<p>“So that is what you meant when I thought you were thinking +of my mother?”</p> +<p>“I am obliged to take thought for myself when you take heed +to no one but her,” said Cecil; and as the carriage was at that +moment announced, she left him. Which was the most sick at heart +it would be hard to say, the wife with the sense that she was postponed +in everything to the mother, the husband at the alienation that had +never before been so fully expressed. Cecil’s errand was +a council about the bazaar; and driving round by Sirenwood, Lady Tyrrell +became her companion in the carriage. The quick eyes soon perceived +that something had taken place, and confidence was soon drawn forth.</p> +<p>“The ice is broken; and by whom do you think?”</p> +<p>“By <i>la belle mère</i>? Skilful strategy to +know when the position is not tenable.”</p> +<p>“She wants to retreat to Church-house.”</p> +<p>“Don’t consent to that.”</p> +<p>“I said I should prefer Swanslea for ourselves.”</p> +<p>“Hold to that, whatever you do. If she moves to the village +you will have all the odium and none of the advantages. There +will be the same daily haunt; and as to your freedom of action, there +are no spies like the abdicated and their dependents. A very clever +plan, but don’t be led away by it.”</p> +<p>“No,” said Cecil, resolutely; but after a moment: “It +would be inconvenient to Raymond to live so far away from the property.”</p> +<p>“Swanslea will be property too, and a ride over on business +is not like strolling in constantly.”</p> +<p>“I know I shall never feel like my own mistress in a house +of hers.”</p> +<p>“Still less with her close by, with the Rectory family running +in and out to exchange remarks. No, no, hold fast to insisting +that she must not leave the ancestral halls. That you can do dutifully +and gracefully.”</p> +<p>Cecil knew she had been betrayed into the contrary; but they were +by this time in the High Street, bowing to others of the committee on +their way to the town-hall, a structure of parti-coloured brick in harlequin +patterns, with a peaked roof, all over little sham domes, which went +far to justify its title of the Rat-house, since nothing larger could +well use them. The façade was thus somewhat imposing; of +the rear the less said the better; and as to the interior, it was at +present one expanse of dust, impeded by scaffold-poles, and all the +windows had large blotches of paint upon them.</p> +<p>It required a lively imagination to devise situations for the stalls; +but Mrs. Duncombe valiantly tripped about, instructing her attendant +carpenter with little assistance except from the well-experienced Miss +Strangeways. The other ladies had enough to do in keeping their +plumage unsoiled. Lady Tyrrell kept on a little peninsula of encaustic +tile, Cecil hopped across bird-like and unsoiled, Miss Slater held her +carmelite high and dry, but poor Miss Fuller’s pale blue and drab, +trailing at every step, became constantly more blended!</p> +<p>The dust induced thirst. Lady Tyrrell lamented that the Wil’sbro’ +confectioner was so far off and his ices doubtful, and Miss Slater suggested +that she had been making a temperance effort by setting up an excellent +widow in the lane that opened opposite to them in a shop with raspberry +vinegar, ginger-beer, and the like mild compounds, and Mrs. Duncombe +caught at the opportunity of exhibiting the sparkling water of the well +which supplied this same lane. The widow lived in one of the tenements +which Pettitt had renovated under her guidance, and on a loan advanced +by Cecil, and she was proud of her work.</p> +<p>“Clio Tallboys would view this as a triumph,” said Mrs. +Duncombe, as, standing on the steps of the town-hall, she surveyed the +four tenements at the corner of the alley. “Not a man would +stir in the business except Pettitt, who left it all to me.”</p> +<p>“Taking example by the Professor,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“It is strange,” said Miss Slater, “how much illness +there has been ever since the people went into those houses. They +are in my district, you know.”</p> +<p>“You should make them open their windows,” said Mrs. +Duncombe.</p> +<p>“They lay it on the draughts.”</p> +<p>“And stuff up my ventilators. That is always the way +they begin.”</p> +<p>The excellent widow herself had a bad finger, which was a great impediment +in administering the cooling beverages, but these were so excellent +as to suggest the furnishing of a stall therewith for the thirsty, as +something sure to be popular and at small expense. Therewith the +committee broke up, all having been present but Miss Moy, whose absence +was not regretted, though apologized for by Mrs. Duncombe. “I +could not get her away from the stables,” she said. “She +and Bob would contemplate Dark Hag day and night, I believe.”</p> +<p>“I wouldn’t allow it,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>Mrs. Duncombe shrugged her shoulders and laughed. “That’s +Mr. Moy’s look-out,” she said.</p> +<p>“You don’t choose to interfere with her emancipation,” +said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Clio would tell you she could take care of herself at the +stables as well as anywhere else.”</p> +<p>“Query?” said Lady Tyrrell. “Don’t +get into a scrape, Bessie. Does your Captain report on the flirtation +with young Simmonds?”</p> +<p>“Who is he?” asked Cecil</p> +<p>“The trainer’s son,” said Bessie. “It +is only a bit of imitation of Aurora Floyd.”</p> +<p>“You know she’s an heiress,” said Lady Tyrrell. +“You had better take care how you put such a temptation in his +way.”</p> +<p>“I don’t suppose the Moys are anybody,” said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Not in your sense, my dear,” said Lady Tyrrell, laughing; +“but from another level there’s a wide gap between the heiress +of Proudfoot Lawn and the heir of the training stables.”</p> +<p>“Cecil looks simply disgusted,” said Bessie. “She +can’t bear the Moys betwixt the wind and her nobility.”</p> +<p>“They are the great drawback to Swansea, I confess,” +said Cecil.</p> +<p>“Oh! are you thinking of Swanslea?” cried Mrs Duncombe.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Lady Tyrrell, “she is one to be congratulated +on emancipation.”</p> +<p>“Well can I do so,” said Mrs. Duncombe. “Don’t +I know what mothers-in-law are? Mine is the most wonderful old +Goody, with exactly the notions of your meek Mrs. Miles.”</p> +<p>“Incompatibility decidedly,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Only she was the Spartan mother combined with it,” continued +Mrs. Duncombe. “When Bob was a little urchin, he once, in +anticipation of his future tastes, committed the enormity of riding +on a stick on Sunday; so she locked him up till he had learnt six verses +of one of Watts’s hymns about going to church being like a little +heaven below, isn’t it?”</p> +<p>“Increasing his longing that way,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“She doesn’t even light the drawing-room fire on Sunday, +for fear people should not sit in their rooms and meditate,” continued +Mrs. Duncombe. “Bob manages to be fond of her through all; +but she regularly hates me.”</p> +<p>“Not very wonderful,” said Lady Tyrrell, laughing. +“I suppose there is a charming reciprocity of feeling.”</p> +<p>“I think I can afford to pity her,” said Mrs. Duncombe, +lightly. “Just fancy what I must have been to her! +You know I was brought up in a convent at Paris. The very bosom +of the scarlet woman.”</p> +<p>“But,” interrupted Cecil, “you were never a Roman +Catholic, Bessie!”</p> +<p>“Oh dear, no; the Protestant boarders were let entirely alone. +There were only two of us, and we lay in bed while the others went to +mass, and played while they went to confession, that was all. +I was an orphan; never remember my mother, and my father died abroad. +Luckily for me, Bob was done for by my first ball. Very odd he +should have liked a little red-haired thing like me; but every one is +ticketed, I believe. My uncle was glad enough to get rid of me, +and poor old Mrs. Duncombe was unsuspecting till we went home—and +then!”</p> +<p>“And then?”</p> +<p>“Cecil may have some faint idea.”</p> +<p>“Of what you underwent?”</p> +<p>“She wanted to begin on me as if I were a wild savage heathen, +you know! I believe she nearly had a fit when I declined a prayer-meeting, +and as to my walking out with Bob on Sunday evening!”</p> +<p>“Did she make you learn Watts’s hymns?”</p> +<p>“No! but she did what was much worse to poor Bob. She +told him she had spent the time in prayer and humiliation, and the poor +fellow very nearly cried.”</p> +<p>“Ah, those mothers have such an advantage over their sons,” +said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“I determined I would never go near her again after that,” +said Mrs. Duncombe. “Bob goes; he is really fond of her; +but I knew we should keep the peace better apart. I let her have +the children now and then, when it is convenient, and oddly enough they +like it; but I shall soon have to stop that, for I won’t have +them think me a reprobate; and she has thought me ten times worse ever +since I found out that I had brains and could use them.”</p> +<p>“Quite true,” said Camilla; “there’s no peacemaker +like absence.”</p> +<p>“The only pity is that Swanslea is no further off,” returned +Bessie.</p> +<p>And so it was that Cecil, backed by her two counsellors, held her +purpose, and Raymond sadly spoke of the plan of separation to Julius. +Both thought Mrs. Poynsett’s own plan the best, though they could +not bear the idea of her leaving her own house. Raymond was much +displeased.</p> +<p>“At least,” he said, “there is a reprieve till +this frantic fortnight is over. I envy your exemption from the +turmoil.”</p> +<p>“I wish you would exempt yourself from the races,” said +Julius. “The mischief they have done in these villages is +incalculable! The very men-servants are solicited to put into +sweepstakes, whenever they go into Wil’sbro’; and only this +morning Mrs. Hornblower has been to me about her son.”</p> +<p>“I thought he was the great feather in Herbert Bowater’s +cap.”</p> +<p>“Showing the direction of the wind only too well. Since +Herbert has been infected with the general insanity, poor Harry Hornblower +has lapsed into his old ways, and is always hanging about the ‘Three +Pigeons’ with some of the swarm of locusts who have come down +already to brawl round the training stables. This has come to +Truelove’s ears, and he has notice of dismissal. At the +mother’s desire I spoke to Truelove, but he told me that at last +year’s races the lad had gambled at a great rate, and had only +been saved from dishonesty by detection in time. He was so penitent +that Truelove gave him another trial, on condition that he kept out +of temptation; but now he has gone back to it, Mr. Truelove thinks it +the only way of saving him from some fresh act of dishonesty. +‘It is all up with them,’ he says, ‘when once they +take that turn.’”</p> +<p>“You need not speak as if I were accountable for all the blackguardism.”</p> +<p>“Every man is accountable who lends his name and position to +bolster up a field of vice.”</p> +<p>“Come, come, Julius. Remember what men have been on the +turf.”</p> +<p>“If those men had withheld their support, fashion would not +have led so many to their ruin.”</p> +<p>“Hundreds are present without damage. It is a hearty +out-of-doors country amusement, and one of the few general holidays +that bring all ranks together.”</p> +<p>“You speak of racing as it has been or might be in some golden +age,” said Julius. “Of course there is no harm in +trying one horse’s speed against another; but look at the facts +and say whether it is right to support an amusement that becomes such +an occasion of evil.”</p> +<p>“Because a set of rascals choose to bring their villainies +there you would have the sport of the whole neighbourhood given up. +‘No cakes and ale’ with a vengeance!”</p> +<p>“The cakes and ale that make a brother offend ought to be given +up.”</p> +<p>“That sentences all public amusements.”</p> +<p>“Not necessarily. The question is of degree. Other +amusements may have evil incidentally connected with them, and may lead +to temptation, but it is not their chief excitement. The play +or the opera is the prime interest, and often a refined and elevated +one, but at races the whole excitement depends upon the horses, and +is so fictitious that it needs to be enhanced by this betting system. +No better faculty is called into play. Some few men may understand +the merits of the horse; many more, and most of the ladies, simply like +the meeting in numbers; but there is no higher faculty called out, and +in many cases the whole attraction is the gambling, and the fouler wickedness +in the background.”</p> +<p>“Which would be ten thousand times worse if all gentlemen stood +aloof.”</p> +<p>“What good do these gentlemen do beyond keeping the contest +honourable and the betting in which they are concerned? Do not +they make themselves decoys to the young men on the border-land who +would stay away if the turf were left to the mere vulgar? Why +should they not leave it to drop like bull-baiting or cock-fighting?”</p> +<p>“Well done, Julius!” said Raymond. “You will +head a clerical crusade against the turf, but I do not think it just +to compare it with those ferocious sports which were demoralizing in +themselves; while this is to large numbers simply a harmless holiday +and excuse for an outing, not to speak of the benefit to the breed of +horses.”</p> +<p>“I do not say that all competitions of speed are necessarily +wrong, but I do say that the present way of managing races makes them +so mischievous that no one ought to encourage them.”</p> +<p>“I wonder what Backsworth and Wil’sbro’ would say +to you! It is their great harvest. Lodgings for those three +days pay a quarter’s rent; and where so many interests are concerned, +a custom cannot lightly be dropped.”</p> +<p>“Well,” said Raymond with a sigh, “it is not pleasure +that takes me. I shall look on with impartial eyes, if that is +what you wish.”</p> +<p>Poor Raymond! it was plain that he had little liking for anything +that autumn. He rode over to Swanslea with Cecil, and when he +said it was six miles off, she called it four; what he termed bare, +marshy, and dreary, was in her eyes open and free; his swamp was her +lake; and she ran about discovering charms and capabilities where he +saw nothing but damp and dry rot, and, above all, banishment.</p> +<p>Would she have her will? Clio would have thought her lecture +had taken effect, and mayhap, it added something to the general temper +of self-assertion, but in fact Cecil had little time to think, so thickly +did gaieties and preparations crowd upon her. It was the full +glory and importance of the Member’s wife, her favourite ideal, +but all the time her satisfaction was marred by secret heartache as +she saw how wearily and formally her husband dragged through whatever +fell to his lot, saw how jaded and depressed he looked, and heard him +laugh his company laugh without any heart in it. She thought it +all his mother’s fault, and meant to make up for everything when +she had him to herself.</p> +<p>Julius had his troubles. When Rosamond found that races were +what she called his pet aversion, she resisted with all her might. +Her home associations were all on fire again. She would not condemn +the pleasures she had shared with her parents, by abstinence from them, +any more than she would deviate from Lady Rathforlane’s nursery +management to please Mrs. Poynsett and Susan. A bonnet, which +Julius trusted never to see in church, was purchased in the face of +his remark that every woman who carried her gay attire to the stand +made herself an additional feather on the hook of evil. At first +she laughed, and then grew tearfully passionate in protests that nothing +should induce her to let her brothers see what their own father did +turned into a crime; and if they went without her to take care of them, +and fell into mischief, whose fault would that be?</p> +<p>It was vain to hint that Tom was gone back to school, and Terry cared +more for the Olympic dust than that of Backsworth. She had persuaded +herself that his absence would be high treason to her father, whom she +respected far more at a distance than when she had been struggling with +his ramshackle, easy-going ways. Even now, she was remonstrating +with him about poor Terry’s present misery. His last half +year had been spent under the head-master, who had cultivated his historical +and poetical intelligence, whereas Mr. Driver was nothing but an able +crammer; and the moment the lad became interested and diverged from +routine, he was choked off because such things would not ‘tell.’ +If the ‘coach’ had any enthusiasm it was for mathematics, +and thitherwards Terry’s brain was undeveloped. With misplaced +ingenuity, he argued that sums came right by chance and that Euclid +was best learnt by heart, for ‘the pictures’ simply confused +him; and when Julius, amazed at finding so clever a boy in the novel +position of dunce, tried to find out what he did know of arithmetic, +his ignorance and inappreciation were so unfathomable that Julius doubted +whether the power or the will was at fault. At any rate he was +wretched in the present, and dismal as to the future, and looked on +his brother-in-law as in league with the oppressors for trying to rouse +his sense of duty.</p> +<p>Remonstrance seemed blunted and ineffective everywhere. When +Herbert Bowater tried to reclaim Harry Hornblower into giving up his +notorious comrades, he received the dogged reply, “Why should +not a chap take his pleasure as well as you?” With the authority +at once of clergyman and squire’s son, he said, “Harry, +you forget yourself. I am not going to discuss my occupations +with you.”</p> +<p>“You know better,” rudely interrupted the lad. +“Racketing about all over the country, and coming home late at +night. You’d best not speak of other folks!”</p> +<p>As a matter of fact, Herbert had never been later than was required +by a walk home from a dinner, or a very moderate cricket supper; and +his conscience was clear as to the quality of his amusements; but instead +of, as hitherto, speaking as youth to youth, he used the language of +the minister to the insulting parishioner. “I am sorry I +have disturbed Mrs. Hornblower, but the case is not parallel. +Innocent amusement is one thing—it is quite another to run into +haunts that have <i>already</i> proved dangerous to your principles.”</p> +<p>Harry Hornblower laughed. “It’s no go coming the +parson over me, Mr. Bowater! It’s well known what black +coats are, and how they never cry out so loud upon other folks as when +they’ve had a jolly lark among themselves. No concealment +now, we’re up to a thing or two, and parsons, and capitalists, +and squires will have to look sharp.”</p> +<p>This oration, smacking of ‘The Three Pigeons,’ was delivered +so loud as to bring the mother on the scene. “O, Harry, +Harry, you aren’t never speaking like that to Mr. Bowater!”</p> +<p>“When folks jaw me about what’s nothing to them I always +give them as good as they bring. That’s my principle,” +said Harry, flinging out of the house, while the curate tried to console +the weeping mother, and soon after betook himself to his Rector with +no mild comments on the lad’s insolence.</p> +<p>“Another warning how needful it is for us to avoid all occasion +for misconstruction,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“We do, all of us,” said Herbert. “Even that +wretched decoction, Fuller, and that mere dictionary, Driver, never +gave cause for imputations like these. What has the fellow got +hold of?”</p> +<p>“Stories of the last century ‘two-bottle men,’” +said Julius, “trumped up by unionists now against us in these +days. The truth is that the world triumphs and boasts whenever +it catches the ministry on its own ground. Its ideal is as exacting +as the saintly one.”</p> +<p>“I say Rector,” exclaimed the curate, after due pause, +“you’ll be at Evensong on Saturday? The ladies at +Sirenwood want me to go to Backsworth with them to hear the band.”</p> +<p>“Cannot young Strangeways take care of his sisters?”</p> +<p>“I would not ask it, sir, but they have set their heart on +seeing Rood House, and want me to go with them because of knowing Dr. +Easterby. Then I’m to dine with them, and that’s the +very last of it for me. There’s no more croquet after this +week.”</p> +<p>“I am thankful to hear it,” said Julius, suppressing +his distaste that the man he most reverenced, and the place which was +his haven of rest, should be a mere lion for Bee and Conny, a slight +pastime before the regimental band!</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIII<br /> +The Apple of Ate</h2> +<blockquote><p>Oh mirror, mirror on the wall,<br /> +Who is the fairest of us all?—The Three Bears</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“I do really think Terry has found the secret of happiness, +for a <i>little</i> while at least,” said Rosamond, entering Mrs. +Poynsett’s room. “That funny little man in the loan +museum has asked him to help in the arrangement.”</p> +<p>“Who is it?”</p> +<p>“The little watchmaker, or watch cobbler, in the old curiosity +shop.”</p> +<p>“Yes; Terry calls him a descendant of the Genoese Frescobaldi, +and I’m sure his black eyes were never made for an English head. +Terry has always haunted those uncanny wares of his, and has pursued +them to the museum. ‘’Tis not every young gentleman +I would wish to see there,’ says the old man, ‘but the Honourable +Mr. De Lancey has the soul of an antiquarian.’”</p> +<p>“They say the old man is really very clever and well read.”</p> +<p>“He looks like an old magician, with his white cap and spectacles, +and he had need to have a wand to bring order out of that awful chaos. +Everybody all round has gone and cleared out their rubbish-closet. +Upon my word, it looks so. There are pictures all one network +of cracks, and iron caps and gauntlets out of all the halls in every +stage of rust, and pots and pans and broken crocks, and baskets of coin +all verdigris and tarnish!—Pah!”</p> +<p>“Are Miles’s birds safe?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, with a swordfish’s sword and a sawfish’s +saw making a trophy on the top. Terry is in the library, hunting +material for a dissertation upon the ancient unicorn, which ought to +conclude with the battle royal witnessed by Alice in Wonderland. +The stuffed department is numerous but in a bad way as to hair, and +chiefly consists of everybody’s grandmother’s old parrots +and squirrels and white rats. Then, every boy, who ever had a +fit of birds’ eggs or butterflies, has sent in a collection, chiefly +minus the lower wings, and with volunteer specimens of moth; but luckily +some give leave to do what they please with them, so the magician is +making composition animals with the <i>débris</i>.”</p> +<p>“Not really!”</p> +<p>“I made a feeble attempt with an admiral’s wings and +an orange tip, but I was scouted. About four dilapidated ones +make up a proper specimen, and I can’t think how it is all to +be done in the time; but really something fit to be seen is emerging. +Terry is sorting the coins, a pretty job, I should say; but felicity +to him. But oh! the industrial articles! There are all the +regalia, carved out of cherry-stones, and a patchwork quilt of 5000 +bits of silk each no bigger than a shilling. And a calculation +of the middle verse in the Bible, and the longest verse, and the shortest +verse, and the like edifying Scriptural researches, all copied out like +flies’ legs, in writing no one can see but Julius with his spectacles +off, and set in a brooch as big as the top of a thimble, all done by +a one-legged sergeant of marines. So that the line might not be +out done, I offered my sergeant-major’s banner-screen, but I am +sorry to say they declined it, which made me jealous.”</p> +<p>“Are there any drawings of the Reynolds’ boy?”</p> +<p>“Yes, Lenore Vivian brought them down, and very good they are. +Every one says he has the making of a genius, but he does not look as +if it agreed with him; he is grown tall, and thin, and white, and I +should not wonder if those good-for-nothing servants bullied him.”</p> +<p>“Did you see anything of Eleonora?”</p> +<p>“Nothing so impossible. I meet her every day, but she +is always beset with the Strangeways, and I think she avoids me.”</p> +<p>“I can hardly think so.”</p> +<p>“I don’t like it! That man is always hanging about +Sirenwood, and Lenore never stirs an inch without one of those girls. +I wish Frank could see for himself, poor fellow.”</p> +<p>“He does hope to run down next week. I have just heard +from him in high spirits. One of his seniors has come into some +property, another is out of health and retires, so there is some promotion +in view.”</p> +<p>“I wish it would make haste then. I don’t like +the look of things.”</p> +<p>“I can hardly disbelieve in the dear girl herself; yet I do +feel as if it were against nature for it to succeed. Did you hear +anything of Mrs. Bowater to-day?”</p> +<p>“Yes, she is much better, and Edith is coming to go into the +gallery with me on Tuesday when they inaugurate the Rat-house. +Oh! did you hear of the debate about it? You know there’s +to be a procession—all the Volunteers, and all the Odd Fellows, +and all the Good Templars, and all the school-children of all denominations—whatever +can walk behind a flag. Our choir boys grew emulous, and asked +Herbert to ask the Rector to let them have our lovely banner with the +lilies on it; but he declined, though there’s no choice but to +give the holiday that will be taken.”</p> +<p>“Was that the debate?”</p> +<p>“Oh no! that was among the higher powers—where the procession +should start from. The precedent was an opening that began with +going to church, and having a sermon from the Bishop; but then there’s +no church, and after that spur the Bishop gave them they can’t +ask him without one; besides, the mayor dissents, and so do a good many +more of them. So they are to meet at the Market Cross, and Mr. +Fuller, in the famous black gown, supported by Mr. Driver, is to head +them. I’m not sure that Julius and Herbert were not in the +programme, but Mr. Truelove spoke up, and declared that Mr. Flynn the +Wesleyan Methodist, and Mr. Howler the Primitive Methodist, and Mr. +Riffell the Baptist, had quite as good a right to walk in the foreground +and to hold forth, and Mr. Moy supported him.”</p> +<p>“Popularity hunting against Raymond.”</p> +<p>“Precisely. But Howler, Flynn, and Co. were too much +for Mr. Fuller, so he seceded, and the religious ceremonies are now +to be confined to his saying grace at the dinner. Raymond thinks +it as well, for the inaugural speech would only have been solemn mockery; +but Julius thinks it a sad beginning for the place to have no blessing +because of our unhappy divisions. Isn’t that like Julius?”</p> +<p>“Exactly, though I see it more from Raymond’s point of +view. So you are going to the dinner?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes. Happily my Rector has nothing to say against +that, and I am sure he owes me something for keeping me out of the bazaar. +In fact, having avoided the trouble, I <i>couldn</i>’<i>t</i> +take the pleasure! and he must set that against the races.”</p> +<p>“My dear, though I am not set against races like Julius, I +think, considering his strong feelings on the subject—”</p> +<p>“My dear Mrs. Poynsett, it would be very bad for Julius to +give in to his fancies. The next thing would be to set baby up +in a little hood and veil like a nun!”</p> +<p>Rosamond’s winsome nonsense could not but gain a smile. +No doubt she was a pleasant daughter-in-law, though, for substantial +care, Anne was the strength and reliance. Even Anne was much engrossed +by preparations for the bazaar. It had been a great perplexity +to her that the one thing she thought not worldly should be condemned +by Julius, and he had not tried to prevent her from assisting Cecil, +thinking, as he had told Eleonora, that the question of right and wrong +was not so trenchant as to divide households.</p> +<p>The banquet and inauguration went off fairly well. There was +nothing in it worth recording, except that Rosamond pronounced that +Raymond only wanted a particle of Irish fluency to be a perfect speaker; +but every one was observing how ill and depressed he looked. Even +Cecil began to see it herself, and to ask Lady Tyrrell with some anxiety +whether she thought him altered.</p> +<p>“Men always look worn after a Session,” said Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“If this really makes him unhappy!”</p> +<p>“My dear Cecil, that’s the very proof of the necessity. +If it makes him unhappy to go five miles away with his wife, it ought +not. You should wean him from such dependence.”</p> +<p>Cecil had tears in her eyes as she said, “I don’t know! +When I hear him sighing in his sleep, I long to give it up and tell +him I will try to be happy here.”</p> +<p>“My dear child, don’t be weak. If you give way +now, you will rue it all your life.”</p> +<p>“If I could have taken to his mother, I think he would have +cared more for me.”</p> +<p>“No. The moment her jealousy was excited she would have +resumed him, and you would have been the more shut out in the cold. +A little firmness now, and the fresh start is before you.”</p> +<p>Cecil sighed, feeling that she was paying a heavy price for that +fresh start, but her hands were too full for much thought. Guests +came to dinner, Mrs. Poynsett kept more to her own room, and Raymond +exerted himself to talk, so that the blank of the evenings was less +apparent. The days were spent at the town-hall, where the stalls +were raised early enough for all the ladies, their maids and footmen, +to buzz about them all day, decking them out.</p> +<p>Mrs. Duncombe was as usual the guiding spirit, contriving all with +a cleverness that made the deficiencies of her household the more remarkable. +Conny and Bee Strangeways were the best workers, having plenty of experience +and resource, and being ready to do anything, however hard, dusty, or +disagreeable; and to drudge contentedly, with plenty of chatter indeed, +but quite as freely to a female as to a male companion; whereas Miss +Moy had a knot of men constantly about her, and made a noise which was +a sore trial to Cecil’s heavy spirit all the first day, exclusive +of the offence to her native fastidiousness. She even called upon +Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. Duncombe to hold a council whether all gentlemen +should not be excluded the next day, as spoiling the ladies’ work, +and of no use themselves; but there were one or two who really did toil, +and so well that they could not be dispensed with, and Mrs. Duncombe +added that it would not do to give offence.</p> +<p>There was a harassed look about Mrs. Duncombe herself, for much depended +on the success of her husband’s filly, Dark Hag. The Captain +had hitherto been cautious, and had secured himself against heavy loss, +so as to make the turf a tolerable speculation, on but the wonderful +perfections of this animal had led him to stake much more on her than +had been his wont; and though his wife was assured of being a rich woman +in another week, she was not sorry for the multiplicity of occupations +which hindered her mind from dwelling too much on the chances.</p> +<p>“How calm you look,—how I envy you!” she said, +as she came to borrow some tape of Eleonora Vivian, who was fastening +the pendent articles to the drapery of her sister’s stall. +Eleonora gave a constrained smile, feeling how little truth there was +in her apparent peace, wearied out as she was with the long conflict +and constant distrust. She was the more anxious to be with Lady +Susan, whose every word she could believe, and she finally promised +to leave home with Bee and Conny the day after the ball, and to meet +their mother in London. They knew there was no chance for Lorimer, +but they took her on her own terms, hoping something perhaps, and at +any rate glad to be a comfort to one whom they really loved, while Lady +Tyrrell was delighted to promote the visit, seeing that the family did +more for Lorimer’s cause than he did for himself; and in his own +home who could guess the result, especially after certain other manœuvres +of her ladyship had taken effect?</p> +<p>Lady Tyrrell did not know, nor indeed did Conny or Bee, that, though +they would meet their mother in London, she would not at once go into +Yorkshire with them, but would send them to their uncle’s, while +she repaired to the retreat at St. Faith’s. The harass of +these last few weeks, especially the endeavour to make her go to the +races, had removed all scruples from Lenore’s mind as to leaving +her home in ignorance of her intentions. To her mind, the circumstances +of her brother’s death had made a race-course no place for any +of the family, especially that of Backsworth; gout coming opportunely +to disable her father in London, and one or two other little accidents, +had prevented the matter from coming to an issue while she had been +in London, and the avowal of her intention to keep away had filled her +father with passion at her for her absurd scruples and pretences at +being better than other people. It had been Lady Tyrrell who pacified +him with assurances that she would soon do better; no one wished to +force her conscience, and Lenore, always on the watch, began to wonder +whether her sister had any reason for wishing to keep her away, and +longed the more for the house of truth and peace.</p> +<p>So came on the bazaar day, which Mrs. Poynsett spent in solitude, +except for visits from the Rectory, and one from Joanna Bowater, who +looked in while Julius was sitting with her, and amused them by her +account of herself as an emissary from home with ten pounds to be got +rid of from her father and mother for good neighbourhood’s sake. +She brought Mrs. Poynsett a beautiful bouquet, for the elderly spinsters, +she said, sat on the stairs and kept up a constant supply; and she had +also some exquisite Genoese wire ornaments from Cecil’s counter, +and a set of studs from a tray of polished pebbles sent up from Vivian’s +favourite lapidary at Rockpier. She had been amused to find the +Miss Strangeways hunting over it to match that very simple-looking charm +which Lena wore on to her watch, for, as she said, “the attraction +must either be the simplicity of it, or the general Lena-worship in +which those girls indulge.”</p> +<p>“How does that dear child look?”</p> +<p>“Fagged, I think, but so does every one, and it was not easy +to keep order, Mrs. Duncombe’s counter was such a rendezvous for +noisy people, and Miss Moy was perfectly dreadful, running about forcing +things on people and refusing change.”</p> +<p>“And how is poor Anne enduring?”</p> +<p>“Like Christian in Vanity Fair as long as she did endure, for +she retired to the spinsters on the back stairs. I offered to +bring her home, and she accepted with delight, but I dropped her in +the village to bestow her presents. I was determined to come on +here; we go on Monday.”</p> +<p>“Shall you be at the Ordination?”</p> +<p>“I trust so. If mamma is pretty well, we shall both go.”</p> +<p>“Is Edith going to the ball on Thursday?”</p> +<p>“No, she has given it up. It seems as if we at least +ought to recollect our Ember days, though I am ashamed to think we never +did till this time last year.”</p> +<p>“I confess that I never heard of them,” said Mrs. Poynsett. +“Don’t look shocked, my dear; such things were not taught +in my time.”</p> +<p>Julius showed her the rubric and the prayer from the book in his +pocket, knowing that the one endeared to her by association was one +of the Prayer-books made easy by omission of all not needed at the barest +Sunday service.</p> +<p>“I see,” she said, “it seems quite right. +I wish you had told me before you were ordained, my dear.”</p> +<p>“You kept your Ember days for me by instinct, dear mother.”</p> +<p>“Don’t be too sure, Julius. One learns many things +when one is laid on one’s back.”</p> +<p>“Think of Herbert now,” whispered Jenny. “I +am glad he is sheltered from all this hubbub by being at the palace. +I suppose you cannot go to the Cathedral, Julius?”</p> +<p>“No, Bindon will not come back till his brother’s holiday +is over, nor do I even know where to write to him. Oh! here comes +Anne. Now for her impressions.”</p> +<p>Anne had brought her little gift for Mrs. Poynsett, and displayed +her presents for Glen Fraser, but as to what she had seen it made her +shudder and say, “You were right, Julius, I did not know people +could go on so! And with all those poor people ill close by. +Miss Slater, who sat on the stairs just below me tying up flowers, is +much grieved about a lad who was at work there till a fortnight ago, +and now is dying of a fever, and harassed by all the rattling of the +carriages.”</p> +<p>“What! close by! Nothing infectious, I hope?”</p> +<p>“The doctor called it gastric fever, but no one was to hear +of it lest there should be an alarm; and it was too late to change the +place of the bazaar, though it is so sad to have all that gaiety close +at hand.”</p> +<p>If these were the impressions of Anne and Joanna early in the day, +what were they later, when, in those not sustained by excitement, spirit +and energy began to flag? Cecil’s counter, with her excellent +and expensive wares, and her own dignified propriety, was far less popular +than those where the goods were cheaper and the saleswomen less inaccessible, +and she was not only disappointed at her failure, but vexed when told +that the articles must be raffled for. She could not object, but +it seemed an unworthy end for what had cost her so much money and pains +to procure, and it was not pleasant to see Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Moy +hawking the tickets about, like regular touters, nor the most beautiful +things drawn by the most vulgar and tasteless people.</p> +<p>Miss Moy had around her a court of ‘horsey’ men who were +lounging away the day before the races, and who had excited her spirits +to a pitch of boisterousness such as dismayed Mrs. Duncombe herself +when her attempts at repression were only laughed at.</p> +<p>Somehow, among these adherents, there arose a proposal for the election +of a queen of beauty, each gentleman paying half-a-crown for the right +of voting. Miss Moy bridled and tried to blush. She was +a tall, highly-coloured, flashing-eyed brunette, to whom a triumph would +be immense over the refined, statuesque, severe Miss Vivian, and an +apple-blossom innocent-looking girl who was also present, and though +Lady Tyrrell was incontestably the handsomest person in the room, her +age and standing had probably prevented her occurring to the propounders +of the scheme.</p> +<p>The design was taking shape when young Strangeways, who was willing +to exchange chaff with Gussie Moy, but was gentleman enough to feel +the indecorum of the whole thing, moved across to his sister, and muttered, +“I say, Con, they are getting up that stupid trick of election +of a queen of beauty. Does Lady Tyrrell know it?”</p> +<p>“Wouldn’t it be rather fun?”</p> +<p>“Horrid bad form, downright impudence. Mother would squash +it at once. Go and warn one of them,” signing with his head.</p> +<p>Constance made her way to Eleonora, who had already been perplexed +and angered by more than one critical stare, as one and another man +loitered past and gazed intrepidly at her. She hurried at once +to her sister, who was sitting passively behind her counter as if wearied +out, and who would not be stirred to interference. “Never +mind, Lenore, it can’t be helped. It is all for the cause, +and to stop it would be worse taste, fitting on the cap as an acknowledged +beauty, and to that I’m not equal.”</p> +<p>“It is an insult.”</p> +<p>“Never fear, they’ll never choose you while you look +so forbidding, though perhaps it is rather becoming. They have +not the taste.”</p> +<p>Eleonora said no more, but went over to the window where Raymond +was keeping his guard, with his old-fashioned sense of protection. +She had no sooner told him than he started into incredulous indignation, +in which he was joined by his wife who only wished him to dash forward +to prevent the scheme before he would believe it real.</p> +<p>However, when the ballot-box came his way, and a simpering youth +presented him with a card, begging for his opinion, he spoke so as to +be heard by all, “No, thank you, sir. I am requested by +the ladies present to state that such competition was never contemplated +by their committee and would be repugnant to all their sentiments. +They beg that the election may be at once dropped and the money returned.”</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock Poynsett had a weight that no one resisted. There +was a moment’s silence, a little murmur, apologetic and remonstrant, +but the deed was done.</p> +<p>Only a clear voice, with the thrillings of disappointed vanity and +exultation scarcely disguised by a laugh, was heard saying, louder than +the owner knew, “Oh, of course Mr. Charnock Poynsett spoiled sport. +It would have been awkward between his wife and his old flame.”</p> +<p>“For shame, Gussie,” hushed Mrs. Duncombe, “they’ll +hear.”</p> +<p>“I don’t care! Let them! Stuck-up people!”</p> +<p>Whoever heard, Cecil Charnock Poynsett did, and felt as if the ground +were giving way with her.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIV<br /> +The Lady Green Mantle</h2> +<blockquote><p>The night, just like the night before,<br /> + In terrors passed away,<br /> +Nor did the demons vanish thence<br /> + Before the dawn of day.—MOORE</p> +</blockquote> +<p>The turmoil was over, the gains had been emptied into bags to be +counted at leisure, the relics of the sale left to be disposed of through +the <i>Exchange and Mart</i>. Terry, looking tired to death, descended +from his post as assistant showman; and, with some gentlemen who were +to dine at Compton Poynsett, Cecil drove home to dress in haste, and +act hostess to a large dinner-party. All the time she felt giddy +at the words she had heard—“Mr. Poynsett’s old flame.” +It was constantly ringing in her ears, and one conviction was before +her mind. Her cheeks burnt like fire, and when she reached her +own room at night, and leant from the window to cool them, they only +burnt the more.</p> +<p>Had she been wilfully deceived? had she been taking the counsel of +a jealous woman about her husband? Had not Camilla assured her +that the object of his first love was not in the country? Ay; +but when that was spoken Camilla herself was in London, and Cecil knew +enough of her friend to be aware that she viewed such a subterfuge as +ingenious. Even then she had perceived that the person alluded +to could only have been a Vivian, and the exclamation of careless spite +carried assurance to her that she had been tricked into confidence, +and acceptance of the advice of a rival. She had a feverish longing +to know more, and obtain explanation and external certainty. But +how?</p> +<p>Raymond was one of the very tired that night. He fell asleep +the instant his head touched the pillow; but it was that sobbing, sighing +sleep which had before almost swept away, from very ruth, her resolution; +and on this night there were faltering words, strangely, though unconsciously, +replying to her thoughts. “Camilla, a cruel revenge!” +“Poor child! but for you she might have learnt.” “My +mother!” “Why, why this persistent hatred?” +“Cannot you let us alone?” “Must you destroy +our home?”</p> +<p>These were the mutterings at intervals. She listened, and in +the darkness her impulse was to throw herself on her husband, tell him +all, show him how she had been misled, and promise to give up all to +which that true Vivienne had prompted her. She did even try to +wake him, but the attempt caused only a more distinct expostulation +of “Cannot you let her alone?” “Cannot you let +us learn to love one another?” “It may be revenge +on me or my mother; but what has she done?” “Don’t!—oh, +don’t!”</p> +<p>The distress she caused forced her to desist, and she remembered +how Raymond had always warned her. The intimacy with Lady Tyrrell +had been in the teeth of his remonstrances. He had said everything +to prevent it short of confessing his former attachment, and though +resentful that the warning had been denied her, she felt it had been +well that she had been prevented from putting the question on her first +impulse. Many ways of ascertaining the fact were revolved by her +as with an aching head she lay hopelessly awake till morning, when she +fell into a doze which lasted until she found that Raymond had risen, +and that she must dress in haste, unless she meant to lose her character +for punctuality. Her head still ached, and she felt thoroughly +tired; but when Raymond advised her to stay at home, and recruit herself +for the ball, she said the air of the downs would refresh her. +Indeed, she felt as if quiet and loneliness would be intolerable until +she could understand herself and what she had heard.</p> +<p>Raymond took the reins of the barouche, and a gentleman who had slept +at the Hall went on the box beside him, leaving room for Rosamond and +her brother, who were to be picked up at the Rectory; but when they +drew up there, only Rosamond came out in the wonderful bonnet, just +large enough to contain one big water-lily, which suited well with the +sleepy grace of her movements, and the glossy sheen of her mauve silk.</p> +<p>“Terry is not coming. He has a headache, poor boy,” +she said, as Julius shut her into the barouche. “Take care +of him and baby.”</p> +<p>“Take care of yourself, Madam Madcap,” said Julius, with +a smile, as she bent down to give him a parting kiss, with perhaps a +little pleading for forgiveness in it. But instead of, as last +year, shuddering, either at its folly or publicity, Cecil felt a keen +pang of desire for such a look as half rebuked, while it took a loving +farewell of Rosamond. Was Camilla like that statue which the husband +inadvertently espoused with a ring, and which interposed between him +and his wife for ever?</p> +<p>Rosamond talked. She always had a certain embarrassment in +<i>tête-à-têtes</i> with Cecil, and it took form +in a flow of words. “Poor Terry! he turned faint and giddy +at breakfast. I thought he had been indulging at the refreshment-stall, +but he says he was saving for a fine copy of the <i>Faerie Queen</i> +that Friskyball told him of at a book-stall at Backsworth, and existed +all day on draughts of water when his throat grew dry as showman; so +I suppose it is only inanition, coupled with excitement and stuffiness, +and that quiet will repair him. He would not hear of my staying +with him.”</p> +<p>“I suppose you do not wish to be late?”</p> +<p>“Certainly not,” said Rosamond, who, indeed, would have +given up before, save for her bonnet and her principle; and whatever +she said of Lady Rathforlane’s easy management of her nurslings, +did not desire to be <i>too</i> many hours absent from her Julia.</p> +<p>“I only want to stay till the Three-year-old Cup has been run +for,” said Cecil. “Mrs. Duncombe would feel it unkind +if we did not.”</p> +<p>“You look tired,” said Rosamond, kindly; “put your +feet upon the front seat—nobody will look. Do you know how +much you cleared?”</p> +<p>“Not yet,” said Cecil. “I do not know what +was made by the raffles. How I do hate them! Fancy that +lovely opal Venetian vase going to that big bony Scotswoman, Mr. M’Vie’s +mother.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! That is a pity. If I had known it would +be raffled for, I would have sent a private commission, though I don’t +know if Julius would have let me. He says it is gambling. +What became of the Spa work-box, with the passion-flower wreath?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know. I was so disgusted, that I would +not look any more. I never saw such an obnoxious girl as that +Miss Moy.”</p> +<p>“<i>That</i> she is,” said Rosamond. “I should +think she was acting the fast girl as found in sensation novels.”</p> +<p>“Exactly,” said Cecil, proceeding to narrate the proposed +election; and in her need of sympathy she even told its sequel, adding, +“Rosamond, do you know what she meant?”</p> +<p>“Is it fair to tell you?” said Rosamond, asking a question +she knew to be vain.</p> +<p>“I must know whether I have been deceived.”</p> +<p>“Never by Raymond!” cried Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Never, never, never!” cried Cecil, with most unusual +excitement. “He told me all that concerned himself at the +very first. I wish he had told me who it was. How much it +would have saved! Rosamond, you know, I am sure.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I made Julius tell me; but indeed, Cecil, you need not +mind. Never has a feeling more entirely died out.”</p> +<p>“Do you think I do not know that?” said Cecil. +“Do you think my husband could have been my husband if he had +not felt <i>that</i>?”</p> +<p>“Dear Cecil, I am so glad,” cried impulsive Rosamond; +her gladness, in truth, chiefly excited by the anger that looked like +love for Raymond. “I mean, I am glad you see it so, and +don’t doubt him.”</p> +<p>“I hope we are both above that,” said Cecil. “No, +it is Camilla that I want to know about. I <i>must</i> know whether +she told me truth.”</p> +<p>“She told! what did she tell you?”</p> +<p>“That <i>he</i>—Raymond—had loved some one,” +said Cecil in a stifled voice; “that I little knew what his love +could be. I thought it had been for her sister in India. +She told me that it was nobody in the country. But then we were +in town.”</p> +<p>“Just like her!” cried Rosamond, and wondered not to +be contradicted.</p> +<p>“Tell me how it really was!” only asked Cecil.</p> +<p>“As far as I know, the attachment grew up with Raymond, but +it was when the brother was alive, and Sir Harry at his worst; and Mrs. +Poynsett did not like it, though she gave in at last, and tried to make +the best of it; but then she—Camilla—as you call her—met +the old monster, Lord Tyrrell, made up a quarrel, because Mrs. Poynsett +would not abdicate, and broke it off.”</p> +<p>“She said Mrs. Poynsett only half consented, and that the family +grew weary of her persistent opposition.”</p> +<p>“And she made you think it Mrs. Poynsett’s doing, and +that she is not possible to live with! O, Cecil! you will not +think that any longer. Don’t you see that it is breaking +Raymond’s heart?”</p> +<p>Cecil’s tears were starting, and she was very near sobbing +as she said, “I thought perhaps if we were away by ourselves he +might come to care for me. <i>She</i> said he never would while +his mother was by—that she would not let him.”</p> +<p>“That’s not a bit true!” said Rosamond, indignantly. +“Is it not what she has most at heart, to see her sons happy? +When has she ever tried to interfere between Julius and me? Not +that she could,” added Rosamond to herself in a happy little whisper, +not meant to be heard, but it was; and with actual though suppressed +sobs, Cecil exclaimed—</p> +<p>“O, Rose, Rose! what do you do to make your husband love you?”</p> +<p>“Do? Be very naughty!” said Rosamond, forced to +think of the exigencies of the moment, and adding lightly, “There! +it won’t do to cry. Here are the gentlemen looking round +to see what is the matter.”</p> +<p>Ardently did she wish to have been able to put Cecil into Raymond’s +arms and run out of sight, but with two men-servants with crossed arms +behind, a strange gentleman in front, the streets of Wil’sbro’ +at hand, and the race-ground impending, sentiment was impossible, and +she could only make herself a tonic, and declare nothing to be the matter; +while Cecil, horrified at attracting notice, righted herself and made +protest of her perfect health and comfort. When Raymond, always +careful of her, stopped the carriage and descended from his perch to +certify himself whether she was equal to going on, his solicitude went +to her heart, and she gave his hand, as it lay on the door, an affectionate +thankful pressure, which so amazed him that he raised his eyes to her +face with a softness in them that made them for a moment resemble Frank’s.</p> +<p>That was all, emotion must be kept at bay, and as vehicles thickened +round them as they passed through Wil’sbro’, the two ladies +betook themselves to casual remarks upon them. Overtaking the +Sirenwood carriage just at the turn upon the down, Raymond had no choice +but to take up his station with that on one side, and on the other Captain +Duncombe’s drag, where, fluttering with Dark Hag’s colours, +were perched Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Moy, just in the rear of the like +conveyance from the barracks.</p> +<p>Greetings, and invitations to both elevations were plentiful, and +Rosamond would have felt in her element on the military one. She +was rapidly calculating, with her good-natured eye, whether the choice +her rank gave her would exclude some eager girl, when Cecil whispered, +“Stay with me pray,” with an irresistibly beseeching tone. +So the Strangeways sisters climbed up, nothing loth; Lady Tyrrell sat +with her father, the centre of a throng of gentlemen, who welcomed her +to the ground where she used to be a reigning belle; and the Colonel’s +wife, Mrs. Ross, came to sit with Lady Rosamond. The whole was +perfect enjoyment to the last. She felt it a delightful taste +of her merry old Bohemian days to sit in the clear September sunshine, +exhilarated by the brilliancy and life around, laughing with her own +little court of officers, exclaiming at every droll episode, holding +her breath with the thrill of universal expectation and excitement, +in the wonderful hush of the multitude as the thud of the hoofs and +rush in the wind was heard coming nearer, straining her eyes as the +glossy creatures and their gay riders flashed past, and setting her +whole heart for the moment on the one she was told to care for.</p> +<p>Raymond, seeing his ladies well provided for, gave up his reins to +the coachman, and started in quest of a friend from the other side of +the county. About an hour later, when luncheon was in full progress, +and Rosamond was, by Cecil’s languor, driven into doing the honours, +with her most sunshiny drollery and mirth, Raymond’s hand was +on the carriage door, and he asked in haste, “Can you spare me +a glass of champagne? Have you a scent-bottle?”</p> +<p>“An accident?”</p> +<p>“Yes, no, not exactly. She has been knocked down and +trampled on.”</p> +<p>“Who? Let me come! Can’t I help? Could +Rosamond?”</p> +<p>“No, no. It is a poor woman, brutally treated. +No, I say, I’ll manage. It is a dreadful scene, don’t.”</p> +<p>But there was something in his tone which impelled Rosamond to open +the carriage door and spring out.</p> +<p>“Rose, I say it is no place for a lady. I can’t +answer for it to Julius.”</p> +<p>“I’ll do that. Take me.”</p> +<p>There was no withstanding her, and, after all, Raymond’s tone +betrayed that he was thankful for her help, and knew that there was +no danger for her.</p> +<p>He had not many yards to lead her. The regions of thoughtless +gaiety were scarcely separated from the regions of undisguised evil, +and Raymond, on his way back from his friend, had fallen on a horrible +row, in which a toy-selling woman had been set upon, thrown down and +trodden on, and then dragged out by the police, bleeding and senseless. +When he brought Rosamond to the spot, she was lying propped against +a bundle, moaning a little, and guarded by a young policeman, who looked +perplexed and only equal to keeping back the crowd, who otherwise, with +better or worse purposes, would have rushed back in the few minutes +during which Mr. Poynsett had been absent.</p> +<p>They fell back, staring and uttering expressions of rough wonder +at the advance of the lady in her glistening silk, but as she knelt +down by the poor creature, held her on her arm, bathed her face with +scent on her own handkerchief, and held to her lips the champagne that +Raymond poured out, there was a kind of hoarse cheer.</p> +<p>“I think her arm is put out,” said Rosamond; “she +ought to go to the Infirmary.”</p> +<p>“Send for a cab,” said Raymond to the policeman; but +at that moment the girl opened her eyes, started at the sight of him +and tried to hide her face with her hand.</p> +<p>“It is poor Fanny Reynolds,” said he in a low voice to +Rosamond, while the policeman was gruffly telling the woman she was +better, and ought to get up and not trouble the lady; but Rosamond waved +off his too decided assistance, saying:</p> +<p>“I know who she is; she comes from my husband’s parish; +and I will take her home. You would like to go home, would you +not, poor Fanny?”</p> +<p>The woman shuddered, but clung to her; and in a minute or two an +unwilling fly had been pressed into the service, and the girl lifted +into it by Raymond and the policeman.</p> +<p>“You are really going with her?” said the former. +“You will judge whether to take her home; but she ought to go +to the Infirmary first.”</p> +<p>“Tell Cecil I am sorry to desert her,” said Rosamond, +as he wrung her hand, then paid the driver and gave him directions, +the policeman going with them to clear the way through the throng to +the border of the down.</p> +<p>The choice of the cabman had not been happy. He tried to go +towards Backsworth, and when bidden to go to Wil’sbro’, +growled out an imprecation, and dashed off at a pace that was evident +agony to the poor patient; but when Rosamond stretched out at the window +to remonstrate, she was answered with rude abuse that he could not be +hindered all day by whims. She perceived that he was so much in +liquor that their connection had better be as brief as possible; and +the name on the door showed that he came from beyond the circle of influence +of the name of Charnock Poynsett. She longed to assume the reins, +if not to lay the whip about his ears; but all she could do was to try +to lessen the force of the jolts by holding up the girl, as the horse +was savagely beaten, and the carriage so swayed from side to side that +she began to think it would be well if there were not three cases for +the Infirmary instead of one. To talk to the girl or learn her +wishes was not possible, among the moans and cries caused by the motion; +and it was no small relief to be safely at the Infirmary door, though +there was no release till after a fierce altercation with the driver, +who first denied, and then laughed to scorn the ample fare he had received, +so that had any policeman been at hand, the porter and house surgeon +would have given him in charge, but they could only take his number +and let him drive off in a fury.</p> +<p>Poor Fanny was carried away fainting to the accident ward, and Rosamond +found it would be so long before she would be visible again, that it +would be wiser to go home and send in her relations, but there was not +a fly or cab left in Wil’sbro’, and there was nothing for +it but to walk.</p> +<p>She found herself a good deal shaken, and walked fast because thus +her limbs did not tremble so much, while the glaring September afternoon +made her miss the parasol she had left in the carriage, and find little +comfort in the shadeless erection on her head. It was much further +than she had walked for a long time past, and she had begun to think +she had parted with a good deal of her strength before the Compton woods +grew more defined, or the church tower came any nearer.</p> +<p>Though the lane to the Reynolds’ colony was not full in her +way, she was glad to sit down in the shade to speak to old Betty, who +did not comport herself according to either extreme common to parents +in literature.</p> +<p>“So Fanny, she be in the ’firmary, be her? I’m +sure as ’twas very good of the young Squire and you, my lady; +and I’m sorry her’s bin and give you so much trouble.”</p> +<p>Everybody was harvesting but the old woman, who had the inevitable +bad leg. All men and beasts were either in the fields or at the +races, and Rosamond, uncertain whether her patient was not in a dying +state, rejoiced in her recent acquisition of a pony carriage, and speeding +home with renewed energy, roused her ‘parson’s man’ +from tea in his cottage, and ordered him off to take Betty Reynolds +to see her daughter without loss of time.</p> +<p>Then at length she opened her own gate and walked in at the drawing-room +window. Terry started up from the sofa, and Anne from a chair +by his side, exclaiming at her appearance, and asking if there had been +any accident.</p> +<p>“Not to any of us, but to a poor woman whom I have been taking +to the Infirmary,” she said, sinking into a low chair. “Where’s +Julius?”</p> +<p>“He went to see old George Willett,” said Anne. +“The poor old man has just heard of the death of his daughter +at Wil’sbro’.”</p> +<p>“And you came to sit with this boy, you good creature. +How are you, master?”</p> +<p>“Oh, better, thanks,” he said, with a weary stretch. +“How done up you look, Rose! How did you come?”</p> +<p>“I walked from Wil’sbro’.”</p> +<p>“Walked!” echoed both her hearers.</p> +<p>“Walked! I liked my two legs better than the four of +the horse that brought me there, though ’twasn’t his fault, +poor beast, but the brute of a driver, whom we’ll have up before +the magistrate. I’ve got the name; doing his best to dislocate +every bone in the poor thing’s body. Well, and I hope baby +didn’t disturb you?”</p> +<p>“Baby has been wonderfully quiet. Julius went to see +after her once, but she was out.”</p> +<p>“I’ll go and see the young woman, and then come and tell +my story.”</p> +<p>But Rosamond came back almost instantly, exclaiming, “Emma +must have taken the baby to the Hall. I wish she would be more +careful. The sun is getting low, and there’s a fog rising.”</p> +<p>“She had not been there when I came down an hour ago,” +said Anne; “at least, not with Mrs. Poynsett. They may have +had her in the housekeeper’s room. I had better go and hasten +her home.”</p> +<p>Julius came in shortly after, but before he had heard the tale of +Fanny Reynolds, Anne had returned to say that neither child nor nurse +had been at the Hall, nor passed the large gate that morning. +It was growing rather alarming. The other servants said Emma had +taken the baby out as usual in the morning, but had not returned to +dinner, and they too had supposed her at the Hall. None of the +dependants of the Hall in the cottages round knew anything of her, but +at last Dilemma Hornblower imparted that she had seen my lady’s +baby’s green cloak atop of a tax-cart going towards Wil’sbro’.</p> +<p>Now Emma had undesirable relations, and Rosamond had taken her in +spite of warning that her uncle was the keeper of the ‘Three Pigeons.’ +The young parents stood looking at one another, and Rosamond faintly +said, “If that girl has taken her to the races!”</p> +<p>“I’m more afraid of that fever in Water Lane,” +said Julius. “I have a great mind to take the pony carriage +and see that the girl does not take her there.”</p> +<p>“Oh! I sent it with Betty Reynolds,” cried Rosamond +in an agony.</p> +<p>“At that moment the Hall carriage came dashing up, and as Raymond +saw the three standing in the road, he called to the coachman to stop, +for he and his friend were now within, and Cecil leaning back, looking +much tired. Raymond’s eager question was what Rosamond had +done with her charge.</p> +<p>“Left her at the Infirmary;—but, oh! you’ve not +seen baby?”</p> +<p>“Seen—seen what! your baby?” asked Raymond, as +if he thought Rosamond’s senses astray, while his bachelor friend +was ready to laugh at a young mother’s alarms, all the more when +Julius answered, “It is too true; the baby and her nurse have +not been seen here since ten o’clock; and we are seriously afraid +the girl may have been beguiled to those races. There is a report +of the child’s cloak having been seen on a tax-cart.”</p> +<p>“Then it was so,” exclaimed Cecil, starting forward. +“I saw a baby’s mantle of that peculiar green, and it struck +me that some farmer’s wife had been aping little Julia’s.”</p> +<p>“Where? When?” cried Rosamond.</p> +<p>“They passed us, trying to find a place. I did not show +it to you for you were talking to those gentlemen.”</p> +<p>“Did you see it, Brown?” asked Julius, going towards +the coachman. “Our baby and nurse, I mean.”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell about Miss Charnock, sir,” said the +coachman, “but I did think I remarked two young females with young +Gadley in a tax-cart. I would not be alarmed, sir, nor my lady,” +he added, with the freedom of a confidential servant, who, like all +the household, adored Lady Rosamond. “It was a giddy thing +in the young woman to have done; and no place to take the young lady +to. But there—there were more infants there than a man could +count, and it stands to reason they come to no harm.”</p> +<p>“The most sensible thing that has been said yet,” muttered +the friend; but Rosamond was by no means pacified. “Gadley’s +cart! They’ll go to that horrid public-house in Water Lane +where there’s typhus and diphtheria and everything; and there’s +this fog—and that girl will never wrap her up. Oh! why did +I ever go?”</p> +<p>“My dear Rose,” said Julius, trying to speak with masculine +composure, “this is nonsense. Depend upon it, Emma is only +anxious to get her home.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know, I don’t know! If she could +take her to the races, she would be capable of taking her anywhere! +They all go and drink at that beer-shop, and catch—Julius, the +pony carriage! Oh! it’s gone!”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Julius in explanation. “She sent +Betty Reynolds into Wil’sbro’ in it.”</p> +<p>“Get in, Rosamond,” cried Cecil, “we will drive +back till we find her.”</p> +<p>But this was more than a good coachman could permit for his horses’ +sake, and Brown declared they must be fed and rested before the ball. +Cecil was ready to give up the ball, but still they could not be taken +back at once; and Rosamond had by this time turned as if setting her +face to walk at once to the race-ground until she found her child, when +Raymond said, “Rose! would you be afraid to trust to King Coal +and me? I would put him in at once and drive you till you find +Julia.”</p> +<p>“Oh! Raymond, how good you are!”</p> +<p>The coachman, glad of this solution, only waited to pick up Anne, +and hurried on his horses, while the bachelor friend could not help +grunting a little, and observing that it was plain there was only one +child in the family, and that he would take any bet ‘it’ +was at home all right long before Poynsett reached the parsonage.</p> +<p>“Maybe so,” said Raymond, “but I would do anything +rather than leave her mother in the distress you take so easily.”</p> +<p>“Besides, there’s every chance of her being taken to +that low public-house,” said Cecil. “One that Mr. +Poynsett would not allow our servants to go to during the bazaar, though +it is close to the town-hall, and all the others did.”</p> +<p>“Let us hope that early influence may prevent contamination,” +solemnly said the friend.</p> +<p>Cecil turned from him. “I still hope she may be at home,” +she said; “it is getting very chill and foggy. Raymond, +I hope you may not have to go.”</p> +<p>“You must lie down and get thoroughly rested,” he said, +as he helped her out; and only waiting to equip himself for the evening +dance, he hurried to the stables to expedite the harnessing of the powerful +and fiery steed which had as yet been only experimentally driven by +himself and the coachman.</p> +<p>Rosamond was watching, and when King Coal was with difficulty pulled +up, she made but one spring to the seat of the dog-cart; and Julius, +who was tucking in the rug, had to leap back to save his foot, so instantaneous +was the dash forward. They went like the wind, Rosamond not caring +to speak, and Raymond had quite enough on his hands to be glad not to +be required to talk, while he steered through the numerous vehicles +they met, and she scanned them anxiously for the outline of Emma’s +hat. At last they reached Wil’sbro’, where, as they +came to the entrance of Water Lane, Rosamond, through the hazy gaslight, +declared that she saw a tax-cart at the door of the ‘Three Pigeons,’ +and Raymond, albeit uncertain whether it were <i>the</i> tax-cart, could +only turn down the lane at her bidding, with difficulty preventing King +Coal from running his nose into the vehicle. Something like an +infant’s cry was heard through the open door, and before he knew +what she was about, Rosamond was on the pavement and had rushed into +the house; and while he was signing to a man to take the horse’s +head, she was out again, the gaslight catching her eyes so that they +glared like a tigress’s, her child in her arms, and a whole Babel +of explaining tongues behind her. How she did it neither she nor +Raymond ever knew, but in a second she had flown to her perch, saying +hoarsely, “Drive me to Dr. Worth’s. They were drugging +her. I don’t know whether I was in time. No, not a +word”—(this to those behind)—“never let me see +any of you again.”</p> +<p>King Coal prevented all further words of explanation by dancing round, +so that Raymond was rejoiced at finding that nobody was run over. +They were off again instantly, while Rosamond vehemently clasped the +child, which was sobbing out a feeble sound, as if quite spent with +crying, but without which the mother seemed dissatisfied, for she moved +the poor little thing about if it ceased for a moment. They were +soon within Dr. Worth’s iron gates, where Raymond could give the +horse to a servant, help his sister-in-law down, and speak for her; +for at first she only held up the phial she had clutched, and gazed +at the doctor speechlessly.</p> +<p>He looked well both at the bottle and the baby while Raymond spoke, +and then said, “Are you sure she took any, Lady Rosamond?”</p> +<p>“Quite, quite sure!” cried Rosamond. “The +spoon was at her lips, the dear little helpless darling!”</p> +<p>“Well, then,” said the doctor, dryly, “it only +remains to be proved whether an aristocratic baby can bear popular treatment. +I dare say some hundred unlucky infants have been lugged out to the +race-course to-day, and come back squalling their hearts out with fatigue +and hunger, and I’ll be bound that nine-tenths are lulled with +this very sedative, and will be none the worse.”</p> +<p>“Then you do not think it will hurt her?”</p> +<p>“So far from it, that, under the circumstances, it was the +best thing she could have. She has plainly been exhausted, and +though I would not exactly recommend the practice in your nursery, I +doubt if she could have taken nourishment till she had been composed. +She will sleep for an hour or two, and by that time you can get her +home, and feed her as usual. I should be more anxious about Lady +Rosamond herself,” he added, turning to Raymond. “She +looks completely worn out. Let me order you a basin of soup.”</p> +<p>But Rosamond would not hear of it, she must get baby home directly. +Raymond advised a fly, but it was recollected that none was attainable +between the races and the ball, so the little one was muffled in shawls +and cloaks almost to suffocation, and the doctor forced a glass of wine +on her mother, and promised to look in the next day. Still they +had a delay at the door, caused by the penitent Emma and her aunt, bent +on telling how far they had been from intending any harm; how Emma, +when carrying the baby out, had been over-persuaded by the cousins she +had never disappointed before; how they had faithfully promised to take +her home early, long before my lady’s return; how she had taken +baby’s bottle, but how it had got broken; how impossible it had +been to move off the ground in the throng; and how the poor baby’s +inconsolable cries had caused the young nurse to turn aside to see whether +her aunt could find anything to prevent her from screaming herself into +convulsions.</p> +<p>Nothing but the most determined volubility on Mrs. Gadley’s +part could have poured this into the ears of Raymond; Rosamond either +could not or would not heed, pushed forward, past the weeping Emma, +and pulled away her dress with a shudder, when there was an attempt +to draw her back and make her listen.</p> +<p>“Don’t, girl,” said Raymond. “Don’t +you see that Lady Rosamond can’t attend to you? If you have +anything to say, you must come another time. You’ve done +quite enough mischief for the present.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said the doctor, “tell your brother to put +them both to bed, and keep them quiet. I should like to prescribe +the same for you, Mr. Poynsett; you don’t look the thing, and +I suppose you are going to take the ball by way of remedy.”</p> +<p>Raymond thanked the doctor, but was too much employed in enveloping +his passengers to make further reply.</p> +<p>It was quite dark, and the fog had turned to misty rain, soft and +still, but all pervading, and Rosamond found it impossible to hold up +an umbrella as well as to guard the baby, who was the only passenger +not soaked and dripping by the time they were among the lighted windows +of the village.</p> +<p>“Oh, Raymond! Raymond!” she then said, in a husky +dreamy voice, “how good and kind you have been. I know there +was something that would make you very, very glad!”</p> +<p>“Is there?” he said. “I have not met with +anything to make me glad for a long time past!”</p> +<p>“And I don’t seem able to recollect what it was, or even +if I ought to tell,” said Rosamond, in the same faint, bewildered +voice, which made Raymond very glad they were at the gate, where stood +Julius.</p> +<p>But before Rosamond would descend into her husband’s arms, +she opened all her child’s mufflings, saying, “Kiss her, +kiss her, Raymond—how she shall love you!” And when +he had obeyed, and Rosamond had handed the little one down to her father, +she pressed her own wet cheek against his dripping beard and moustache, +and exclaimed, “I’ll never forget your goodness. Have +you got her safe, Julius? I’ll never, never go anywhere +again!”</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXV<br /> +The Pebbles</h2> +<blockquote><p>O no, no, no; ’tis true. Here, take this +too;<br /> +It is a basilisk unto mine eye,<br /> +Kills me to look on’t. Let there be no honour,<br /> +Where there is beauty; truth, where semblance; love,<br /> +Where there’s another man.—Cymbeline</p> +</blockquote> +<p>When Julius, according to custom, opened his study shutters, at half-past +six, to a bright sunrise, his eldest brother stood before the window. +“Well, how are they?” he said.</p> +<p>“All right, thank you; the child woke, had some food, and slept +well and naturally after it; and Rose has been quite comfortable and +at rest since midnight. You saved us from a great deal, Raymond.”</p> +<p>“Ah!” with a sound of deep relief; “may Julia only +turn out as sweet a piece of womanhood as her mother. Julius, +I never understood half what that dear wife of yours was till yesterday.”</p> +<p>“I was forced to cut our gratitude very short,” said +Julius, laying his hand on his brother’s shoulder. “You +know I’ve always taken your kindness as a matter of course.”</p> +<p>“I should think so,” said Raymond, the more moved of +the two. “I tell you, Julius, that Rosamond was to me the +only redeeming element in the day. I wanted to know whether you +could walk with me to ask after that poor girl; I hear she came home +one with her grandmother.”</p> +<p>“Gladly,” said Julius. “I ought to have gone +last night; but what with Rose, and the baby, and Terry, I am afraid +I forgot everything.” He disappeared, and presently issued +from the front door in his broad hat, while Raymond inquired for Terry.</p> +<p>“He is asleep now, but he has been very restless, and there +is something about him I don’t like. Did not Worth say he +would come and look at the baby?”</p> +<p>“Yes, but chiefly to pacify Rosamond, about whom he was the +most uneasy.”</p> +<p>“She is quite herself now; but you look overdone, Raymond. +Have you had any sleep?”</p> +<p>“I have not lain down. When we came home at four o’clock, +Cecil was quite knocked up, excited and hysterical. Her maid advised +me to leave her to her; so I took a bath, and came down to wait for +you.”</p> +<p>Julius would have liked to see the maid who could have soothed his +Rosamond last night without him! He only said, however, “Is +Frank come down? My mother rather expected him.”</p> +<p>“Yes, he came to the race-ground.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! He was not with you when you came back, or were +we not sufficiently rational to see him?”</p> +<p>“Duncombe gave a dinner at the hotel, and carried him off to +it. I’m mortally afraid there’s something amiss in +that quarter. What, didn’t you know that Duncombe’s +filly failed?”</p> +<p>“No, indeed, I did not.”</p> +<p>“The town was ringing with it. Beaten out-and-out by +Fair Phyllida! a beast that took them all by surprise—nothing +to look at—but causing, I fancy, a good deal of distress. +They say the Duncombes will be done for. I only wish Frank was +clear; but that unhappy engagement has thrown him in with Sir Harry’s +set, and he was with them all day—hardly spoke to me. To +a fellow like him, a veteran scamp like old Vivian, with his benignant +looks, is ten times more dangerous than men of his own age. However, +having done the damage, they seem to have thrown him off. Miss +Vivian would not speak to him at the ball.”</p> +<p>“Eleonora! I don’t know how to think it!”</p> +<p>“What you cannot <i>think</i>, a Vivian can <i>do</i> and does!” +said Raymond, bitterly. “My belief is that he was decoyed +into being fleeced by the father, and now they have done their worst, +he is cast off. He came home with us, but sat outside, and I could +not get a word out of him.”</p> +<p>“I hope my mother may.”</p> +<p>“If he be not too far gone for her. I always did expect +some such termination, but not with this addition.”</p> +<p>“I don’t understand it now—Lena!”</p> +<p>“I only wonder at your surprise. The girl has been estranged +from us all for a long time. If it is at an end, so much the better. +I only wish we were none of us ever to see the face of one of them again.”</p> +<p>Julius knew from his wife that there were hopes for Raymond, but +of course he might not speak, and he was revolving these words, which +had a vehemence unlike the wont of the speaker, when he was startled +by Raymond’s saying, “Julius, you were right. I have +come to the conclusion that no consideration shall ever make me sanction +races again.”</p> +<p>“I am glad,” began Julius.</p> +<p>“You would not be glad if you had seen all I saw yesterday. +You must have lent me your eyes, for when you spoke before of the evils, +I thought you had picked up a Utopian notion, and were running a-muck +with it, like an enthusiastic young clergyman. For my own part +I can’t say I ever came across anything offensive. Of course +I know where to find it, as one does wherever one goes, but there was +no call to run after it; and as we were used to the affair, it was a +mere matter of society—”</p> +<p>“No, it could never be any temptation to you,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“No, nor to any other reasonable man; and I should add, though +perhaps you might not allow it, that so long as a man keeps within his +means, he has a right to enhance his excitement and amusement by bets.”</p> +<p>“Umph! He has a right then to tempt others to their ruin, +and create a class of speculators who live by gambling.”</p> +<p>“You need not go on trying to demolish me. I was going +to say that I had only thought of the demoralization, from the betting +side; but yesterday it was as if you had fascinated my eyes to look +behind the scenes. I could not move a step without falling on +something abominable. Roughs, with every passion up to fever-pitch, +ferocity barely kept down by fear of the police, gambling everywhere, +innocent young things looking on at coarseness as part of the humour +of the day, foul language, swarms of vagabond creatures, whose trade +is to minister to the license of such occasions. I declare that +your wife was the only being I saw display a spark of any sentiment +human nature need not blush for!”</p> +<p>“Nay, Raymond, I begin to wonder whose is the exaggerated feeling +now.”</p> +<p>“You were not there,” was the answer; and they were here +interrupted by crossing the path of the policeman, evidently full of +an official communication.</p> +<p>“I did not expect to see you so early, sir,” he said. +“I was coming to the Hall to report to you after I had been in +to the superintendent.”</p> +<p>“What is it?”</p> +<p>“There has been a burglary at Mrs. Hornblower’s, sir. +If you please, sir,” to Julius, “when is the Reverend Mr. +Bowater expected home?”</p> +<p>“Not before Monday. Is anything of his taken?”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir. A glass case has been broken open, and a silver +cup and oar, prizes for sports at college, I believe, have been abstracted. +Also the money from the till below; and I am sorry to say, young Hornblower +is absconded, and suspicion lies heavy on him. They do say the +young man staked heavily on that mare of Captain Duncombe’s.”</p> +<p>“You had better go on to the superintendent now,” said +Raymond. “You can come to me for a summons if you can find +any traces.”</p> +<p>Poor Mrs. Hornblower, what horror for her! and poor Herbert too who +would acutely feel this ingratitude. The blackness of it was beyond +what Julius thought probable in the lad, and the discussion of it occupied +the brothers till they reached the Reynolds colony, where they were +received by the daughter-in-law, a much more civilized person than old +Betty.</p> +<p>After Fanny’s dislocated arm had been set, the surgeon had +sent her home in the Rectory carriage, saying there was so much fever +in Wil’sbro’, that she would be likely to recover better +at home; but she had been suffering and feverish all night, and Dan +Reynolds was now gone in quest of ‘Drake,’ for whom she +had been calling all night.</p> +<p>“Is he her husband?” asked Julius.</p> +<p>“Well, I don’t know, sir; leastways, Granny says he ought +to be answerable for what’s required.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Reynolds further betrayed that the family had not been ignorant +of Fanny’s career since she had run away from home, leaving her +child on her grandmother’s hands. She had made her home +in one of the yellow vans which circulate between fairs and races, driving +an ostensible trade in cheap toys, but really existing by setting up +games which were, in fact, forms of gambling, according to the taste +of the people and the toleration of the police. From time to time, +she had appeared at home, late in the evening, with small sums of money +and presents for her boy; and Mrs. Dan believed that she thought herself +as good as married to ‘that there Drake.’ She was +reported to be asleep, and the place ‘all of a caddle,’ +and Julius promised to call later in the day.</p> +<p>“Yes, sir,” said Mrs. Reynolds; “it would be a +right good thing, poor girl. She’ve a kind heart, they all +do say; not as I know, not coming here till she was gone, nor wanting +to know much on her, for ’twas a right bad way she was in, and +’twere well if them nasty races were put down by Act of Parliament, +for they be the very ruin of the girls in these parts.”</p> +<p>“There’s a new suggestion, Raymond,” said Julius +as he shut the garden gate.</p> +<p>Raymond was long in answering, and when he spoke, it was to say, +“I shall withdraw from the subscription to the Wil’sbro’ +Cup.”</p> +<p>“So much the better.”</p> +<p>Then Raymond began discussing the terms of the letter in which he +would state his reasons, but with an amount of excitement that made +Julius say, “I should think it better not to write in this first +heat. It will take more effect if it is not so visibly done on +the spur of the moment.”</p> +<p>But the usually deliberate Raymond exclaimed, “I cannot rest +till it is done. I feel as if I must be like Lady Macbeth, continually +washing my hands of all this wreck and ruin.”</p> +<p>“No wonder; but I should think there was great need of caution—to +use your own words.”</p> +<p>“My seat must go, if this is to be the price,” said Raymond. +“I felt through all the speeches at that gilt-gingerbread place, +that it was a monument of my truckling to expediency. We began +the whole thing at the wrong end, and I fear we are beginning to see +the effects.”</p> +<p>“Do you mean that you are anxious about that fever in Water +Lane?”</p> +<p>“There was an oppressive sickly air about everything, strongest +at the ball. I can’t forget it,” said Raymond, taking +off his hat, so that the morning air might play about his temples. +“We talked about meddling women, but the truth was that they were +shaming us by doing what they could.”</p> +<p>“I hope others will see it so. Is not Whitlock to be +mayor next time?”</p> +<p>“Yes. He may do something. Well, they will hardly +unseat me! I should not like to see Moy in my place, and it would +be a sore thing for my mother; but,” he continued, in the same +strange, dreamy manner, “everything has turned out so wretchedly +that I hardly know or care how it goes.”</p> +<p>“My dear old fellow!”</p> +<p>Raymond had stopped to lean over a gate, where he could look up to +the old red house in the green park, set in brightly-tinted trees, all +aglow in the morning sunshine. Tears had sprung on his cheeks, +and a suppressed sob heaved his chest. Julius ventured to say, +“Perhaps there may yet be a change of mind.”</p> +<p>“No!” was the answer. “In the present situation +there is nothing for it but to sacrifice my last shred of peace to the +one who has the chief right—in a certain way.”</p> +<p>They walked on, and he hardly spoke again till, as they reached the +Rectory, Julius persuaded him to come in and have a cup of tea; and +though he said he must go back and see his friend off, he could not +withstand the sight of Rosamond at the window, fresh and smiling, with +her child in her arms.</p> +<p>“Not a bit the worse for her dissipation,” she merrily +said. “Oh, the naughty little thing!—to have begun +with the turf, and then the ‘Three Pigeons’! Aren’t +you ashamed of her, papa? Sit down, Raymond; how horribly tired +you do look.”</p> +<p>“Ha! What’s this?” exclaimed Julius, who +had been opening the post-bag. “Here’s a note from +the Bishop, desiring me to come to the palace to-day, if possible.”</p> +<p>“Oh!” cried Raymond. “Where is there vacant—isn’t +there a canonry or a chaplaincy?”</p> +<p>“Or an archbishopric or two?” said Julius. “The +pony can do it, I think, as there will be a long rest. If he seems +fagged, I can put up at Backsworth and take a fly.”</p> +<p>“You’ll let James drive you,” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“I had rather not,” said Julius. “It may +be better to be alone.”</p> +<p>“He is afraid of betraying his elevation to James,” laughed +Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Mrs. Daniel Reynolds to see you, sir.”</p> +<p>This was with the information that that there trapezing chap, Drake, +had fetched off poor Fanny in his van. He had been in trouble +himself, having been in custody for some misdemeanour when she was thrown +down; but as soon as he was released, he had come in search of her, +and though at first he seemed willing to leave her to be nursed at home, +he had no sooner heard of the visitors of that morning than he had sworn +he would have no parson meddling with his poor gal! she was good enough +for him, and he would not have a pack of nonsense put in her head to +set her against him.</p> +<p>“He’s good to her, sir,” said Mrs. Reynolds, “I +think he be; but he is a very ignorant man. He tell’d us +once as he was born in one of they vans, and hadn’t never been +to school nor nothin’, nor heard tell of God, save in the way +of bad words: he’ve done nothin’ but go from one races and +fairs to another, just like the gipsies, though he bain’t a gipsy +neither; but he’s right down attacted to poor Fanny, and good +to her.”</p> +<p>“Another product of the system,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“Like the gleeman, whom we see through a picturesque medium,” +said Julius; “but who could not have been pleasant to the mediæval +clergyman. I have hopes of poor Fanny yet. She will drift +home one of these days, and we shall get hold of her.”</p> +<p>“What a fellow you are for hoping!” returned Raymond, +a little impatiently.</p> +<p>“Why not?” said Julius.</p> +<p>“Why! I should say—” replied Raymond, setting +out to walk home, where he presided over his friend’s breakfast +and departure, and received a little banter over his solicitude for +the precious infant. Cecil was still in bed, and Frank was looking +ghastly, and moved and spoke like one in a dream, Raymond was relieved +to hear him pleading with Susan for to his mother’s room much +earlier than usual.</p> +<p>Susan took pity and let him in; when at once he flung himself into +a chair, with his face hidden on the bed, and exclaimed, “Mother, +it is all over with me!”</p> +<p>“My dear boy, what can have happened?”</p> +<p>“Mother, you remember those two red pebbles. Could you +believe that she has sold hers?”</p> +<p>“Are you sure she has? I heard that they had a collection +of such things from the lapidary at Rockpier.”</p> +<p>“No, mother, that is no explanation. When I found that +I should be able to come down, I sent a card to Lady Tyrrell, saying +I would meet them on the race-ground—a post-card, so that Lena +might see it. When I came there was no Lena, only some excuse +about resting for the ball—lying down with a bad headache, and +so forth—making it plain that I need not go on to Sirenwood. +By and by there was some mild betting with the ladies, and Lady Tyrrell +said, ‘There’s a chance for you, Bee; don’t I see +the very fellow to Conny’s charm?’ Whereupon that +girl Conny pulled out the very stone I gave Lena three years ago at +Rockpier. I asked; yes, I asked—Lena had sold it; Lena, +at the bazaar; Lena, who—”</p> +<p>“Stay, Frank, is this trusting Lena as she bade you trust her? +How do you know that there were no other such pebbles?”</p> +<p>“You have not seen her as I have done. There has been +a gradual alienation—holding aloof from us, and throwing herself +into the arms of those Strangeways. It is no fault of her sister’s. +She has lamented it to me.”</p> +<p>“Or pointed it out. Did she know the history of these +pebbles?”</p> +<p>“No one did. Lena was above all reserved with her.”</p> +<p>“Camilla Tyrrell knows a good deal more than she is told. +Where’s your pebble? You did not stake that?”</p> +<p>“Those who had one were welcome to the other.”</p> +<p>“O, my poor foolish Frank! May it not be gone to tell +the same tale of you that you think was told of her? Is this all?”</p> +<p>“Would that it were!”</p> +<p>“Well, go on, my dear. Was she at the ball?”</p> +<p>“Surrounded by all that set. I was long in getting near +her, and then she said her card was full; and when I made some desperate +entreaty, she said, in an undertone that stabbed me by its very calmness, +‘After what has passed to-day, the less we meet the better.’ +And she moved away, so as to cut me off from another word.”</p> +<p>“After what had passed! Was it the parting with the stone?”</p> +<p>“Not only. I got a few words with Lady Tyrrell. +She told me that early impressions had given Lena a kind of fanatical +horror of betting, and that she had long ago made a sort of vow against +a betting man. Lady Tyrrell said she had laughed at it, but had +no notion it was seriously meant; and I—I never even heard of +it!”</p> +<p>“Nor are you a betting man, my Frank.”</p> +<p>“Ay! mother, you have not heard all.”</p> +<p>“You are not in a scrape, my boy?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I am. You see I lost my head after the pebble transaction. +I couldn’t stand small talk, or bear to go near Raymond, so I +got among some other fellows with Sir Harry—”</p> +<p>“And excitement and distress led you on?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know what came over me. I could not stand +still for fear I should feel. I must be mad on something. +Then, that mare of Duncombe’s, poor fellow, seemed a personal +affair to us all; and Sir Harry, and a few other knowing old hands, +went working one up, till betting higher and higher seemed the only +way of supporting Duncombe, besides relieving one’s feelings. +I know it was being no end of a fool; but you haven’t felt it, +mother!”</p> +<p>“And Sir Harry took your bets?”</p> +<p>“One must fare and fare alike,” said Frank.</p> +<p>“How much have you lost?”</p> +<p>“I’ve lost Lena, that’s all I know,” said +the poor boy; but he produced his book, and the sum appalled him. +“Mother,” he said in a broken voice, “there’s +no fear of its happening again. I can never feel like this again. +I know it is the first time one of your sons has served you so, and +I can’t even talk of sorrow, it seems all swallowed up in the +other matter. But if you will help me to meet it, I will pay you +back ten or twenty pounds every quarter.”</p> +<p>“I think I can, Frankie. I had something in hand towards +my own possible flitting. Here is the key of my desk. Bring +me my banker’s book and my cheque book.”</p> +<p>“Mother! mother!” he cried, catching her hand and kissing +it, “what a mother you are!”</p> +<p>“You understand,” she said, “that it is because +I believe you were not master of yourself, and that this is the exception, +not the habit, that I am willing to do all I can for you.”</p> +<p>“The habit! No, indeed! I never staked more than +a box of gloves before; but what’s the good, if she has made a +vow against me?”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett was silent for a few moments, then she said, “My +poor boy, I believe you are both victims of a plot. I suspect +that Camilla Tyrrell purposely let you see that pebble-token and be +goaded into gambling, that she might have a story to tell her sister, +when she had failed to shake her constancy and principle in any other +way.”</p> +<p>“Mother, that would make her out a fiend. She has been +my good and candid friend all along. You don’t know her.”</p> +<p>“What would a friend have done by you yesterday?”</p> +<p>“She neither saw nor heard my madness. No, mother, Lenore’s +heart has been going from me for months past, and she is glad of this +plea for release, believing me unworthy. Oh! that stern face of +hers! set like a head of Justice with not a shade of pity—so beautiful—so +terrible! It will never cease to haunt me.”</p> +<p>He sat in deep despondency, while Mrs. Poynsett overlooked her resources; +but presently he started up, saying, “There’s one shadow +of a hope. I’ll go over to Sirenwood, insist on seeing one +her and having an explanation. I have a right, whatever I did +yesterday; and you have forgiven me for that, mother!”</p> +<p>“I think it is the most hopeful way. If you can see her +without interposition, you will at least come to an understanding. +Here, you had better take this cheque for Sir Harry.”</p> +<p>When he was gone, she wondered whether she had been justified in +encouraging him in defending Eleonora. Was this not too like another +form of the treatment Raymond had experienced? Her heart bled +for her boy, and she was ready to cry aloud, “Must that woman +always be the destroyer of my sons’ peace?”</p> +<p>When Frank returned, it was with a face that appalled her by its +blank despair, as he again flung himself down beside her.</p> +<p>“She is gone,” he said.</p> +<p>“Gone!”</p> +<p>“Gone, and with the Strangeways. I saw her.”</p> +<p>“Spoke to her?”</p> +<p>“Oh no. The carriage turned the corner as I crossed the +road. The two girls were there, and she—”</p> +<p>“Going with them to the station?”</p> +<p>“I thought so; I went to the house, meaning to leave my enclosure +for Sir Harry and meet her on her way back; but I heard she was gone +to stay with Lady Susan in Yorkshire. Sir Harry was not up, nor +Lady Tyrrell.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett’s hope failed, though she was relieved that Camilla’s +tongue had not been in action. She was dismayed at the prone exhausted +manner in which Frank lay, partly on the floor, partly against her couch, +with his face hidden.</p> +<p>“Do you know where she is gone?”</p> +<p>“Yes, Revelrig, Cleveland, Yorkshire.”</p> +<p>“I will write to her. Whatever may be her intentions, +they shall not be carried out under any misrepresentation that I can +contradict. You have been a foolish fellow, Frankie; but you shall +not be painted worse than you are. She owes you an explanation, +and I will do my best that you shall have it. My dear, what is +the matter?”</p> +<p>She rang her bell hastily, and upheld the sinking head till help +came. He had not lost consciousness, and called it giddiness, +and he was convicted of having never gone to bed last night, and having +eaten nothing that morning; but he turned against the wine and soup +with which they tried to dose him, and, looking crushed and bewildered, +said he would go and lie down in his own room.</p> +<p>Raymond went up with him, and returned, saying he only wanted to +be alone, with his face from the light; and Mrs. Poynsett, gazing at +her eldest son, thought he looked as ill and sunken as his younger brother.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVI<br /> +A Stickit Minister</h2> +<blockquote><p>And the boy not out of him.—TENNYSON’S Queen +Mary</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Julius had only too well divined the cause of his summons. +He found Herbert Bowater’s papers on the table before the Bishop, +and there was no denying that they showed a declension since last year, +and that though, from men without his advantages they would have been +passable, yet from him they were evidences of neglect of study and thought. +Nor could the cause be ignored by any one who had kept an eye on the +cricket reports in the county paper; but Herbert was such a nice, hearty, +innocent fellow, and his father was so much respected, that it was with +great reluctance that his rejection was decided on and his Rector had +been sent for in case there should be any cause for extenuation.</p> +<p>Julius could not say there was. He was greatly grieved and +personally ashamed, but he could plead nothing but his own failure to +influence the young man enough to keep him out of a rage for amusement, +of which the quantity, not the quality, was the evil. So poor +Herbert was sent for to hear his fate, and came back looking stunned. +He hardly spoke till they were in the fly that Julius had brought from +Backsworth, and then the untamed school-boy broke forth: “What +are you doing with me? I say, I can’t go back to Compton +like a dog in a string.”</p> +<p>“Where will you go?”</p> +<p>“I don’t care. To Jericho at once, out of the way +of every one. I tell you what, Rector, it was the most ridiculous +examination I ever went up for, and I’m not the only man that +says so. There was Rivers, of St. Mary’s at Backsworth,—he +says the questions were perfectly unreasonable, and what no one could +be prepared for. This fellow Danvers is a new hand, and they are +always worst, setting one a lot of subjects of no possible use but to +catch one out. I should like to ask him now what living soul at +Compton he expects to be the better for my views on the right reading +of—”</p> +<p>Julius interrupted the passionate tones at the lodge by saying, “If +you wish to go to Jericho, you must give directions.”</p> +<p>Herbert gave something between a laugh and a growl.</p> +<p>“I left the pony at Backsworth. Will you come with me +to Strawyers and wait in the park till I send Jenny out to you?”</p> +<p>“No, I say. I know my father will be in a greater rage +than he ever was in his life, and I won’t go sneaking about. +I’d like to go to London, to some hole where no one would ever +hear of me. If I were not in Orders already, I’d be off +to the ivory-hunters in Africa, and never be heard of more. If +this was to be, I wish they had found it out a year ago, and then I +should not have been bound,” continued the poor young fellow, +in his simplicity, thinking his thoughts aloud, and his sweet candid +nature beginning to recover its balance. “Now I’m +the most wretched fellow going. I know what I’ve undertaken. +It’s not your fault, nor poor Joanna’s. You’ve +all been at me, but it only made me worse. What could my father +be thinking of to make a parson of a fellow like me? Well, I must +face it out sooner or later at Compton, and I had better do it there +than at home, even if my father would have me.”</p> +<p>“I must go to Strawyers. The Bishop gave me a letter +for your father, and I think it will break it a little for your mother. +Would you wait for me at Rood House? You could go into the chapel, +and if they wish for you, I could return and fetch you.”</p> +<p>Herbert caught at this as a relief, and orders were given accordingly. +It seemed a cruel moment to tell him of young Hornblower’s evasion +and robbery, but the police wanted the description of the articles; +and, in fact, nothing would have so brought home to him that, though +Compton might not appreciate minutiæ of Greek criticism, yet the +habit of diligence, of which it was the test, might make a difference +there. The lingering self-justification was swept away by the +sense of the harm his pleasure-seeking had done to the lad whom he had +once influenced. He had been fond and proud of his trophies, but +he scarcely wasted a thought on them, so absorbed was he in the thought +of how he had lorded it over the youth with that late rebuke. +The blame he had refused to take on himself then came full upon him +now, and he reproached himself too much to be angered at the treachery +and ingratitude.</p> +<p>“I can’t prosecute,” he said, when Julius asked +for the description he had promised to procure.</p> +<p>“We must judge whether it would be true kindness to refrain, +if he is captured,” said Julius. “I had not time to +see his mother, but Rosamond will do what she can for her, poor woman.”</p> +<p>“How shall I meet her?” sighed Herbert; and so they arrived +at the tranquil little hospital and passed under the deep archway into +the gray quadrangle, bright with autumn flowers, and so to the chapel. +As they advanced up the solemn and beautiful aisle Herbert dropped on +his knees with his hands over his face. Julius knelt beside him +for a moment, laid his hand on the curly brown hair, whispered a prayer +and a blessing, and then left him; but ere reaching the door, the low +choked sobs of anguish of heart could be heard.</p> +<p>A few steps more, and in the broad walk along the quadrangle, Julius +met the frail bowed figure with his saintly face, that seemed to have +come out of some sacred bygone age.</p> +<p>Julius told his errand. “If you could have seen him just +now,” he said, “you would see how much more hope there is +of him than of many who never technically fail, but have not the same +tender, generous heart, and free humility.”</p> +<p>“Yes, many a priest might now be thankful if some check had +come on him.”</p> +<p>“And if he had met it with this freedom from bitterness. +And it would be a great kindness to keep him here a day or two. +Apart from being with you, the showing himself at Compton or at Strawyers +on Sunday would be hard on him.”</p> +<p>“I will ask him. I will gladly have him here as long +as the quiet may be good for him. My nephew, William, will be +here till the end of the Long Vacation, but I must go to St. Faith’s +on Monday to conduct the retreat.”</p> +<p>“I leave him in your hands then, and will call as I return +to see what is settled, and report what his family wish. I grieve +more for them than for himself.”</p> +<p>Julius first encountered Jenny Bowater in the village making farewell +calls. He stopped the carriage and joined her, and not a word +was needed to tell her that something was amiss. “You have +come to tell us something,” she said. “Herbert has +failed?”</p> +<p>“Prayers are sometimes answered as we do not expect,” +said Julius. “I believe it will be the making of him.”</p> +<p>“Oh, but how will mamma ever bear it!” cried Jenny.</p> +<p>“We must remind her that it is only a matter of delay, not +rejection,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“Have you seen him?”</p> +<p>“Yes, the Bishop sent for me, and asked me to see your father. +It was partly from slips in critical knowledge, which betrayed the want +of study, and the general want of thought and progress, and all the +rest of it, in his papers—”</p> +<p>“Just the fact—”</p> +<p>“Yes, which a man of less reality and more superficial quickness +might have concealed by mere intellectual answers, though it might have +been much worse for him in the end.”</p> +<p>“Where is he?”</p> +<p>“At Rood House. Unless your mother wishes for him here, +he had better stay there till he can bear to come among us again.”</p> +<p>“Much better, indeed,” said Jenny. “I only +hope papa and mamma will see how good it is for him to be there. +O, Julius, if he is taking it in such a spirit, I can think it all right +for him; but for them—for them, it is very hard to bear. +Nothing ever went wrong with the boys before, and Herbert—mamma’s +darling!” Her eyes were full of tears.</p> +<p>“I wish he had had a better Rector,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“No, don’t say that. It was not your fault.”</p> +<p>“I cannot tell. An older man, or more truly a holier +man, might have had more influence. We were all in a sort of <i>laissez-aller</i> +state this autumn, and now comes the reckoning.”</p> +<p>“There’s papa,” said Jenny. “Had you +rather go to him alone, or can I do any good?”</p> +<p>“I think I will go alone,” said Julius.</p> +<p>Mr. Bowater, who had grown up in a day when examinations were much +less earnest matters, never guessed what brought Julius over, but simply +thought he had come to wish them good-bye; then believed in any accident +rather than in failure, and finally was exceedingly angry, and stormed +hotly, first at examinations and modern Bishops, then at cricket and +fine ladies, then at Julius, for not having looked after the lad better, +and when this was meekly accepted, indignation took a juster direction, +and Herbert’s folly and idleness were severely lashed more severely +than Julius thought they quite deserved, but a word of pleading only +made it worse. Have him home to take leave? No, indeed, +Mr. Bowater hoped he knew his duty better as father of a family, when +a young man had publicly disgraced himself. “I’ll +tell you what, Julius Charnock, if you wish him to forget all the little +impression it may have made, and be ready to run after any amount of +folly, you’d make me have him home to be petted and cried over +by his mother and sisters. He has been their spoilt pet too long, +and I won’t have him spoilt now. I’ll not see him +till he has worked enough to show whether there’s any real stuff +in him.”</p> +<p>Mr. Bowater never even asked where his son was, probably taking it +for granted that he was gone back to Compton; nor did Julius see Jenny +again, as she was trying to comfort her mother under the dreadful certainty +that poor dear Herbert was most cruelly treated, and that the examining +chaplain came of a bad stock, and always had had a dislike to the family. +It was to be hoped that Mr. Bowater would keep to his wise resolution, +and not send for Herbert, for nothing could be worse for him than the +sympathy he would have met with from her.</p> +<p>What with looking in to report at Rood House and finding Herbert +most grateful for leave to remain there for a few days, Julius did not +reach home till long after dark. Pleasantly did the light greet +him from the open doorway where his Rosamond was standing. She +sprang at once into his arms, as if he had been absent a month, and +cried, “Here you are, safe at last!” Then, as she +pulled off his wraps, “How tired you must be! Have you had +any food? No—it’s all ready;” and he could see +‘high tea’ spread, and lighted by the first fire of the +season. “Come and begin!”</p> +<p>“What, without washing my hands?”</p> +<p>“You are to do that in the study; it is all ready.” +He did not exactly see why he should be too tired to mount to his dressing-room; +but he obeyed, not ungratefully, and his chair was ready, his plate +heaped with partridge and his tumbler filled with ale almost before +his eyes had recovered the glare of light. The eagerness and flutter +of Rosamond’s manner began to make him anxious, and he began for +the third time the inquiries she had always cut short—“Baby +all right? Terry better?”</p> +<p>“Baby—oh yes, a greater duck than ever. I put her +to bed myself, and she was quite delicious. Eat, I say; go on.”</p> +<p>“Not unless you eat that other wing.”</p> +<p>“I’ll help myself then. You go on. I don’t +see Herbert, so I suppose it is all right. Where’s your +canonry?”</p> +<p>“Alas! poor Herbert is plucked. I had to go round by +Strawyers to tell them.”</p> +<p>“Plucked! I never heard of such a thing. I think +it is a great shame such a nice honest fellow should be so ill-used, +and when all his pretty things have been stolen too! Do you know, +they’ve taken up young Hornblower; but his friends have made off +with the things, and they say they are in the melting-pot by this time, +and there’s no chance of recovering them.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think he cares much now, poor fellow. +Did you see Mrs. Hornblower?”</p> +<p>“No; by the time I could get my hat on she had heard it, poor +thing, and was gone to Backsworth; for he’s there, in the county +gaol; was taken at the station, I believe; I don’t half understand +it.”</p> +<p>Her manner was indeed strange and flighty; and though she recurred +to questions about the Ordination and the Bowaters, Julius perceived +that she was forcing her attention to the answers as if trying to stave +off his inquiries, and he came to closer quarters. “How +is Terry? Has Dr. Worth been here?”</p> +<p>“Yes; but not till very late. He says he never was so +busy.”</p> +<p>“Rosamond, what is it? What did he say of Terry?”</p> +<p>“He said”—she drew a long breath—“he +says it is the Water Lane fever.”</p> +<p>“Terry, my dear—”</p> +<p>She held him down with a hand on his shoulder—</p> +<p>“Be quiet. Finish your dinner. Dr. Worth said the +great point was to keep strong, and not be overdone, nor to go into +infected air tired and hungry. I would not have let you come in +if there had been any help for it; and now I’ll not have you go +near him till you’ve made a good meal.”</p> +<p>“You must do the same then. There, eat that slice, or +I won’t;” and as she allowed him to place it on her plate, +“What does he call it—not typhus?”</p> +<p>“He can’t tell yet; he does not know whether it is infectious +or only epidemic; and when he heard how the dear boy had been for days +past at the Exhibition at the town-hall, and drinking lots of iced water +on Saturday, he seemed to think it quite accounted for. He says +there is no reason that in this good air he should not do very well; +but, oh, Julius, I wish I had kept him from that horrid place. +They left him in my charge!”</p> +<p>“There is no reason to distress yourself about that, my Rose. +He was innocently occupied, and there was no cause to expect harm. +There’s all good hope for him, with God’s blessing. +Who is with him now?”</p> +<p>“Cook is there now. Both the maids were so kind and hearty, +declaring they would do anything, and were not afraid; and I can manage +very well with their help. You know papa had a low fever at Montreal, +and mamma and I nursed him through it, so I know pretty well what to +do.”</p> +<p>“But how about the baby?”</p> +<p>“Emma came back before the doctor came, crying piteously, poor +child, as if she had had a sufficient lesson; so I said she might stay +her month on her good behaviour, and now we could not send her out of +the house. I have brought the nursery down to the spare room, +and in the large attic, with plenty of disinfecting fluid, we can, as +the doctor said, isolate the fever. He is quiet and sleepy, and +I do not think it will be hard to manage, if you will only be good and +conformable.”</p> +<p>“I don’t promise, if that means that you are to do everything +and I nothing. When did Worth see him?”</p> +<p>“Not till five o’clock: and he would not have come at +all, if Anne had not sent in some one from the Hall when she saw how +anxious I was. He would not have come otherwise; he is so horribly +busy, with lots of cases at Wil’sboro’. Now, if you +have done, you may come and see my boy.”</p> +<p>Julius did see a flushed sleeping face that did not waken at his +entrance; and as his wife settled herself for her watch, he felt as +if he could not leave her after such a day as she had had, but an indefinable +apprehension made him ask whether she would spare him to run up to the +Hall to see his mother and ask after Raymond, whose looks had haunted +him all day. She saw he would not rest otherwise, and did not +show how unwilling was her consent, for though she knew little, her +mind misgave her.</p> +<p>He made his way into the Hall by the back door, and found his mother +still in the drawing-room, and Raymond dozing in the large arm-chair +by the fire. Mrs. Poynsett gave a warning look as Julius bent +over her, but Raymond only opened his eyes with a dreamy gaze, without +speaking. “Why, mother, where are the rest?”</p> +<p>“Poor Frank—I hope it is only the shock and fatigue; +but Dr. Worth wished him to be kept as quiet as possible. He can’t +bear to see any one in the room, so that good Anne said she would sit +in Charlie’s room close by.”</p> +<p>“Then he is really ill?” said Julius.</p> +<p>“He nearly fainted after walking over to Sirenwood in vain. +I don’t understand it. There’s something very wrong +there, which seems perfectly to have crushed him.”</p> +<p>“I’ll go up and see him,” said Julius. “You +both of you look as if you ought to be in bed. How is Cecil, Raymond?”</p> +<p>“Quite knocked up,” he sleepily answered. “Here’s +Susan, mother.”</p> +<p>Susan must have been waiting till she heard voices to carry off her +mistress. Raymond pushed her chair into her room, bent over her +with extra tenderness, bade her good night; and when Julius had done +the same they stood by the drawing-room fire together.</p> +<p>“I’ve been trying to write that letter, Julius,” +said Raymond, “but I never was so sleepy in my life, and I can’t +get on with it.”</p> +<p>“What letter?”</p> +<p>“That letter. About the races.”</p> +<p>“Oh! That seems long ago!”</p> +<p>“So it does,” said Raymond, in the same dreamy manner, +as if trying to shake something off. “Some years, isn’t +it? I wanted it done, somehow. I would sit down to it now, +only I have fallen asleep a dozen times over it already.”</p> +<p>“Not very good for composition,” said Julius, alarmed +by something indefinable in his brother’s look, and by his manner +of insisting on what was by no means urgent. “Come, put +it out of your head, and go to bed.”</p> +<p>“How did you find the boy Terry?” asked Raymond, again +as if in his sleep.</p> +<p>“I scarcely saw him. He was asleep.”</p> +<p>“And Worth calls it—?”</p> +<p>“The same fever as in Water Lane.”</p> +<p>“I thought so. We are in for it,” said Raymond, +now quite awake. “He did not choose to say so to my mother, +but I gathered it from his orders.”</p> +<p>“But Frank only came down yesterday.”</p> +<p>“Frank was knocked down and predisposed by the treatment he +met with, poor boy. They say he drank quarts of iced things at +the dinner and ball, and ate nothing. This may be only the effect +of the shock, but his head is burning, and there is a disposition to +wander. However, he has had his <i>coup de grâce</i>, and +that may account for it. It is Cecil.”</p> +<p>“Cecil!”</p> +<p>“Cecil, poor child. She has been constantly in that pestiferous +place. All Worth would say was that she must be kept quiet and +cool, but he has sent the same draughts for all three. I saw, +for Terry’s came here. I fancy Worth spoke out plainly to +that maid of Cecil’s, Grindstone; but she only looks bitter at +me, says she can attend to her mistress, and has kept me out of the +room all day. But I will go in to-night before I go to bed,” +added Raymond, energetically. “You are ready to laugh at +me, Julius. No one has meddled between you and Rosamond.”</p> +<p>“Thank God, no!” cried Julius.</p> +<p>“Friend abroad, or you may leave out the <i>r</i>,” said +Raymond, “maid at home. What chance have I ever had?”</p> +<p>“I’ll tell you what I should do, Raymond,” said +Julius, “turn out the maid, keep the field, nurse her myself.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Raymond, “that’s all very well +if—if you haven’t got the fever yourself. There, you +need say nothing about it, nobody would be of any use to me to-night, +and it may be only that I am dead beat.”</p> +<p>But there was something about his eyes and his heavy breath which +confirmed his words, and Julius could only say, “My dear Raymond!”</p> +<p>“It serves us right, does not it?” said his brother, +smiling. “I only wish it had not fixed on the one person +who tried to do good.”</p> +<p>“If I could only stay with you; but I must tell Rosamond first.”</p> +<p>“No, indeed. I want no one to-night, no one; after that +you’ll look after my mother, that’s the great thing.” +He spoke steadily, but his hand trembled so that he could not light +his candle, and Julius was obliged to do it, saying wistfully, “I’ll +come up the first thing in the morning and see how you are.”</p> +<p>“Do, and if there is need, you will tell my mother. A +night’s rest may set me right, but I have not felt well these +three or four days—I shall be in my own old room.”</p> +<p>He leant heavily on the balusters, but would not take his brother’s +arm. He passed into his dressing-room, and thus to the open door +of the room where he heard his wife’s voice; and as Mrs. Grindstone +came forward to warn him off, he said, “She is awake.”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir; but she must not be excited.”</p> +<p>“Raymond!”</p> +<p>“How are you now?” he asked, coming up to the bed.</p> +<p>“Oh! it is very hot and heavy,” said Cecil wearily, putting +her hand into his; “I’m aching all over.”</p> +<p>“Poor child!” he said softly.</p> +<p>She lifted her eyes to his face. “I wanted to tell you +all day,” she said. “Didn’t you come to the +door?”</p> +<p>“Many times, my dear.”</p> +<p>“And now! oh dear! I don’t recollect. Don’t +go, please.”</p> +<p>He sat down by her; she held his hand and dozed again.</p> +<p>“You had best leave her now, sir,” said the maid; “she +will only go on in this way, and I can tend her.”</p> +<p>He would have given a great deal to have been sure that he could +hold up his head ten minutes longer and to venture to send the woman +away. Cecil muttered “Stay,” and he sat on till her +sleep seemed deeper, and he felt as if a few moments more might disable +him from crossing the room, but his first movement again made her say +“Don’t.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Poynsett cannot stay, ma’am,” said Grindstone, +in a persuasive tone. “He is very tired, and not well, and +you would not wish to keep him.”</p> +<p>“Give me a kiss,” she said, like a tired child. +It was not like the shy embrace with which they had sometimes met and +parted, but he knew he must not rouse her, and only said very low, “Good +night, my poor dear; God bless you, and grant us a happy meeting, whenever +it is.”</p> +<p>Tears were flowing down his cheeks when Julius presently came to +him again, and only left him when settled for the night.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER, XXVII<br /> +The Water Lane Fever</h2> +<p>The Water Lane Fever. People called it so, as blinking its +real name, but it was not the less true that it was a very pestilence +in the lower parts of Wil’sbro’; and was prostrating its +victims far and wide among the gentry who had resorted to the town-hall +within the last few weeks.</p> +<p>Cases had long been smouldering among the poor and the workmen employed, +and several of these were terminating fatally just as the outbreak was +becoming decisive.</p> +<p>On Monday morning Julius returned from visits to his brothers to +find a piteous note from Mrs. Fuller entreating him to undertake two +funerals. Her husband had broken down on Sunday morning and was +very ill, and Mr. Driver had merely read the services and then joined +his pupils, whom he had sent away to the sea-side. He had never +been responsible for pastoral care, and in justice to them could not +undertake it now. “Those streets are in a dreadful state,” +wrote the poor lady, “several people dying; and there is such +a panic in the neighbourhood that we know not where to turn for help. +If you could fix an hour we would let the people know. The doctor +insists on the funerals being immediate.”</p> +<p>Julius was standing in the porch reading this letter, and thinking +what hour he could best spare from nearer claims, when he heard the +gate swing and beheld his junior curate with a very subdued and sobered +face, asking, “Is it true?”</p> +<p>“That the fever is here? Yes, it is.”</p> +<p>“And very bad?”</p> +<p>“Poor Frank is our worst case as yet. He is constantly +delirious. The others are generally sensible, except that Terry +is dreadfully haunted with mathematics.”</p> +<p>“Then it is all true about the Hall. Any one else ill?”</p> +<p>“Only the two Willses. They were carousing at the ‘Three +Pigeons.’ I hope that Raymond’s prohibition against +that place may have been the saving of the Hall servants. See +here,” and he gave the note.</p> +<p>“I had better take those two funerals. I can at least +do that,” said Herbert. “That Driver must be a regular +case of a hireling.”</p> +<p>“He never professed that the sheep were his,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“Then I’ll go to the Vicarage and get a list of the sick, +and see after them as far as I can,” said Herbert, in a grave, +humble tone, showing better than a thousand words how he felt the deprivation +he had brought on himself; and as to shame or self-consciousness, the +need had swallowed them all.</p> +<p>“It will be a great act of kindness, Herbert. The point +of infection does not seem clear yet, but I am afraid it will be a serious +outbreak.”</p> +<p>“I did not believe it could all be true when the report came +to Rood House, but of course I came to hear the truth and see what I +could do. How is Mrs. Poynsett bearing up?”</p> +<p>“Bravely. Anne contrived our carrying her up-stairs, +and it is the greatest comfort to Raymond to lie and look at her, and +Susan looks after them both.”</p> +<p>“Then he can’t be so very ill.”</p> +<p>“Not so acutely, but there are symptoms that make Worth anxious. +Shall I give you a note for Mrs. Fuller?”</p> +<p>“Do, and put me at your disposal for all you can spare for, +or I can do. Have you written to Bindon?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know where, within some hundred miles. +But, Herbert, I think we ought to undertake the help that is wanted +at Wil’sbro’. Smith of Duddingstone is too weakly, +and poor old Mr. Moulden neither could nor would. We are the nearest, +and having it here already, do not run the risk of spreading it. +As things are, I cannot be very long away from home, but I would come +in for an hour or so every day, if you could do the rest.”</p> +<p>“Yes, that was what I meant,” said Herbert.</p> +<p>“Worth says the best protection is never to go among the sick +hungry or exhausted. He says he keeps a biscuit in his pocket +to eat before going into a sick house. I shall make Rosamond keep +you supplied, and you must promise to use them.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, I promise.”</p> +<p>“And never drink anything there. There is to be a public +meeting to-morrow, to see whether the cause of this outbreak is not +traceable to the water down there.”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Duncombe’s meddling?”</p> +<p>“Don’t judge without evidence. But it does seem +as if the water at the well at Pettitt’s houses had done much +of the harm. Terry was drinking it all that hot day, and to-day +we hear that Lady Tyrrell and two of the servants are ill, besides poor +little Joe Reynolds.”</p> +<p>“It is very terrible,” said Herbert. “Lady +Tyrrell, did you say?”</p> +<p>“Yes. She was there constantly, like Raymond’s +wife. Happily there is not much fear for your people, Herbert. +Your father was at the dinner, but he is not a water drinker, and Jenny +only just came to the bazaar, that was all. Edith happily gave +up the ball.”</p> +<p>“I know,” said Herbert, colouring. “Jenny +persuaded her to give it up because of—me. Oh, how I have +served them all!”</p> +<p>“I told Jenny that perhaps her Ember prayers had been met in +the true way.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Herbert. “I can’t understand +now how I could have been such an audacious fool as to present myself +so coolly after the year I had spent. God forgive me for it! +Rector, thank you for leaving me at Rood House. It was like having +one’s eyes opened to a new life. I say, do you know anything +about Harry Hornblower? Is he come home?”</p> +<p>“Yes. You wouldn’t prosecute?”</p> +<p>“Happily I couldn’t. The things were gone and could +not be identified, and there was nothing about him. So, though +they had me over to Backsworth, they could not fall foul of me for refusing +to prosecute. Have you seen him?”</p> +<p>“No, I tried, but he had got out of my way. You’ve +not been there?” seeing that Herbert had brought back his bag.</p> +<p>“No; I will not till I come back;” and as he took the +note he added, “Rector, I do beg your pardon with all my might.” +Then, after a strong clasp of the hand, he sped away with a long, manful, +energetic stride, which made Julius contrast his volunteer courage with +the flight of the man who, if not pledged to pastoral care at Wil’sbro’, +still had priestly vows upon him.</p> +<p>Julius had no scruples about risking this favourite home child. +If he thought about it at all, it was to rejoice that Mrs. Bowater was +safely gone, for he had passed unscathed through scenes at St. Awdry’s +that would have made his mother tremble, and he had little fear of contagion, +with reasonable care. Of course the doctors had the usual debate +whether the fever were infectious or epidemic, but it made little difference. +The local ones, as well as an authority from London, had an inspection +previous to the meeting, which took place in the school, whose scholars +were dispersed in the panic. No ladies were admitted. “We +have had enough of them,” quoted Worshipful Mayor Truelove. +Mr. Briggs, the ex-mayor, was at the bedside of his son, and there were +hardly enough present to make decisions.</p> +<p>The focus of the disease was in Pettitt’s well. The water, +though cold, clear, and sparkling, was affected by noxious gases from +the drains, and had become little better than poison; the air was not +much better, and as several neighbouring houses, some swarming with +lodgers, used this water, the evil was accounted for. The ‘Three +Pigeons’ had been an attraction to the servants waiting with their +ladies’ carriages during the entertainments, and though they had +not meddled much with the simple element, spirits had not neutralized +the mischief. Thence too had come water for the tea and iced beverages +used at the bazaar and ball. Odours there had been in plenty from +the untouched drainage of the other houses, and these, no doubt, enhanced +the evil; but every one agreed that the bad management of the drains +on Mr. Pettitt’s property had been the main agency in the present +outbreak.</p> +<p>The poor little perfumer had tears of grief and indignation in his +eyes, but he defended his cause and shielded the ladies with chivalry +worthy of his French ancestry. He said he had striven to do his +duty as a proprietor, and if other gentlemen had done the same, and +the channels could have had a free outlet, this misfortune would never +have occurred. He found himself backed up by Mr. Julius Charnock, +who rose to declare that what Mr. Pettitt had said was just what his +brother, Mr. Charnock Poynsett, had desired should be stated as his +own opinion, namely, that the responsibility rested, not with those +who had done all within their power or knowledge for the welfare of +their tenants, but with those whose indifference on the score of health +had led them to neglect all sanitary measures.</p> +<p>“He desires me to say,” added Julius, “that being +concerned both in the neglect and in the unfortunate consequences, he +is desirous to impress his opinion on all concerned.”</p> +<p>Future prevention was no longer in the hands of the Town Council, +for a sanitary commission would take that in hand; but in the meantime +it was a time of plague and sickness, and measures must be taken for +the general relief. Mr. Moy, to whom most of the houses belonged, +was inquired for; but it appeared that he had carried off his wife and +daughter on Saturday in terror when one of his servants had fallen ill, +and even his clerks would not know where to write to him till he should +telegraph. The man Gadley was meantime driving an active trade +at the ‘Three Pigeons,’ whither the poor, possessed with +the notion that spirits kept out the infection, were resorting more +than ever, and he set at defiance all the preventives which doctors, +overseer, and relieving officer were trying to enforce, with sullen +oaths against interference.</p> +<p>Two deaths yesterday, one to-day, three hourly apprehended; doctors +incessantly occupied, nurses, however unfit, not to be procured by any +exertion of the half-maddened relieving-officer; bread-winners prostrated; +food, wine, bedding, everything lacking. Such was the state of +things around the new town-hall of Wil’sbro’, and the gentry +around were absorbed by cases of the same epidemic in their own families.</p> +<p>To telegraph for nurses from a hospital, to set on foot a subscription, +appoint a committee of management, and name a treasurer and dispenser +of supplies, were the most urgent steps. Julius suggested applying +to a Nursing Sisterhood, but Mr. Truelove, without imputing any motives +to the reverend gentleman, was unwilling to insert the thin end of the +wedge; so the telegram was sent to a London Hospital, and Mr. Whitlock, +the mayor-elect, undertook to be treasurer, and to print and circulate +an appeal for supplies of all sorts. Those present resolved themselves +into a committee, and consulted about a fever hospital, since people +could hardly be expected to recover in the present condition of Water +Lane; but nothing was at present ready, and the question was adjourned +to the next day. As Julius parted with Mr. Whitlock he met Herbert +Bowater returning from the cemetery in search of him, with tidings of +some cases where he was especially needed. As they walked on together +Mrs. Duncombe overtook them with a basket on her arm. She held +out her hand with an imploring gesture.</p> +<p>“Mr. Charnock, it can’t be true, can it?—they only +say so out of ignorance—that it was Pettitt’s well, I mean?”</p> +<p>In a few words Julius made it clear what the evil had been and how +it arose.</p> +<p>She did not dispute it, she merely grew sallower and said:</p> +<p>“God forgive us! We did it for the best. I planned. +I never thought of that. Oh!”</p> +<p>“My brother insists that the mischief came of not following +the example you set.”</p> +<p>“And Cecil!”</p> +<p>“Cecil is too much stupefied to know anything about it.”</p> +<p>“You are helping here? Make me all the use you can. +Whatever has to be done give it to me.”</p> +<p>“Nay, you have your family to consider.”</p> +<p>“My boys are at their grandmother’s. My husband +is gone abroad. Give me work. I have brought some wine. +Who needs it most?”</p> +<p>“Wine?” said Herbert. “Here? I was +going back for some, but half an hour may make all the difference to +the poor lad in here.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Duncombe was within the door in a moment.</p> +<p>“There has been an execution in her house,” said Herbert, +as they went home. “That fellow went off on Saturday, and +left her alone to face it.”</p> +<p>“I thought she had striven to keep out of debt.”</p> +<p>“What can a woman do when a man chooses to borrow? That +horse brought them to more unexpected smash. They say that after +the ball, where she appeared in all her glory, as if nothing had happened, +she made Bob give her a schedule of his debts, packed his portmanteau, +sent him off to find some cheap hole abroad, and stayed to pick up the +pieces after the wreck.”</p> +<p>“She is a brave woman,” said Julius.</p> +<p>Therewith they plunged into the abodes of misery, where the only +other helper at present was good old Miss Slater, who was going from +one to another, trying to show helpless women how to nurse, but able +only to contribute infinitesimal grains of aid or comfort at immense +cost to herself. Julius insisted on taking home with him his curate, +who had been at work from ten o’clock that morning till six, when +as Julius resigned the pony’s reins to him, he begged that they +might go round and inquire at Sirenwood, to which consent was the more +willingly given because poor Frank’s few gleams of consciousness +were spent in sending his indefatigable nurse Anne to ask whether his +mother had ‘had that letter,’ and in his delirium he was +always feeling his watch-chain for that unhappy pebble, and moaning +when he missed it. Mrs. Poynsett’s letter had gone on Friday, +and still there was no answer, and this was a vexation, adding to the +fear that the poor fellow’s rejection had been final. Yet +she might have missed the letter by being summoned home. Close +to the lodge, they overtook Sir Harry, riding dejectedly homewards, +and, glad to be saved going up to the house, they stopped and inquired +for Lady Tyrrell.</p> +<p>“Very low and oppressed,” he said. “M’Vie +does not give us reason to expect a change just yet. Do they tell +you the same? Worth attends you, I think?”</p> +<p>“He seems to think it must run on for at least three weeks,” +said Julius.</p> +<p>“You’ve been to the meeting, eh? Was it that well +of Pettitt’s? Really that meddling wife of Duncombe’s +ought to be prosecuted. I hope she’ll catch the fever and +be served out.”</p> +<p>“She tried to prevent it,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“Pshaw! women have no business with such things, they only +put their foot in it. Nobody used to trouble themselves about +drains, and one never heard of fevers.”</p> +<p>Instead of contesting the point, Julius asked whether Miss Vivian +were at home.</p> +<p>“No; that’s the odd thing. I wrote, for M’Vie +has no fear of infection, and poor Camilla is always calling for her, +and that French maid has thought proper to fall ill, and we don’t +know what to do. Upper housemaid cut and run in a panic, cook +dead drunk last night, not a servant in the house to be trusted. +If it were not for my man Victor I don’t know where I should be. +Very odd what that child is about. Lady Susan can’t be keeping +it from her. Unjustifiable!”</p> +<p>“She is with Lady Susan Strangeways?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Went with Bee and Conny. I was glad, for +we can’t afford to despise a good match, though I <i>was</i> sorry +for your brother.”</p> +<p>“Do I understand you that she is engaged to Mr. Strangeways?”</p> +<p>“No, no; not yet. One always hears those things before +they are true, and you see they are keeping her from us as if she belonged +to them already. I call it unfeeling! I have just been to +the post to see if there’s a letter! Can’t be anything +wrong in the address,—Revelrig, Cleveland, Yorkshire.”</p> +<p>“Why don’t you telegraph?”</p> +<p>“I shall, if I don’t hear to-morrow morning.”</p> +<p>But the morning’s telegrams were baffling. None came +in answer to Sir Harry, though he had bidden his daughter to telegraph +back instantly; and two hospitals replied that they had no nurses to +spare! This was the first thing Julius heard when he came to the +committee-room. The second was that the only parish nurse had +been found asleep under the influence of the port-wine intended for +her patients, the third that there were five more deaths, one being +Mrs. Gadley, of the ‘Three Pigeons,’ from diphtheria, and +fourteen more cases of fever were reported. Julius had already +been with the schoolmistress, who was not expected to live through the +day. He had found that Mrs. Duncombe had been up all night with +one of the most miserable families, and only when her unpractised hands +had cared for a little corpse, had been forced home by good Miss Slater +for a little rest. He had also seen poor Mr. Fuller, who was too +weak and wretched to say anything more than ‘God help us, Charnock: +you will do what you can;’ and when Julius asked for his sanction +to sending for Sisters, he answered, “Anything, anything.”</p> +<p>The few members who had come to the committee were reduced to the +same despairing consent, and Julius was allowed to despatch a telegram +to St. Faith’s, which had sent Sisters in the emergency at St. +Awdry’s. He likewise brought an offer, suggested by Raymond, +of a great old tithe barn, his own property, but always rented by Mrs. +Poynsett, in a solitary field, where the uninfected children might be +placed under good care, and the houses in Water Lane thus relieved. +As to a fever hospital, Raymond had sent his advice to use the new town-hall +itself. A word from him went a great way just then with the Town +Council, and the doctors were delighted with the proposal.</p> +<p>Funds and contributions of bedding, clothing, food and wine were +coming in, but hands were the difficulty. The adaptations of the +town-hall and the bringing in of beds were done by one strong carpenter +and Mrs. Duncombe’s man Alexander, whom she had brought with her, +and who proved an excellent orderly; and the few who would consent, +or did not resist occupying the beds there, were carried in by Herbert +Bowater and a strapping young doctor who had come down for this fever +pasture. There Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Slater received them. +No other volunteer had come to light willing to plunge into this perilous +and disgusting abyss of misery; and among the afflicted families the +power of nursing was indeed small.</p> +<p>However, the healthy children were carried away without much resistance, +and established in the great barn under a trustworthy widow; and before +night, two effective-looking Sisters were in charge at the hospital.</p> +<p>Still, however, no telegram, no letter, came from Eleonora Vivian. +Mr. M’Vie had found a nurse for Lady Tyrrell, but old Sir Harry +rode in to meet every delivery of the post, and was half distracted +at finding nothing from her; and Frank’s murmurs of her name were +most piteous to those who feared that, if he were ever clearly conscious +again, it would only be to know how heavy had been the meed of his folly.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXVIII<br /> +The Retreat</h2> +<blockquote><p>What dost thou here, frail wanderer from thy task?—Christian +Year</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Eleonora Vivian was trying to fix her attention on writing out the +meditation she had just heard from Dr. Easterby.</p> +<p>It had been a strange time. All externally was a great hush. +There was perfect rest from the tumult of society, and from the harassing +state of tacit resistance habitual to her. This was the holy quietude +for which she had longed, yet where was the power to feel and profit +by it? Did not the peace without only make her hear the storm +within all the more?</p> +<p>A storm had truly been raging within ever since Conny Strangeways +had triumphantly exhibited the prize she had won from Frank Charnock +at the races; and Camilla had taken care that full and undeniable evidence +should prove that this was not all that the young man had lost upon +the Backsworth race-ground.</p> +<p>Lenore might guess, with her peculiarly painful intuition, who had +been the tempter, but that did not lessen her severity towards the victim. +In her resolution against a betting man, had she not trusted Frank too +implicitly even to warn him of her vow? Nay, had she not felt +him drifting from her all through the season, unjustly angered, unworthily +distrustful, easily led astray? All the misgivings that had fretted +her at intervals and then cleared away seemed to gather into one conviction—Frank +had failed her!</p> +<p>Eleonora’s nature was one to resent before grieving. +Her spirit was too high to break down under the first shock, and she +carried her head proudly to the ball, betraying by no outward sign the +stern despair of her heart, as she listened to the gay chatter of her +companions, and with unflinching severity she carried out that judicial +reply to Frank which she had already prepared, and then guarded herself +among numerous partners against remonstrance or explanation. It +had been all one whirl of bewilderment; Lady Tyrrell tired, and making +the girls’ intended journey on the morrow a plea for early departure; +and the Strangeways, though dancing indefatigably, and laughing at fatigue, +coming away as soon as they saw she really wished it. All said +good night and good-bye together, both to Lady Tyrrell and Sir Harry, +and Lenore started at ten o’clock without having seen either. +Her sense of heroism lasted till after the glimpse of Frank on the road. +Her mood was of bitter disappointment and indignation. Frank was +given up, but not less so were her father, her sister, and the world. +Sir Harry had made Camilla suffice to him, he did not want her. +He had been the means of perverting Frank, and Lenore could not see +that she need any longer be bound for his sake to the life she detested. +In a few weeks she would be of age, and what would then prevent her +from finding a congenial home in the Sisterhood, since such kindred +could have no just claim to her allegiance? It was the hasty determination +of one who had suffered a tacit persecution for three years, and was +now smarting under the cruellest of blows. Her lover perverted, +her conditions broken, her pledge gambled away, and all this the work +of her father and sister!</p> +<p>Conny and Bee thought her grave and more silent than usual, and when +Lady Susan met them in London there was no time for thought. Saturday +was spent on a harvest festival at a suburban church, after which the +daughters were despatched to their uncle’s by a late train. +Sunday was spent in the pursuit of remarkable services; and on Monday +Lady Susan and Eleonora had gone to St. Faith’s and the Retreat +began.</p> +<p>Here was to be the longed-for rest, for which she had thirsted all +the more through those days of hurry and of religious spectacles, as +she felt that, be they what they might to their regular attendants, +to her, as an outsider, they could be but sights, into whose spirit +her sick and wearied soul could not enter.</p> +<p>Here was no outward disturbance, no claim from the world, no importunate +chatter, only religious services in their quietest, most unobtrusive +form; and Dr. Easterby’s low tender tones, leading his silent +listeners to deep heart-searchings, earnest thoughts, and steadfast +resolutions.</p> +<p>Ah! so no doubt it was with many; but Lena, with book and pen, was +dismayed to find that the one thing she recollected was the question, +“Friend, how camest thou in hither?” After that, she +had only heard her own thoughts. Her mind had lapsed into one +vague apprehension of the effects of having cut off all communication +with home, imaginings of Frank’s despair, relentings of pity, +all broken by dismay at her own involuntary hypocrisy in bringing such +thoughts into the Retreat. Had she any right to be there at all? +Was not a thing that should have been for her peace become to her an +occasion of falling?</p> +<p>It was Thursday evening, and on the morrow there would be the opportunity +of private interviews with Dr. Easterby. She longed for the moment, +chiefly to free herself from the sense of deception that had all this +time seemed to vitiate her religious exercises, deafen her ears, and +blow aside her prayers. There was a touch on her shoulder, and +one of the Sisters who had received the ladies said, interrogatively, +“Miss Vivian? The Mother would be obliged if you would come +to her room.”</p> +<p>The general hush prevented Lenore from manifesting her extreme agitation, +and she moved with as quiet a step as she could command, though trembling +from head to foot. In the room to which she came stood the Superior +and Dr. Easterby, and a yellow telegram-paper lay on the table.</p> +<p>“My father?” she asked.</p> +<p>“No,” said the Superior, kindly, “it is your sister, +who is ill. Here is the telegram—”</p> +<blockquote><p>“Sister Margaret to the Mother Superior, St. Faith’s, +Dearport. Lady Tyrrell has the fever. Miss Vivian much needed.</p> +<p>“Wils’bro, Sept. 26th, 5.30.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“The fever!” She looked up bewildered, and the +Superior added—</p> +<p>“You did not know of a fever at Wil’sbro’? +Some of our nursing Sisters were telegraphed for, and went down yesterday. +I was sorry to send Sister Margaret away just when her mother and you +are here; but she was the only available head, and the need seemed great.”</p> +<p>“I have heard nothing since I left home on Friday,” said +Eleonora, hoarsely. “It is my own fault. They think +I am at Revelrig.”</p> +<p>“Your family do not know you are here?” said the Superior, +gravely.</p> +<p>“It was very wrong,” she said. “This is the +punishment. I must go. Can I?”</p> +<p>“Surely, as soon as there is a train,” said the Superior, +beginning to look for a <i>Bradshaw</i>; while Dr. Easterby gave Lenore +a chair, and bade her sit down. She looked up at his kind face, +and asked whether he had heard of this fever.</p> +<p>“On Sunday evening, some friends who came out from Backsworth +to our evening service spoke of an outbreak of fever at Wil’sbro’, +and said that several of the Charnock family were ill. I have +had this card since from young Mr. Bowater:—</p> +<blockquote><p>“T. F. in severe form. J. C. well, but both +his brothers are down in it, and Lady K.’s brother, also Lady +T. and the Vicar. No one to do anything; we have taken charge +of Wil’sbro’. I have no time to do more than thank +you for unspeakable kindness. H. B.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“You knew?” exclaimed Lenore, as she saw her sister’s +initial.</p> +<p>“I knew Lady Tyrrell was ill, but I do not know who the ladies +are whom I address. I did not guess that you were here,” +said Dr. Easterby, gently.</p> +<p>No one living near Backsworth could fail to know Sir Harry Vivian’s +reputation, so that the master of Rood House knew far better than the +Superior of St. Faith’s how much excuse Lenore’s evasion +might have; but whatever could seem like tampering with young people +was most distressing to the Sisters, and the Mother was more grave than +pitiful.</p> +<p>There was no train till the mail at night, and there would be two +hours to wait in London; but Lenore would listen to no entreaties to +wait till morning, and as they saw that she had plenty of health and +strength, they did not press her, though the Superior would send a nurse +with her, who, if not needed at Sirenwood, might work in Water Lane. +It was thought best not to distract Lady Susan, and Lenore was relieved +not to have her vehement regret and fussy cares about her; but there +were still two hours to be spent before starting, and in these Dr. Easterby +was the kindest of comforters.</p> +<p>Had she erred in her concealment? He thought she had, though +with much excuse. A Retreat was not like a sacrament, a necessity +of a Christian’s life; and no merely possible spiritual advantage +ought to be weighed against filial obedience. It was a moment +of contrition, and of outpouring for the burthened heart, as Lenore +was able to speak of her long trial, and all the evil it had caused +in hardening and sealing up her better nature. She even told of +her unsanctioned but unforbidden engagement, and of its termination; +yearning to be told that she had been hasty and hard, and to be bidden +to revoke her rejection.</p> +<p>She found that Dr. Easterby would not judge for her, or give her +decided direction. He showed her, indeed, that she had given way +to pride and temper, and had been unjust in allowing no explanation; +but he would not tell her to unsay her decision, nor say that it might +not be right, even though the manner had been wrong. While the +past was repented, and had its pardon, for the future he would only +bid her wait, and pray for guidance and aid through her trial.</p> +<p>“My child,” he said, “chastening is the very token +of pardon, and therein may you find peace, and see the right course.”</p> +<p>“And you will pray for me—that however it may be, He +may forgive me?”</p> +<p>“Indeed, I will. We all will pray for you as one in sorrow +and anxiety. And remember this: There is a promise that a great +mountain shall become a plain; and so it does, but to those who bravely +try to climb it in strength not their own, not to those who try to go +round or burrow through.”</p> +<p>“I see,” was all she answered, in the meek submissive +tone of a strong nature, bent but not daring to break down. She +could not shed tears, deeply as she felt; she must save all her strength +and bear that gnawing misery which Herbert Bowater’s mention of +J. C.’s brothers had inflicted upon her—bear it in utter +uncertainty through the night’s journey, until the train stopped +at Wil’sbro’ at eleven o’clock, and her father, to +whom she had telegraphed, met her, holding out his arms, and absolutely +crying over her for joy.</p> +<p>“My dear, my dear, I knew you would come; I could trust to +my little Lena. It was all some confounded mistake.”</p> +<p>“It was my fault. How is she?”</p> +<p>“Does nothing but ask for you. Very low—nasty fever +at night. What’s that woman? M’Vie sent a nurse, +who is awfully jealous; can’t have her in to Camilla: but there’s +plenty to do; Anaïs is laid up—coachman too, and Joe—half +the other servants gone off. I told Victor I would pay anything +to him if he would stay.”</p> +<p>“And—at Compton?” faintly asked Lenore.</p> +<p>“Bad enough, they say. Serves ’em right; Mrs. Raymond +was as mischievous as Duncombe’s wife, but I’ve not heard +for the last two days; there’s been no one to send over, and I’ve +had enough to think about of my own.”</p> +<p>“Who have it there?” she managed to say.</p> +<p>“Raymond and his wife, both; and Frank and the young De Lancey, +I heard. I met Julius Charnock the other day very anxious about +them. He’s got his tithe barn stuffed with children from +Water Lane, as if he wanted to spread it. All their meddling! +But what kept you so long, little one? Where were you hiding?—or +did Lady Susan keep it from you? I began to think you had eloped +with her son. You are sure you have not?”</p> +<p>“I was wrong, father; I went to a Retreat with Lady Susan.”</p> +<p>“A what? Some of Lady Susan’s little poperies, +eh? I can’t scold you, child, now I’ve got you; only +have your letters forwarded another time,” said Sir Harry, placable +as usual when alone with Lenore.</p> +<p>Fears of infection for her did not occur to him. Mr. M’Vie +held the non-contagion theory, and helpless selfishness excluded all +thoughts of keeping his daughter at a distance. He clung to her +as he used to do in former days, before Camilla had taken possession +of him, and could not bear to have her out of reach. In the sick-room +she was of disappointingly little use. The nurse was a regular +professional, used to despotism, and resenting her having brought home +any one with her, and she never permitted Miss Vivian’s presence, +except when the patient’s anxiety made it necessary to bring her +in; and when admitted, there was nothing to be done but to sit by Camilla, +and now and then answer the weary disjointed talk, and, if it grew a +little livelier, the warning that Lady Tyrrell was getting excited was +sure to follow.</p> +<p>Outside there was enough to do, in the disorganized state of the +sick and panic-stricken household, where nobody was effective but the +French valet and one very stupid kitchen-maid. Lena helped the +St. Faith’s nurse in her charge of the French maid, but almost +all her time in the morning was spent in domestic cares for the sick +and for her father; and when he was once up, he was half plaintive, +half passionate, if she did not at once respond to his calls. +She read the papers to him, walked up and down the terrace with him +while he smoked, and played <i>bezique</i> with him late into the night, +to distract his thoughts. And where were hers, while each day’s +bulletin from Compton Hall was worse than the last? Little Joe +Reynolds had been sent home on being taken ill, and she would fain have +gone to see him, but detentions sprang up around her, and sometimes +it would have been impossible to go so far from the house, so that days +had become weeks, and the month of October was old before she was walking +down the little garden of old Betty’s house. The door opened, +and Julius Charnock came out, startling her by the sight of his worn +and haggard looks, as he made a deprecating movement, and shut the door +behind him. Then she saw that the blinds were in the act of being +drawn down.</p> +<p>“Is it so?” she said.</p> +<p>“Yes,” said Julius, in a quiet tone, as sad and subdued +as his looks. “He slept himself away peacefully a quarter +of an hour ago.”</p> +<p>“I suppose I must not go in now. I longed to come before. +Poor boy, he was like a toy flung away.”</p> +<p>“You need not grieve over him,” said Julius. “Far +from it. You have done a great deal for him.”</p> +<p>“I—I only caused him to be put into temptation.”</p> +<p>“Nay. Your care woke his spirit up and guarded him. +No one could hear his wanderings without feeling that he owed much to +you. There is a drawing to be given to you that will speak much +to you. It is at the Rectory; it was not safe here. And +his mother is here. I can’t but hope her soul has been reached +through him. Yes,” as Lenore leant against the gate, her +warm tears dropping, “there is no grief in thinking of him. +He had yearnings and conceptions that could not have been gratified +in his former station; and for him an artist’s life would have +been more than commonly uphill work—full of trial. I wish +you could have heard the murmured words that showed what glorious images +floated before him—no doubt now realized.”</p> +<p>“I am glad he was really good,” were the only words that +would come.</p> +<p>The hearts of both were so full, that these words on what was a little +further off were almost necessary to them.</p> +<p>“Take my arm,” said Julius, kindly. “Our +roads lie together down the lane. How is your sister? Better, +I hope, as I see you here.”</p> +<p>“She has slept more quietly. Mr. M’Vie thinks her +a little better.”</p> +<p>“So it is with Terry de Lancey,” said Julius; “he +is certainly less feverish to-day;” but there was no corresponding +tone of gladness in the voice, though he added, “Cecil is going +on well too.”</p> +<p>“And—” Poor Lenore’s heart died within +her; she could only press his arm convulsively, and he had mercy on +her.</p> +<p>“Frank’s illness has been different in character from +the others,” he said; “the fever has run much higher, and +has affected the brain more, and the throat is in a very distressing +state; but Dr. Worth still does not think there are specially dangerous +symptoms, and is less anxious about him than Raymond.”</p> +<p>“Ah! is it true?”</p> +<p>“He does not seem as ill as Frank; but there have been bleedings +at the nose, which have brought him very low, and which have hitherto +been the worst symptoms,” and here the steady sadness of his voice +quivered a little.</p> +<p>Lenore uttered a cry of dismay, and murmured, “Your mother?”</p> +<p>“She is absorbed in him. Happily, she can be with him +constantly. They seem to rest in each other’s presence, +and not to look forward.”</p> +<p>“And Cecil?”</p> +<p>“It has taken the lethargic turn with Cecil. She is almost +always asleep, and is now, I believe, much better; but in truth we have +none of us been allowed to come near her. Her maid, Grindstone, +has taken the sole charge, and shuts us all out, for fear, I believe, +of our telling her how ill Raymond is.”</p> +<p>“Oh, I know Grindstone.”</p> +<p>“Who looks on us all as enemies. However, Raymond has +desired us to write to her father, and he will judge when he comes.”</p> +<p>They were almost at the place of parting. Eleonora kept her +hand on his arm, longing for another word, nay, feeling that without +it her heart would burst. “Who is with Frank?”</p> +<p>“Anne. She hardly ever leaves him. She is our main-stay +at the Hall.”</p> +<p>“Is he ever sensible?” she faintly asked.</p> +<p>“He has not been really rational for nearly ten days now.”</p> +<p>“If—if—oh! you know what I mean. Oh! gain +his pardon for me!” and she covered her face with her hand.</p> +<p>“Poor Frank!—it is of your pardon that he talks. +Tell me, Eleonora, did you ever receive a letter from my mother?”</p> +<p>“Never. Where was it sent?” she said, starting.</p> +<p>“To Revelrig. It was written the day after the ball.”</p> +<p>“I never went to Revelrig. Oh! if I could have spoken +to you first I should have been saved from so much that was wrong. +No one knew where I was.”</p> +<p>“No, not till Sister Margaret told Herbert Bowater that her +sisters had been at a ball at the town-hall the week before. Then +he saw she was Miss Strangeways, and asked if she knew where you were.”</p> +<p>“Ah, yes! disobedience—tacit deception—temper. +Oh! they have brought their just punishment. But that letter!”</p> +<p>“I think it was to explain poor Frank’s conduct at the +races. Perhaps, as the servants at Revelrig had no knowledge of +you, it may have been returned, and my mother’s letter have been +left untouched. I will see.”</p> +<p>They knew they must not delay one another, and parted; Julius walking +homewards by the Hall, where, alas! there was only one of the family +able to move about the house, and she seldom left her patient.</p> +<p>Julius did, however, find her coming down-stairs with Dr. Worth, +and little as he gathered that was reassuring in the physician’s +words, there was a wistful moisture about her eyes, a look altogether +of having a bird in her bosom, which made him say, as the doctor hurried +off, “Anne, some one must be better.”</p> +<p>“Cecil is,” she said; and he had nearly answered, “<i>only</i> +Cecil,” but her eyes brimmed over suddenly, and she said, “I +am so thankful!”</p> +<p>“Miles!” he exclaimed.</p> +<p>She handed him a telegram. The <i>Salamanca</i> was at Spithead; +Miles telegraphed to her to join him.</p> +<p>“Miles come! Thank God! Does mother know?”</p> +<p>“Hush! no one does,” and with a heaving breast she added, +“I answered that I could not, and why, and that he must not come.”</p> +<p>“No, I suppose he must not till he is free of his ship. +My poor Anne!”</p> +<p>“Oh no! I know he is safe. I am glad! But +the knowledge would tear your mother to pieces.”</p> +<p>“Her soul is in Raymond now, and to be certain of Miles being +at hand would be an unspeakable relief to him. Come and tell them.”</p> +<p>“No, no, I can’t!” she cried, with a sudden gush +of emotion sweeping over her features, subdued instantly, but showing +what it was to her. “You do it. Only don’t let +them bring him here.”</p> +<p>And Anne flew to her fastness in Frank’s attic, while Julius +repaired to Raymond’s room, and found him as usual lying tranquil, +with his mother’s chair so near that she could hand him the cool +fruit or drink, or ring to summon other help. Their time together +seemed to both a rest, and Julius always liked to look at their peaceful +faces, after the numerous painful scenes he had to encounter. +Raymond, too, was clinging to him, to his ministrations and his talk, +as to nothing else save his mother. Raymond had always been upright +and conscientious, but his religion had been chiefly duty and obligation, +and it was only now that comfort or peace seemed to be growing out of +it for him. As he looked up at his brother, he too saw the involuntary +brightness that the tidings had produced, and said, “Is any one +else better, Julius? I know Terry is; I am so glad for Rose.”</p> +<p>“I asked Anne the same question,” said Julius. +“Mother, you will be more glad than tantalized. The <i>Salamanca</i> +is come in.”</p> +<p>Raymond made an inarticulate sound of infinite relief. His +mother exclaimed, “He must not come here! But Frankie could +not spare Anne to him. What will she do?”</p> +<p>“She will stay bravely by Frank,” said Julius. +“We must all wait till the ship is paid off.”</p> +<p>“Of course,” said Raymond. “If she can rejoice +that he is out of danger, we will; I am content to know him near. +It makes all much easier. And, mother, he will find all ready +to own what a priceless treasure he sent before him in his wife.”</p> +<p>There was the old note of pain in the comparison. Julius’s +heart was wrung as he thought of Sirenwood, with the sense that the +victim was dying, the author of the evil recovering. He could +only stifle the thought by turning away, and going to the table in his +mother’s adjacent room, where letters had accumulated unopened. +‘On Her Majesty’s Service’ bore the post-mark which +justified him in opening it, and enclosing the letter it contained to +Miss Vivian.</p> +<p>He did so almost mechanically. He had gone through these weeks +only by never daring to have a self. The only man of his family +who could be effective; the only priest in the two infected parishes; +he had steadfastly braced himself for the work. He ventured only +to act and pray, never to talk, save for the consolation of others. +To Wil’sbro’ he daily gave two morning hours, for he never +failed to be wanted either for the last rites, or for some case beyond +Herbert’s experience, as well as to see the Vicar, who was sinking +fast, in a devout and resigned frame, which impressed while it perplexed +his brother clergyman, in view of the glaring deficiencies so plain +to others, but which never seemed to trouble his conscience.</p> +<p>The nursing-staff still consisted of the Sisters, Herbert Bowater, +Mrs. Duncombe and her man-servant. Under their care, the virulence +of the disease was somewhat abating, and the doctors ventured to say +that after the next few days there would be much fewer fatal cases; +but Water Lane was now a strangely silent place,—windows open, +blinds flapping in the wind, no children playing about, and the ‘Three +Pigeons’ remained the only public-house not shut up. It +was like having the red cross on the door.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXIX<br /> +A Strange Night</h2> +<blockquote><p>Cold, cold with death, came up the tide<br /> + In no manner of haste,<br /> +Up to her knees, and up to her side,<br /> + And up to her wicked waist;<br /> +For the hand of the dead, and the heart of the dead,<br /> + Are strong hasps they to hold.—G. MACDONALD</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Rector,” said Herbert Bowater, “are you specially +at home?”</p> +<p>“Why?” asked Julius, pausing.</p> +<p>“There’s that man Gadley.”</p> +<p>“Gadley! Is he down?”</p> +<p>“It seems that he has been ill this fortnight, but in the low, +smouldering form; and he and that hostler of his kept it a secret, for +fear of loss of gain, and hatred of doctors, parsons, Sisters, and authorities +generally, until yesterday, when the hostler made off with all the money +and the silver spoons. This morning early, a policeman, seeing +the door open, went in, and found the poor wretch in a most frightful +state, but quite sensible. I was passing as he came out to look +for help, and I have been there mostly ever since. He is dying—M’Vie +says there’s not a doubt of that, and he has got something on +his mind. He says he has been living on Moy’s hush-money +all this time, for not bringing to light some embezzlement of your mother’s +money, and letting the blame light on that poor cousin of yours, Douglas.”</p> +<p>Herbert was amazed at the lighting up of his Rector’s worn, +anxious face.</p> +<p>“Douglas! Thank Heaven! Herbert, we must get a +magistrate at once to take the deposition!”</p> +<p>“What! Do you want to prosecute Moy?”</p> +<p>“No, but to clear Archie.”</p> +<p>“I thought he was drowned?”</p> +<p>“No; that was all a mistake. Miles saw him at Natal. +Herbert, this will be life and joy to your sister. What!—you +did not know about Jenny and Archie?”</p> +<p>“Not I—Jenny!—poor old Joan! So that’s +what has stood in her way, and made her the jolliest of old sisters, +is it? Poor old Joanie! What! was she engaged to him?”</p> +<p>“Yes, much against your father’s liking, though he had +consented. I remember he forbade it to be spoken of,—and +you were at school.”</p> +<p>“And Joan was away nursing old Aunt Joan for two years. +So Archie went off with this charge on him, and was thought to be lost! +Whew! How did she stand it? I say, does she know he is alive?”</p> +<p>“No, he forbade Miles to speak. No one knows but Miles +and I, and our wives. Anne put us on the scent. Now, Herbert, +I’ll go to the poor man at once, and you had better find a magistrate.”</p> +<p>“Whom can I find?” said Herbert. “There’s +my father away, and Raymond ill, and Lipscombe waved me off—wouldn’t +so much as speak to me for fear I should be infectious.”</p> +<p>“You must get a town magistrate.”</p> +<p>“Briggs is frantic since he lost his son, and Truelove thinks +he has the fever, though Worth says it is all nonsense. There’s +nobody but Whitlock. Dear old Jenny! Well, there always +was something different from other people in her, and I never guessed +what it was. I’d go to the end of the world to make her +happy and get that patient look out of her eyes.”</p> +<p>Herbert had nearly to fulfil this offer, for Mr. Whitlock was gone +to London for the day, and magistrates were indeed scarce; but at last, +after walking two miles out of the town, his vehemence and determination +actually dragged in the unfortunate, timid justice of the peace who +had avoided him in the road, but who could not refuse when told in strong +earnest that the justification of an innocent man depended on his doing +his duty.</p> +<p>Poor Mr. Lipscombe! The neglected ‘Three Pigeons’ +was just now the worst place in all Water Lane. The little that +had hastily been done since the morning seemed to have had no effect +on the foetid atmosphere, even to Herbert’s well accustomed nostrils; +and what must it have been to a stranger, in spite of the open window +and all the disinfectants? And, alas! the man had sunk into a +sleep. Julius, who still stood by him, had heard all he had to +say to relieve his mind, all quite rationally, and had been trying to +show him the need of making reparation by repeating all to a magistrate, +when the drowsiness had fallen on him; and though the sound of feet +roused him, it was to wander into the habitual defiance of authority, +merging into terror.</p> +<p>Herbert soothed him better than any one else could do, and he fell +asleep again; but Mr. Lipscombe declared it was of no use to remain—nothing +but madness; and they could not gainsay him. He left the two clergymen +together, feeling himself to have done a very valiant and useless thing +in the interests of justice, or at the importunity of a foolishly zealous +young curate.</p> +<p>“Look here,” said Herbert, “Whitlock may be trusted. +Leave a note for him explaining. I’ll stay here; I’m +the best to do so, any way. If he revives and is sensible, I’ll +send off at once for Whitlock, or if there is no time, I’ll write +it down and let him see me sign it.”</p> +<p>“And some one else, if possible,” said Julius. +“The difficulty is that I never had authority given me to use +what he said to me in private. Rather the contrary, for old instinctive +habits of caution awoke the instant I told him it was his duty to make +it known, and that Archie was alive. I don’t like leaving +you here, Herbert, but Raymond was very weak this morning; besides, +there’s poor Joe’s funeral.”</p> +<p>“Oh, never mind. He’ll have his sleep out, and +be all right when he awakes. Think of righting Jenny’s young +man! How jolly!”</p> +<p>Julius went across to the town-hall hospital, and told the Sisters, +whose darling his curate was, of the charge he had undertaken, and they +promised to look after him. After which Julius made the best of +his way home, where Rosamond had, as usual, a bright face for him. +Her warm heart and tender tact had shown her that obtrusive attempts +to take care of him would only be harassing, so she only took care to +secure him food and rest in his own house whenever it was possible, +and that however low her own hopes might be, she would not add to his +burden; and now Terry was so much better that she could well receive +him cheerily, and talk of what Terry had that day eaten, so joyously, +as almost to conceal that no one was better at the Hall.</p> +<p>“I will come with you,” she said; “I might do something +for poor Fanny,” as the bell began to toll for little Joshua’s +funeral. Fanny Reynolds, hearing some rumour of her boy’s +illness, had brought Drake to her home three days before his death. +The poor little fellow’s utterances, both conscious and unconscious, +had strangely impressed the man, and what had they not awakened in the +mother? And when the words, so solemn and mysterious, fell on +those unaccustomed ears in the churchyard, and Fanny, in her wild overpowering +grief, threw herself about in an agony of sorrow and remorse, and sobbed +with low screams, it was ‘the lady’ whom she viewed as an +angel of mercy, who held her and hushed her; and when all was over, +and she was sinking down, faint and hysterical, it was ‘the lady’ +who—a little to the scandal of the more respectable—helped +Drake to carry her to the Rectory, the man obeying like one dazed.</p> +<p>“I must leave the sheep that was lost to you, Rose,” +said Julius. “You can do more for them than I as yet, and +they have sent for me to the Hall.”</p> +<p>“You will stay there to-night if they want you; I don’t +want any one,” said Rosamond at the door.</p> +<p>He was wanted indeed at his home. Frank was in a wilder and +more raving state than ever, and Raymond so faint and sinking, and with +such a look about him, that Julius felt, more than he had ever done +before, that though the fever had almost passed away, there was no spirit +or strength to rally. He was very passive, and seemed to have +no power to wonder, though he was evidently pleased when Julius told +him both of Archie Douglas’s life and the hopes of clearing his +name. “Tell Jenny she was right,” he said, and did +not seem inclined to pursue the subject.</p> +<p>They wheeled Mrs. Poynsett away at her usual hour, when he was dozing; +and as Frank was still tossing and moaning incoherently, and often required +to be held, Julius persuaded Anne to let him take her place with him, +while she became Raymond’s watcher. He dozed about half +an hour, and when she next gave him some food, he said, in a very low +feeble tone:</p> +<p>“You have heard from Miles?”</p> +<p>“Yes; he says nothing shall stop him the moment they are paid +off.”</p> +<p>“That’s right. No fear of infection—that’s +clear,” said Raymond.</p> +<p>“I think not—under God!” and Anne’s two hands +unseen clasped over her throbbing, yearning heart.</p> +<p>“Dear old fellow!” said Raymond. “It is such +pleasure to leave mother to him. If I don’t see him, Anne, +tell him how glad I am. I’ve no charge. I know he +will do it all right. And mother will have you,” and he +held out his hand to her. Presently he said: “Anne. +One thing—”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said anxiously.</p> +<p>“You always act on principle, I know; but don’t hang +back from Miles’s friends and pleasures. I know the old +fellow, Anne. His nature is sociable, and he wants sympathy in +it.”</p> +<p>“I know what you mean, Raymond,” said Anne; “I +do mean to try to do right—”</p> +<p>“I know, I know,” said he, getting a little excited, +and speaking eagerly; “but don’t let right blind you, Anne, +if you censure and keep from all he likes—if you will be a recluse +and not a woman—he—don’t be offended, Anne; but if +you leave him to himself, then will every effort be made to turn him +from you. You don’t believe me.”</p> +<p>“My dear Raymond, don’t speak so eagerly,” as his +cheeks flushed.</p> +<p>“I must! I can’t see his happiness and yours wrecked +like mine. Go with him, Anne. Don’t leave him to be +poisoned. Mesmerism has its power over whoever has been under +the spell. And he has—he has! She will try to turn +him against you and mother.”</p> +<p>“Hush, Raymond! Indeed I will be on my guard. There’s +no one there. What are you looking at?”</p> +<p>“Camilla!” he said, with eyes evidently seeing something. +“Camilla! Is it not enough to have destroyed <i>one</i> +peace?”</p> +<p>“Raymond, indeed there is no one here.”</p> +<p>But he had half raised himself. “Yes, Camilla, you have +had your revenge. Let it be enough. No—no; I forgive +you; but I forbid you to touch her.”</p> +<p>He grasped Anne’s arm with one hand, and stretched the other +out as though to warn some one away. The same moment there was +another outburst of the bleeding. Anne rang for help with one +hand, and held him as best she could. It lasted long; and when +it was over he was manifestly dying. “It is coming,” +he said; looking up to Julius. “Pray! Only first—my +love to Cecil. I hope she is still young enough not to have had +all her life spoilt. Is her father coming?”</p> +<p>“To-morrow,” said Anne.</p> +<p>“That’s well. Poor child! she is better free.”</p> +<p>How piteously sad those words of one wedded but a year! How +unlike the look that met his mother’s woeful yet tender eyes, +as she held his hand. She would aid him through that last passage +as through all before, only a word of strong and tender love, as he +again looked up to Julius and Anne, as if to put her in their keeping, +and once more murmured something of “Love to sweet Rose! +Now, Julius, pray!”</p> +<p>An ever dutiful man, there was no wandering in look or tone. +He breathed ‘Amen’ once or twice, but never moved again, +only his eyes still turned on his mother, and so in its time came the +end.</p> +<p>Old Susan saw at first that the long fluttering gasp had no successor, +and her touch certified Julius. He rose and went towards his mother. +She held out her hands and said. “Take me to my Frank.”</p> +<p>“We had better,” whispered Anne.</p> +<p>They wheeled her to the foot of the stairs. Julius took her +in his arms, Anne held her feet, and thus they carried her up the stairs, +and along the passage, hearing Frank’s husky rapid babble all +the way, and finding him struggling with the fierce strength of delirium +against Jenkins, who looked as if he thought them equally senseless, +when he saw his helpless mistress carried in.</p> +<p>“Frank, my boy, do lie still,” she said, and he took +no notice; but when she laid her hand on his, he turned, looked at her +with his dull eyes, and muttered, “Mother!”</p> +<p>It was the first recognition for many a day! and, at the smoothing +motion of her hand over him, while she still entreated, “Lie still, +my dear,” the mutterings died away; the childish instinct of obedience +stilled the struggles; and there was something more like repose than +had been seen all these weary months.</p> +<p>“Mother,” said Julius, “you can do for us what +no one else can. You will save him.”</p> +<p>She looked up to him, and hope took away the blank misery he had +dreaded to see. “My poor Frankie,” she said dreamily, +“he has wanted me, I will not leave him now.”</p> +<p>All was soon still; Frank’s face had something like rest on +it, as he lay with his mother’s hand on his brow, and she intent +only on him.</p> +<p>“You can leave them to me, I think,” said Anne. +“I will send if there be need; but if not, you had better not +come up till you have been to Wil’sbro’—if you must +go.”</p> +<p>“I must, I fear; I promised to come to Fuller if he be still +here. I will speak to Jenkins first.”</p> +<p>Julius was living like a soldier in a campaign, with numbers dropping +beside him, and no time to mourn, scarcely to realize the loss, and +he went on, almost as if he had been a stranger; while the grief of +poor old Jenkins was uncontrollable, both for his lady’s sake +and for the young master, who had been his pride and glory. His +sobs brought out Mrs. Grindstone into the gallery, to insist, with some +asperity, that there should be no noise to awaken her mistress, who +was in a sweet sleep.</p> +<p>“We will take care,” said Julius, sadly. “I +suppose she had better hear nothing till Mr. Charnock comes.”</p> +<p>“She must be left to me, sir, or I cannot be answerable for +the consequences,” was the stiff reply, wherewith Mrs. Grindstone +retreated into her castle.</p> +<p>Julius left the hushed and veiled house, in the frosty chill of the +late autumn just before dawn, shivering between grief and cold, and +he walked quickly down the avenue, feeling it strange that the windows +in the face of his own house were glittering back the reflection of +the setting moon.</p> +<p>Something long and black came from the opposite direction. +“Rector,” it said, in a low hoarse voice, “I’ve +got leave from him to use what he said to you. Sister Margaret +and I signed it. Will that do?”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell now, Herbert, I can’t think. +My brother is just gone,” said Julius in his inward voice.</p> +<p>“Raymond! No! Oh, I beg your pardon; I never thought +of that; Raymond—”</p> +<p>“Go home and go to bed,” said Julius, as the young man +wrung his hand. “Rest now—we must think another time.”</p> +<p>Did Rosamond know? was perhaps the foremost of his weary thoughts. +Ah! did she not! Was she not standing with her crimson shawl round +her, and the long black plaits falling on it, to beckon him to the firelit +comfort of his own room? Did she not fall on his neck as he came +heavily up, and cling around him with her warm arms? “Oh, +Julius, what a dear brother he was! What can we do for your mother?”</p> +<p>As he told her how Frank’s need did more than any support could +do for her, her tears came thicker; but in spite of them, her fond hands +put him into the easy-chair by the fire, and drew off his damp boots; +and while listening to the low sunken voice that told her of the end, +she made ready the cup of cocoa that was waiting, and put the spoon +in his hand in a caressing manner, that made her care, comfort, not +oppression. Fatigue seconded her, for he took the warm food, faltered +and leant back, dozing till the baby’s voice awoke him, and as +he saw Rosamond hushing her, he exclaimed:</p> +<p>“O, Rose! if poor Raymond had ever known one hour like this!” +and he held out his arms for his child.</p> +<p>“You know I don’t let you hold her in that coat. +Go into your dressing-room, have your bath, and put on your dressing-gown, +and if you will lie on the bed, you shall take care of her while I go +and feed Terry. You can’t do anything for anybody yet, it +is only six o’clock.”</p> +<p>These precautions, hindering his going jaded and exhausted into infection, +were what Rosamond seemed to live for, though she never forced them +on him, and he was far too physically tired out not to yield to the +soothing effect; so that even two hours on the bed sent him forth renovated +to that brief service in the church, where Herbert and he daily met +and found their strength for the day. They had not had time to +exchange a word after it before there was a knock at the vestry door, +and a servant gave the message to Herbert, who had opened it: “Lady +Tyrrell is taken worse, sir, and Sir Harry Vivian begged that Mr. Charnock +would come immediately.”</p> +<p>A carriage had been sent for him, and he could only hurry home to +tell Rosamond to send on the pony to Sirenwood, to take him to Wil’sbro’, +unless he were first wanted at home. She undertook to go up to +the Hall and give Anne a little rest, and he threw himself into the +carriage, not daring to dwell on the pain it gave him to go from his +brother’s death bed to confront Camilla.</p> +<p>At the door Eleonora came to meet him. “Thank you,” +she said. “We knew it was no time to disturb you.”</p> +<p>“I can be better spared <i>now</i>,” answered Julius.</p> +<p>“You don’t mean,” she said, with a strange look, +which was not quite surprise.</p> +<p>“Yes, my dear brother left us at about three o’clock +last night. A change came on at twelve.”</p> +<p>“Twelve!” Eleonora laid her hand on his arm, and +spoke in a quick agitated manner. “Camilla was much better +till last night, when at twelve I heard such a scream that I ran into +her room. She was sitting up with her eyes fixed open, like a +clairvoyante, and her voice seemed pleading—pleading with <i>him</i>, +as if for pardon, and she held out her hands and called him. Then, +suddenly, she gave a terrible shriek, and fell back in a kind of fit. +Mr. M’Vie can do nothing, and though she is conscious now, she +does nothing but ask for you and say that he does not want you now.”</p> +<p>Julius grew paler, as he said very low, “Anne said he seemed +to be seeing and answering <i>her</i>. Not like delirium, but +as if she were really there.”</p> +<p>“Don’t tell any one,” entreated Eleonora, in a +breathless whisper, and he signed consent, as both felt how those two +spirits must have been entwined, since these long years had never broken +that subtle link of sympathy which had once bound them.</p> +<p>Sir Harry’s face, dreary, sunken, and terrified, was thrust +over the balusters, as he called, “Don’t hinder him, Lena, +she asks for him every moment;” and as they came on, he caught +Julius’s hand, saying, “Soothe her, soothe her—’tis +the only chance. If she could but sleep!”</p> +<p>There lay Camilla Tyrrell, beautiful still, but more than ever like +the weird tragic head with snake-wreathed brows, in the wasted contour +of her regular features and the flush on her hollow cheeks, while her +eyes burned with a strange fire that almost choked back Julius’s +salutation of peace, even while he breathed it, for might not the Son +of Peace be with some there?</p> +<p>The eager glance seemed to dart at him. “Julius Charnock!” +she cried, “come!” and as he would have said some word about +her health, she cut him short: “Never mind that; I must speak +while my brain serves. After that be the priest. He is dead!”</p> +<p>“My brother? Yes.”</p> +<p>“The only one I ever loved! There’s no sin nor +scandal in saying so now. His wife is better? It will never +kill her.”</p> +<p>“She does not know.”</p> +<p>“No? There was nothing to make her. He could not +give her his heart, try as he would. Why did he turn the unchangeable +to hate! hate! hate!”</p> +<p>“Lady Tyrrell, you did not send for me to hear what ought not +to be said at all?”</p> +<p>“Don’t fly off,” she said. “I had really +something to say. It was not wholly hate, Julius; I really tried +to teach his little idiot of a wife to win him at last. I meant +it to turn out well, and nothing could, with that mother there.”</p> +<p>“I must leave you, Lady Tyrrell, if you will not control yourself.”</p> +<p>“Don’t be hard on me, Julius,” and she looked up +with a glance of better days. “You idolize her, like all +the rest of you; but she chilled me and repelled me, and turned me to +bitterness, when I was young and he might have led me. Her power +and his idolatry made me jealous, and what I did in a fit of petulance +was so fastened on that I could not draw back. Why did not he +wait a little longer to encumber himself with that girl! No—that +wasn’t what I had to say—it’s all over now. +It is the other thing. How is Frank?”</p> +<p>“Very ill indeed; but quieter just now.”</p> +<p>“Then there shall not be another wreck like ours. Lena, +are you here? You saw that Frank had let Constance Strangeways +win your pebble. It was because I showed him the one Beatrice +bought, and he thought it yours. Yes, I saw nothing else for it. +What was to become of the property if you threw yourself away, and on +<i>her</i> son?” she added, with the malignant look. “Whether +he knew of this little vow of yours, I can’t tell, but he had +lost his head and did for himself. It was for your good and papa’s; +but I shall not be here to guide the clue, so you must go your own way +and be happy in it, if <i>she</i> will let you. Father, do you +hear? Don’t think to please me by hindering the course of +true love; and you, Julius, tell Frank he was ‘a dull Moor.’ +I liked the boy, I was sorry for him; but he ought to have known his +token better;—and there was the estate to be saved.”</p> +<p>“Estates weigh little now!”</p> +<p>“Clerical! I suppose now is the time for it? You +were all precision at Compton. It would kill me; I can’t +live with Mrs. Poynsett. No, no, Tom, I can’t have old Raymond +quizzed; I’ll get him out of it when the leading-strings are cut. +What right has she—?”</p> +<p>The delirium had returned. Julius’s voice kept her still +for a few moments, but she broke out afresh at his first pause, and +murmurs fell thick and fast from her tongue, mixing the names of her +brother and Raymond with railings at Mrs. Poynsett for slights in the +days when the mother was striving to discourage the inclination that +resulted in the engagement.</p> +<p>Earnestly did Julius beseech for peace, for repentance for the poor +storm-tossed soul; but when the raving grew past control, and the time +was coming for his ministrations to the Vicar of Wil’sbro’, +he was forced to leave her. Poor old Sir Harry would have clung +to him as to anything like a support, but Eleonora knew better. +“No, dear papa,” she said, “he has given us too much +of his time already. He must go where he can still help. +Poor Camilla cannot attend to him.”</p> +<p>“If she came to herself—”</p> +<p>“Then send for me. I would come instantly. Send +to the town-hall any time before twelve, after that to Compton. +Send without scruples, Lenore, you have truly the right.”</p> +<p>They did not send, except that a note met him as he returned home, +telling him that suffusion of the brain had set in. Camilla Tyrrell +did not survive Raymond Poynsett twelve hours.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXX<br /> +Come Back</h2> +<blockquote><p>And are ye sure the news is true?<br /> +And are ye sure he’s weel?—J. THOMPSON</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Eleonora Vivian was striving to write her sorrowful announcements +in the deepening dusk of that autumn evening, while her father had shut +himself up after his vigil to sleep under Victor’s care, when +a message came that Lady Rosamond Charnock earnestly begged to see her. +She stood with a face white and set, looking like a galvanized corpse, +as her lips framed the words, “He is dead!”</p> +<p>“No!” almost screamed Rosamond, snatching her hand. +“No! But no one can save him but you. Come!”</p> +<p>Without a word, Eleonora stepped into her own room, and came back +in cloak, hat, and veil.</p> +<p>“Right,” said Rosamond, seizing her arm, and taking her +to the pony-carriage at the door, then explaining while driving rapidly: +“He has left off raving ever since his mother has been with him, +but he lies—not still but weak, not speaking, only moaning now +and then. His throat is so dreadful that it is hard to give him +anything, and he takes no notice of what one says, only if his mother +takes the spoon. He gets weaker, and Dr. Worth says it is only +because there is no impulse to revive him—he is just sinking because +he can’t be roused. When I heard that, I thought I knew +who could.”</p> +<p>Eleonora’s lips once moved, but no sound came from them, and +Rosamond urged her little pony to its best speed through the two parks +from one veiled house to another, fastened it to the garden-door without +calling any one, and led her silent companion up the stairs.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett felt a hand on her shoulder, and Rosamond said, “I +have brought our only hope,” and Eleonora stood, looking at the +ghastly face. The yellow skin, the inflamed purple lips, the cavernous +look of cheeks and eyes, were a fearful sight, and only the feeble incessant +groping of the skeleton fingers showed life or action.</p> +<p>“Put this into his hand,” said Rosamond, and Lenore found +the pebble token given to her, and obeyed. At the touch, a quivering +trembled over face and form, the eyelids lifted, the eyes met hers, +there was a catching of the breath, a shudder and convulsive movement. +“He is going,” cried his mother, but Anne started forward +with drops of strong stimulant, Rosamond rubbed spirit into his forehead, +the struggle lessened, the light flickered back into his brown eyes, +his fingers closed on hers. “Speak to him,” said Mrs. +Poynsett. “Do you see her, Frankie dear?”</p> +<p>“Frank! dear Frank, here I am.”</p> +<p>The eyes gazed with more meaning, the lips moved, but no sound came +till Anne had given another drop of the stimulant, and the terrible +pain of the swallowing was lessened. Then he looked up, and the +words were heard.</p> +<p>“Is it true?”</p> +<p>“It is, my dear boy. It is Lena.”</p> +<p>“Here, Frank,” as still the wistful gaze was unsatisfied; +she laid her hands on his, and then he almost smiled and tried to raise +it to his cheeks, but he was too weak; and she obeyed the feeble gesture, +and stroked the wasted face, while a look of content came over it, the +eyes closed, and he slept with his face against her hand, his mother +watching beside with ineffable gratitude and dawning hope.</p> +<p>Lenore was forgetting everything in this watching, but in another +quarter of an hour Anne was forced again to torture him with her spoon; +but life was evidently gaining ground, for though he put it from him +at first, he submitted at Lena’s gesture and word. She felt +the increased warmth and power in his grasp, as he whispered, “Lena, +you are come back,” then felt for the token.</p> +<p>Alas! that she must leave him. They knew she must not stay +away from her father; indeed, Rosamond had told no one of her attempt, +her forlorn hope. Lena tried to give assurances that she only +went because it could not be helped, and the others told him she would +return, but still he held her, and murmured, “Stay.” +She could not tear herself away, she let him keep her hand, and again +he dozed and his fingers relaxed. “Go now, my dear,” +said Mrs. Poynsett, “you have saved him. This stone will +show him that you have been here. You will come back to-morrow, +I may promise him?”</p> +<p>“Yes, yes. In the morning, or whenever I can be spared,” +whispered Lena, who was held for a moment to Mrs. Poynsett’s breast, +ere Rosamond took her away again, and brought her once more down-stairs +and to the pony-carriage. There she leant back, weeping quietly +but bitterly over the shock of Frank’s terribly reduced state, +which seemed to take from her all the joy of his revival, weeping too +at the cruel need that was taking her away.</p> +<p>“He will do now! I know he will,” said Rosamond, +happy in her bold venture.</p> +<p>“Oh! if I could stay!”</p> +<p>“Most likely you would be turned out for fear of excitement. +The stone will be safer for him.”</p> +<p>“Where did that come from?” asked Lenore, struck suddenly +with wonder.</p> +<p>“I wrote to Miss Strangeways, when I saw how he was always +feeling, feeling, feeling for it, like the Bride of Lammermoor. +I told her there was more than she knew connected with that bit of stone, +and life or death might hang on it. Then when I’d got it, +I hardly knew what to do with it, for if it had soothed the poor boy +delirious, the coming to his right mind might have been all the worse.”</p> +<p>Rosamond kissed her effusively, and she dreamily muttered, “He +must be saved.” There was a sort of strange mist round her, +as though she knew not what she was doing, and she longed to be alone. +She would not let Rosamond drive her beyond the Sirenwood gate, but +insisted on walking through the park alone in the darkness, by that +very path where Frank had ten months ago exchanged vows with her.</p> +<p>Rosamond turned back to the Hall. It was poor Cecil’s +pony-carriage that she was driving, and she took it to the stable-yard, +where her entreaty had obtained it from the coachman, whom she rewarded +by saying, “I was right, Brown, I fetched his best doctor,” +and the old servant understood, and came as near a smile as any one +at Compton could do on such a day.</p> +<p>“Is the carriage gone for Mr. Charnock?”</p> +<p>“Yes, my lady, I sent Alfred with it; I did not seem as if +I could go driving into Wil’sbro’ on such a day.”</p> +<p>Rosamond bade a kind farewell to the poor old coachman, and was walking +homewards, when she saw a figure advancing towards her, strangely familiar, +and yet hat and coat forbade her to believe it her husband, even in +the dusk. She could not help exclaiming, “Miles!”</p> +<p>“Yes!” he said, coming to a standstill. “Are +you Rosamond?”</p> +<p>“I am;—Anne is quite well and Frank better. Oh! +this will do them good! You know—”</p> +<p>“Yes—yes, I know,” he said hastily, as if he could +not bear to let himself out to one as yet a stranger. “My +mother?”</p> +<p>“Absorbed in Frank too much to feel it yet fully; Anne watches +them both. Oh! Miles, what she has been!” and she clasped +his hand again. “Let me call her.”</p> +<p>And Rosamond opened the hall door just as some instinct, for it could +hardly have been sense of hearing, had brought Anne upon the stairs, +where, as Miles would have hurried up to her, she seemed, in the light +gray dress she still wore, to hover like some spirit eluding his grasp +like the fabled shades.</p> +<p>“Oh no! you ought not. Infection—I am steeped in +it.”</p> +<p>“Nonsense,” and she was gathered into the strong grasp +that was home and rest to her, while Miles was weeping uncontrollably +as he held her in his arms. “O, Nannie, Nannie! I +did not think it would be like this. Why did they keep me till +he was gone? No, I did not get the telegram, I only heard at the +station. They let me go this morning, and I did think I should +have been in time.” He loosed himself from her, and hung +over the balustrade, struggling with a strong man’s anguish, then +said in a low voice, “Did he want me?”</p> +<p>“He knew it was your duty,” said Anne. “We +all were thankful you were kept from infection, and he said many little +things, but the chief was that he trusted you too much to leave any +special messages. Hark! that must be Mr. Charnock, Cecil’s +father! I must go and receive him. Stay back, Miles, you +can’t now—you know my room—”</p> +<p>He signed acquiescence, but lingered in the dark to look down and +see how, though Rosamond had waited to spare them this reception, his +wife’s tall graceful figure came forward, and her kindly comforting +gestures, as the two sisters-in-law took the newcomer into the drawing-room, +and in another minute Anne flitted up to him again. “That +good Rosamond is seeing to Mr. Charnock,” she said; “will +you come, Miles? I think it will do your mother good; only quietly, +for Frank knows nothing.”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett still sat by Frank. To Miles’s eyes he +was a fearful spectacle, but to Anne there was hourly progress; the +sunken dejected look was gone, and though there was exhaustion, there +was rest; but he was neither sleeping nor waking, and showed no heed +when his brother dropped on one knee by his mother’s side, put +an arm round her waist, and after one fervent kiss laid his black head +on her lap, hiding his face there while she fondled his hair, and said, +“Frank, Frankie dear, here’s Miles come home.” +He did not seem to hear, only his lips murmured something like ‘Anne,’ +and the tender hand and ready touch of his unwearied nurse at once fulfilled +his need, while his mother whispered, “Miles, she is our blessing!”</p> +<p>Poor Miles! Never had sailor a stranger, though some may have +had an even sadder, return. He had indeed found his wife, but +hers was the only hand that could make Frank swallow the sustenance +that he needed every half-hour, or who knew how to relieve him. +Indeed, even the being together in the sick-room was not long possible, +for Anne was called to the door. Mr. Charnock was asking to see +Mrs. Poynsett. Would Mrs. Miles come and speak to him?</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock was a small and restless man with white hair, little +black eyes, looking keener than they were, and a face which had evidently +been the mould of Cecil’s. He was very kind, with a full +persuasion that the consolations of his august self must be infallible; +but this was coupled with an inclination to reprove everybody for the +fate that had left his cherished darling a childless widow at two-and-twenty. +To take him to Frank’s room was impossible, and he had to be roundly +told so. Neither had he seen his daughter. She was very +weak, but recovering, and Grindstone, whom he had seen and talked with, +was as strenuous in deprecating any excitement as he was nervous about +it. So he could only be disposed of in his room till dinner-time, +when he came down prepared to comfort the family, but fulfilled his +mission rather by doing such good as a blister, which lessens the force +of the malady by counter-irritation.</p> +<p>Julius came up to be with Miles, and to help them through the dinner, +the first which had been laid for many a long day. His enquiry +for Cecil was answered: “She is progressing as favourably as there +can be reason to expect, but I have not seen her. I follow the +judgment of her faithful Grindstone.”</p> +<p>“Then she still knows nothing—”</p> +<p>“Of her bereavement? No. Her state does not yet +warrant it. In fact, I almost wish I had obeyed my original impulse, +and brought down Venn to make the melancholy communication.”</p> +<p>To every one’s surprise Anne bristled up, saying, “Why, +here is Julius, Mr. Charnock!”</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock bowed: “I understand that my Cousin Julius has +been engrossed by his wife’s family and by the adjoining parish, +the care of which he has assumed.”</p> +<p>Anne fairly coloured up, and exclaimed, “Julius has been our +main-stay and help in everything—I can’t think how he has +done it. He has been here whenever we needed him, as well as at +Wil’sbro’, where people have been dying everywhere, the +poor Vicar and all—”</p> +<p>“Far be it from me to discourage philanthropy,” said +Mr. Charnock, “only I would have it within due bounds. I +am an old-fashioned squire, of a school, it may be, antiquated, an advocate +of the parochial system; and I cannot help thinking that if this had +been closely adhered to by hot-headed young clergymen, my poor child +might not have been a childless widow at two-and-twenty.”</p> +<p>Julius was too much tired and too sad-hearted to heed greatly what +Mr. Charnock said. It was so strange to have Miles in sight, yet +to feel so unable to be glad, that he scarcely heard anything. +But Anne again took up the cudgels: “Mr. Charnock, you don’t +suppose that it was anything Julius did that brought this fever here. +It was going to the town-hall among the drains.”</p> +<p>“My dear Mrs. Miles Charnock, I am sure your husband will agree +with me that sanitary arrangements and all connected with them are beyond +the range of ladies, who are happily exempted from all knowledge of +the subject.”</p> +<p>Anne could not say aloud that she wished Cecil had held this opinion, +but she subsided, while Mr. Charnock prosed on, asking questions about +the arrangements, and seeming shocked to hear that the funeral must +be early the next day, this being one of the prime injunctions of the +doctors, and that the one had been asked to attend it. It made +him sigh again for his poor daughter, as he handed Anne in to dinner. +She did not stay half through it, for it was again the time for feeding +Frank. Miles went half way up-stairs with her and returned, looking +very wistful. Julius smiled at him, “Your wife is too valuable, +Miles; she is every one’s property.”</p> +<p>“It must be very gratifying to you,” added Mr. Charnock, +“to find how example and superior society have developed the native +qualities your discernment detected in the charming young lady who has +just quitted us. It was a most commendable arrangement to send +her to enjoy the advantages of this place.”</p> +<p>“I sent her to be a comfort to my mother,” said Miles, +bluntly.</p> +<p>“And so she has been,” said Julius, fervently, but <i>sotto +voce.</i></p> +<p>“I understand,” said Mr. Charnock; “and as I was +saying, my dear Cecil expressed from the first her desire to assist +in forming her stranger sister-in-law, and I am happy to see the excellent +effect. I should scarcely have guessed that she came from a colony.”</p> +<p>“Indeed,” Miles answered dryly.</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock might have it his own way, if he liked to think Anne +had been a Hottentot till Cecil reclaimed her.</p> +<p>The two brothers did feel something like joy when a message at last +informed Mr. Charnock that his daughter was awake and he might see her. +They drew nearer together, and leant against one another, with absolute +joy in the contact. They were singularly alike in outline, voice, +and manner, in everything but colouring, and had always been one in +spirit, except for the strong passion for adventure which had taken +Miles to sea, to find he had chosen his profession too young to count +the cost, and he held to it rather by duty than taste. Slight +as had been his seniority, poor Raymond had always been on a sort of +paternal pinnacle, sharing the administration with his mother, while +Miles and Julius had paired on an equality.</p> +<p>“Poor mother!” sighed Miles. “How is she +to live without him? Julius, did he leave any word for me with +you?”</p> +<p>“Above all, that Anne is the daughter for my mother, and so +she is.”</p> +<p>“What, when this poor wife of Raymond’s was said to be +the superior creature?”</p> +<p>“You see her adoring father,” said Julius. “My +Rose has necessarily her own cares, but Anne has been my mother’s +silent aid and stay for months, and what she has been in the present +need no words can say. My mother has had no power to take the +direction of anything, her whole being has been absorbed, first in Raymond, +now in Frank; and not only has Anne been Frank’s constant nurse +through these five weeks of the most frightful fever and delirium I +have seen at all here, but she has had thought for all, and managed +all the house and servants. We could do comparatively little, +with Rose’s brother ill at home, and the baby so young; besides, +there have been eleven cases in the parish; and there was Wil’sbro’—but +Anne has been the angel in the house.”</p> +<p>“I knew—I knew she would be everything when once the +first strangeness was over; but, poor girl, her heart is in Africa, +and it has been all exile here; I could see it in every letter, though +she tried to make the best of it. If there had but been a child +here!”</p> +<p>“I think you will find sufficient attachment to mother to weigh +a good deal with her. Poor Anne, she did think us all very wicked +at first, and perhaps she does still, but at least this has drawn us +all nearer together.”</p> +<p>And then the brothers lowered their voices, and Miles heard the full +history of Raymond’s last illness, with all the details that Julius +could have spoken of to none else, while the sailor’s tears slowly +dropped through the hands that veiled his face. It was a great +deprivation to him that he might not look on Raymond’s face again, +but the medical edict had been decisive, and he had come home to be +of use and not a burthen. As Julius told Rosamond, he only thoroughly +felt the blessing of Miles’s return when he bade good night and +left the Hall, in peace and security that it had a sufficient aid and +stay, and that he was not deserting it.</p> +<p>Miles had proposed to send his wife to bed and take the night watch, +and he so far prevailed that she lay down in the adjoining room in her +dressing gown while he sat by Frank’s side. She lay where +she could feast her eyes upon him, as the lamplight fell on his ruddy +brown cheek, black hair, and steady dark eye, so sad indeed, but so +full of quiet strength and of heedful alacrity even in stillness—a +look that poor Raymond, with all his grave dignity, had never worn. +That sight was all Anne wanted. She did not speak, she did not +sleep; it was enough, more than enough, to have him there. She +was too much tired, body and mind, after five weeks of strain, for more +than the sense that God had given her back what she loved, and this +was ‘more than peace and more than rest.’</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXI<br /> +Breaking Down</h2> +<p>Funerals were little attended in these sad days. The living +had to be regarded more than the dead, and Raymond Poynsett was only +followed to the grave by his two brothers, his father-in-law, and some +of the servants. Rosamond, however, weeping her soft profuse tears, +could hear everything from behind the blind at Terry’s open window, +on that moist warm autumn day; everything, for no exception was made +to the rule that coffins might not be taken into the church during this +deadly sickness. She did hear a faltering and a blundering, which +caused her to look anxiously at the tall white figure standing at the +head of the grave, and, as she now saw, once or twice catching at the +iron railing that fenced in the Poynsett tombs. Neither her husband +nor his brother seemed to notice what she observed. Absorbed in +the sorrow and in one another, they turned away after the service was +ended and walked towards the Hall. Rosamond did not speak for +a minute or two, then she turned round to Terry, who was sitting up +in bed, with an awe-struck face, listening as well as he could to the +low sounds, and watching her.</p> +<p>“Terry, dear, shall you mind my going to see after Herbert +Bowater? I am sure they have let him overwork himself. If +he is not fit to take Lady Tyrrell’s funeral this afternoon, I +<i>shall</i> send to Duddingstone on my own responsibility. I +will not have Julius doing that!”</p> +<p>“Do you think he is ill—Bowater, I mean?” asked +Terry.</p> +<p>“I don’t like it. He seemed to totter as he went +across the churchyard, and he blundered. I shall go and see.”</p> +<p>“Oh yes, go,” said Terry; “I don’t want anybody. +Don’t hurry.”</p> +<p>Rosamond put on her hat and sped away to Mrs. Hornblower’s. +As usual, the front door leading to the staircase was open, and, going +up, she knocked at the sitting-room door; but the only response was +such a whining and scratching that she supposed the dogs had been left +prisoners there and forgotten, and so she turned the lock—but +there was an obstruction; so that though Mungo and Tartar darted out +and snuffed round her, only Rollo’s paw and head appeared, and +there was a beseeching earnestness in his looks and little moans, as +if entreating her to come in. Another push, vigorously seconded +by Rollo within, showed her that it was Herbert’s shoulder that +hindered her, and that he was lying outstretched on the floor, apparently +just recalled to consciousness by the push; for as Rollo proceeded to +his one remedy of licking, there was a faint murmur of “Who—what—”</p> +<p>“It is I! What is the matter?”</p> +<p>“Lady Rose! I’ll—I’ll try to move—oh!” +His voice died away, and Rosamond thrust in her salts, and called to +Mrs. Hornblower for water, but in vain. However, Herbert managed +to move a little to one side. She squeezed into the doorway, hastily +brought water from his bedroom within, and, kneeling down by him, bathed +his face, so that he revived to say, in the same faint voice, “I’m +so sorry I made such mulls. I couldn’t see. I thought +I knew it by heart.”</p> +<p>“Never mind, never mind, dear Herbert! You are better. +Couldn’t you let me help you to the sofa?”</p> +<p>“Oh, presently;” and as she took his head on her lap, +“Thank you; I did mean to hold out till after this day’s +work; but it is all right now Bindon is come.”</p> +<p>“Come!—is he?” she joyfully exclaimed.</p> +<p>“Yes, I saw him from the window. I was getting up to +hail him when the room turned upside down with me.”</p> +<p>“There’s his step!” now exclaimed Rosamond. +“Squeeze in, Mr. Bindon; you are a very welcome sight.”</p> +<p>Mr. Bindon did make his way in, and stood dismayed at the black mass +on the floor. Rosamond and Rollo, one on each side of Herbert’s +great figure, in his cassock, and the rosy face deadly white, while +Mungo and Tartar, who hated Mr. Bindon, both began to bark, and thus +did the most for their master, whose call of ‘Quiet! you brutes,’ +seemed to give him sudden strength. He took a grip of Rollo’s +curly back, and, supported by Mr. Bindon, dragged himself to the sofa +and fell heavily back on it.</p> +<p>“Give him some brandy,” said Mr. Bindon, hastily.</p> +<p>“There’s not a drop of anything,” muttered Herbert; +“it’s all gone—”</p> +<p>“To Wil’sbro’,” explained Rosamond; then +seeing the scared face of Dilemma at the door, she hastily gave a message, +and sent her flying to the Rectory, while Mr. Bindon was explaining.</p> +<p>“I wish I had known. I never will go out of the reach +of letters again. I saw in the <i>Times</i>, at Innspruck, a mention +of typhoid fever here, and I came back as fast as trains would bring +me; but too late, I fear.”</p> +<p>“You are welcome, indeed,” repeated Rosamond. “Herbert +has broken down at last, after doing more than man could do, and I am +most thankful that my husband should be saved the funerals at Wil’sbro’.”</p> +<p>Mr. Bindon, whose face showed how shocked he was, made a few inquiries. +He had learnt the main facts on his way, but had been seeking his junior +to hear the details, and he looked, like the warrior who had missed +Thermopylæ, ashamed and grieved at his holiday.</p> +<p>The bottle Rosamond had sent for arrived, and there was enough vigour +restored to make her say, “Here’s a first service, Mr. Bindon, +to help this poor fellow into bed.”</p> +<p>“No, no!” exclaimed Herbert.</p> +<p>“You are not going to say there’s nothing the matter +with you?” said Rosamond, as a flush passed over the pale face.</p> +<p>“No,” he said; “but I want to go home. I +should have taken a fly at Wil’sbro’. Cranky will +see to me without bothering anybody else. If you would send for +one—”</p> +<p>“I don’t think I can till I know whether you are fit +to move,” said Rosamond. “I desired Dilemma to tell +them to send Dr. Worth here when he comes to Terry. Besides, is +it quite right to carry <i>this</i> into another place?”</p> +<p>“I never thought of that,” said Herbert. “But +they would shut me up; nobody come near me but Cranky.” +But there a shivering fit caught him, so that the sofa shook with him, +and Rosamond covered him with rugs, and again told him bed was the only +place for him, and he consented at last, holding his head as he rose, +dizzy with the ache.</p> +<p>“Look here, Lady Rose,” he said, falling back into a +sitting posture at the first attempt, “where’s my writing-case? +If I go off my head, will you give this to the Rector, and ask him if +it will be any good in the matter he knows of?” and he handed +her an envelope. “And this keep,” he added, giving +her one addressed to his father. “Don’t let him have +it till it’s all over. You know.” Then he took +up a pen and a sheet of paper, and got as far, with a shaking hand, +as ‘Dear Crank—’ but there he broke down, and laid +his head on the table, groaning.</p> +<p>“I’ll do it. What shall I say, dear Herbert?”</p> +<p>“Only tell her to come to me,” he gasped. “Cranstoun—our +old nurse. Then I’ll be no trouble.”</p> +<p>While Mr. Bindon helped Herbert into his room, Rosamond sped home +to send for Mrs. Cranstoun, arrange for the care of the new patient +in the intervening hours, and fetch some of those alleviations of which +experience had taught the use. Mr. Bindon came to meet her on +her return, carefully shutting the door, and saying, “Lady Rosamond, +can he be delirious already? He is talking of being plucked for +his Ordination.”</p> +<p>“Too true,” said Rosamond. “I thought it +a great shame to be so hard on a man with <i>that</i> in him; but I +believe you expected it?”</p> +<p>“No; I may have said he would fail, but I never expected it.”</p> +<p>“Fail, indeed! Fancy a man being turned back who has +worked night and day—night and day—doing all the very hardest +services—never resting! Very likely killing himself!” +cried Rosamond hotly. “May I come back to him? Terry +can spare me, and if you will go to Wil’sbro’ I’ll +stay till my husband comes, or the doctor. The Sisters will tell +you what to do.”</p> +<p>Herbert was, however, so much more comfortable for being in bed, +that he was able to give Mr. Bindon directions as to the immediate cares +at Wil’sbro’; but he was distressed at occupying Lady Rose, +his great object being to be no trouble to anybody, though he had seen +so much of the disease as to have been fully aware that it had been +setting in for the last two days, yet his resolution to spare his Rector +had kept him afoot till he had seen other help arrive. He declared +that he wanted nobody but Rollo, who could fetch and carry, and call +any one, if only the doors were open, and really the creature’s +wistful eyes and gentle movements justified the commendation.</p> +<p>“Only,” said Herbert anxiously, “I suppose this +is not catching for dogs. You’ll make a home for him Lady +Rose?” he added. “I should like you to have him, and +he’ll be happier with you than with any one else.”</p> +<p>“Herbert, I can’t have you talk of that.”</p> +<p>“Very well,” he said, quietly. “Only you +will keep my dear old fellow—I’ve had him from a puppy—and +he is but three years old now.”</p> +<p>Rosamond gave all promises, from her full heart, as she fondled the +soft, wise black head.</p> +<p>Herbert was unhappy too about Mrs. Hornblower’s trouble. +Harry had been one of the slighter cases, and was still in his room, +a good deal subdued by the illness, and by the attention the lodger +had shown him; for Herbert had spent many hours, when he had been supposed +to be resting, in relieving Mrs. Hornblower, and she was now in a flood +of gratitude, only longing to do everything for him herself. Had +he not, as she declared, saved her son, body and soul?</p> +<p>The most welcome sight was Julius, who came down in dismay as soon +as he could leave the Hall. “I am so glad,” said the +patient; “I want to talk things over while my head is clearer +than it ever may be again.”</p> +<p>“Don’t begin by desponding. These fevers are much +less severe now than six weeks ago.”</p> +<p>“Yes; but they always go the hardest with the great big strong +young fellows. I’ve buried twelve young men out of the whole +forty-five.”</p> +<p>“Poor lads, I doubt if their life had been such a preparation +as yours.”</p> +<p>“Don’t talk of my life. A stewardship I never set +myself to contemplate, and so utterly failed in. I’ve got +nothing to carry to my God but broken vows and a wasted year.”</p> +<p>“Nothing can be brought but repentance.”</p> +<p>“Yes, but look at others who have tried, felt their duties, +and cared for souls; while I thought only of my vows as a restraint, +and tried how much pleasure I could get in spite of them. A pretty +story of all the ministry I shall ever have.”</p> +<p>“These last weeks!”</p> +<p>“Common humanity—nonsense! I should always have +done as much; besides, I was crippled everywhere, not merely by want +of power as a priest, but by having made myself such a shallow, thoughtless +ass. But that was not what I wanted to say. It was about +Gadley and his confession.”</p> +<p>“O, Herbert! I am afraid I was very unkind that night. +I did not think of anything but our own trouble, nor see how much it +had cost you.”</p> +<p>“Of course not—nonsense. You had enough to think +of yourself, and I was only ashamed of having bored you.”</p> +<p>“And when I think of the state of that room, I am afraid it +was then you took in the poison.”</p> +<p>“Don’t say <i>afraid</i>. If it was for Jenny, +I shall have done some good in the world. But the thing is—is +it good? Will it clear Douglas? I suppose what he said to +you was under seal of confession?”</p> +<p>“Scarcely so, technically; but when a man unburthens himself +on his death-bed, and then, so far from consenting, shows terror and +dismay at the notion of his words being taken down as evidence, it seems +to me hardly right or honourable to make use of them—though it +would right a great wrong. But what did you get from him?”</p> +<p>“I gave Lady Rose the paper. He raved most horribly for +an hour or two, as if all the foul talk of his pot-house had got into +his brain,” said Herbert, with a shudder. “Rector, +Rector, pray for me, that I mayn’t come out with <i>that</i> at +any rate. It has haunted me ever since. Well, at last he +slept, and woke up sinking but conscious, knew me, and began to ask +if this was death, and was frightened, clutching at me, and asking to +be held, and what he could do. I told him at least he could undo +a wrong, if he would only authorize us to use what he said to clear +Douglas; and then, as Sister Margaret had come across, I wrote as well +as I could: “George Gadley authorizes what he said to the Rev. +Julius Charnock to be used as evidence;” and I suppose he saw +us sign it, if he could see at all, for his sight was nearly gone.”</p> +<p>Julius drew a long breath.</p> +<p>“And now, what was it?” said Herbert.</p> +<p>“Well, the trio—Moy, young Proudfoot, and Tom Vivian—detained +a letter of my mother’s, with a cheque in it, and threw the blame +of it on Archie Douglas. They thought no one was in the office +but themselves; but Gadley was a clerk there, and was in the outer room, +where he heard all. He came to Moy afterwards, and has been preying +on him for hush-money ever since.”</p> +<p>“And this will set things straight?”</p> +<p>“Yes. How to set about the public justification I do +not yet see; but with your father, and all the rest, Archie’s +innocence will be as plain as it always has been to us.”</p> +<p>“Where is he?”</p> +<p>“On an ostrich farm at Natal.”</p> +<p>“Whew!—we must have him home. Jenny can’t +be spared. Poor Jenny, when she hears that, it will make all other +things light to her.”</p> +<p>“What is their address?”</p> +<p>“No, don’t write. Mamma has had a fresh cold, and +neither my father nor Jenny could leave her. Let them have a little +peace till it gets worse. There will be plenty of time, if it +is to be a twenty-eight days business like the others. Poor mamma!” +and he rolled his head away; then, after some minutes of tossing and +shivering, he asked for a prayer out of the little book in his pocket. +“I should know it, but my memory is muddled, I think.”</p> +<p>The book—a manual for sick-rooms—was one which Julius +had given him new five weeks back. It showed wear already, having +been used as often in that time as in six ordinary years of parish work. +By the time the hard-pressed doctor came, it was plain that the fever +was setting in severely, aggravated no doubt by the dreadful night at +the ‘Three Pigeons,’ and the unrelaxed exertions ever since; +for he was made to allow that he had come home in the chill morning +air, cold, sickened, and exhausted; had not chosen to disturb anybody, +and had found no refreshment but a raw apple—the last drop of +wine having been bestowed on the sick; had lain down for a short sleep +worse than waking, and had neither eaten nor slept since, but worked +on by sheer strength of will and muscle. When Julius thought of +the cherishing care that he had received himself, he shuddered, with +a sort of self-reproach for his neglect; and the doctor, though good-humouredly +telling Herbert not to think he knew anything about his own symptoms, +did not conceal from Julius that enough harm had been done in these +few days to give the fine Bowater constitution a hard struggle.</p> +<p>“Grown careless,” he said. “Regular throwing +away of his life.”</p> +<p>Careless Herbert might have been, but Julius wondered whether this +might not be losing of the life to find it.</p> +<p>Cranstoun or Cranky arrived, a charming old nurse, much gratified +in the midst of her grief, and inclination to scold. She summarily +sent off Mungo and Tartar by the conveyance that brought her, and would +have sent Rollo away, but that Herbert protested against it, and no +power short of an order from him would have taken the dog from his bedside.</p> +<p>And Mr. Bindon returned from Wil’sbro’ in unspeakable +surprise. “The heroes of the occasion,” he said, “were +Bowater and Mrs. Duncombe! Every sick person I visited, and there +were fourteen in all stages, had something to say of one or other. +Poor things, how their faces fell when they saw me instead of his bright, +honest face! ‘Cheering the very heart of one!’ as +a poor woman said; ‘That’s what I calls a true shepherd,’ +said an old man. You don’t really mean he was rejected at +the Ordination?’”</p> +<p>“Yes, and it will make him the still truer shepherd, if he +is only spared!”</p> +<p>“The Sisters can’t say enough of him. They thought +him very ill yesterday, and implored him to take care of himself; but +he declared he could not leave these two funerals to you. But, +after all, he is less amazing to me than Mrs. Duncombe. She has +actually been living at the hospital with the Sisters. I should +not have known her.”</p> +<p>“Great revolutions have happened in your absence. Much +that has drawn out her sterling worth, poor woman.”</p> +<p>“I shall never speak harshly again, I hope. It seems +to be a judgment on me that I should have been idling on the mountains, +while those two were thus devoting themselves to my Master in His poor.”</p> +<p>“We are thankful enough to have you coming in fresh, instead +of breaking down now. Have you a sermon? You will have to +take Wil’sbro’ to-morrow. Driver won’t come. +He wrote to the churchwardens that he had a cold, and that his agreement +was with poor Fuller.”</p> +<p>“And you undertook the Sunday?”</p> +<p>“Yes. They would naturally have no Celebration, and I +thought Herbert’s preaching in the midst of his work would be +good for them. You never heard such an apology and confession +as the boy made to our people the first Sunday here, begging them to +bear with him.”</p> +<p>“Then I can’t spare you anything here?”</p> +<p>“Yes, much care and anxiety. The visitation has done +its worst in our house. We have got into the lull after the storm, +and you need not be anxious about me. There is peace in what I +have to do now. It is gathering the salvage after the wreck.”</p> +<p>Then Julius went into his own house, where he found Terry alone, +and, as usual, ravenously hungry.</p> +<p>“Is Bowater really ill?” he asked.</p> +<p>“I am afraid there is no believing otherwise, Terry,” +said Julius. “You will have to spare Rose to him sometimes, +till some one comes to nurse him.”</p> +<p>“I would spare anything to him,” said Terry, fervently. +“Julius, it is finer than going into battle!”</p> +<p>“I thought you did not care much for battles, Terry.”</p> +<p>“If it was battles, I should not mind,” said the boy; +“it is peaceful soldiering that I have seen too much of. +But don’t you bother my father, Julius, I won’t grumble +any more; I made up my mind to that.”</p> +<p>“I know you did, my boy; but you did so much futile arithmetic, +and so often told us that <i>a</i>+<i>b-c</i> equalled Peter the Great, +that Dr. Worth said you must not be put to mathematics for months to +come, and I have told your father that if he cannot send you to Oxford, +we will manage it.”</p> +<p>A flush of joy lighted up the boy’s face. “Julius, +you are a brick of a brother!” he said. “I’ll +do my best to get a scholarship.”</p> +<p>“And the best towards that you can do now is to get well as +soon as possible.”</p> +<p>“Yes. And you lie down on the sofa there, Julius, and +sleep—Rose would say you must. Only I want to say one thing +more, please. If I do get to Oxford, and you are so good, I’ve +made up my mind to one thing. It’s not only for the learning +that I’ll go; but I’ll try to be a soldier in your army +and Bowater’s. That’s all that seems to me worth the +doing now.”</p> +<p>So Julius dropped asleep, with a thankworthy augury in his ears. +It is not triumph, but danger and death that lead generous spirits each +to step where his comrade stood!</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXII<br /> +The Salvage</h2> +<p>Frank was certainly better. Ever since that sight of Eleonora +he had been mending. If he muttered her name, or looked distressed, +it was enough to guide his hand to her token, he smiled and slept again; +and on the Sunday morning his throat and mouth were so much better, +that he could both speak and swallow without nearly so much pain; but +one of his earliest sayings was, “Louder, please, I can’t +hear. When does she come?”</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett raised her voice, Anne tried; but he frowned and sighed, +and only when Miles uttered a sea-captain’s call close to his +ear, did he smile comprehension, adding, “Were you shouting?” +a fact only too evident to those around.</p> +<p>“Then I’m deaf,” he said. And Anne wrote +and set before him, “We hope it will pass as you get better.” +He looked grateful, but there was little more communication, for his +eyes and head were still weak, and signs and looks were the chief currency; +however, Julius met Eleonora after morning service, to beg her to renew +her visit, after having first prepared her for what she would find. +Eleonora was much distressed; then paused a minute, and said, “It +does him good to see me?”</p> +<p>“It seems to be the one thing that keeps him up,” said +Julius, surprised at the question.</p> +<p>“O, yes! I can’t—I could not stay away,” +she said. “It is all so wrong together; yet this last time +cannot hurt!”</p> +<p>“Last time?”</p> +<p>“Yes; did you not know that papa has set his heart on going +to London to-morrow? Yes, early to-morrow. And it will be +for ever. We shall never see Sirenwood again.”</p> +<p>She stood still, almost bent with the agony of suppressed grief.</p> +<p>“I am very sorry; but I do not wonder he wishes for change.”</p> +<p>“He has been in an agony to go these three days. It was +all I could do to get him to stay to-day. You don’t think +it will do Frank harm? Then I would stay, if I took lodgings in +the village; but otherwise—poor papa—I think it is my duty—and +he can’t do without me.”</p> +<p>“I think Frank is quite capable of understanding that you are +forced to go, and that he need not be the worse for it.”</p> +<p>“And then,” she lowered her voice, “it does a little +reconcile me that I don’t think we ought to go further into it +till we can understand. I did make that dreadful vow. I +know I ought not now; but still I did, in so many words.”</p> +<p>“You mean against a gambler?”</p> +<p>“If it had only been against a gambler; but I was stung, and +wanted to guard myself, and made it against any one who had ever betted! +If I go on, I must break it, you see, and if I do might it not bring +mischief on him? I don’t even feel as if it were <i>true</i> +to have come to him on Friday, and now—yet they said it was the +only chance for his life.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I think it saved him then, and to disappoint him now +might quite possibly bring a relapse,” said Julius. “It +seems to me that you can only act as seems right at the moment. +When he is his own man again, you will better have the power of judging +about this vow, and if it ought to bind you. And so, it may really +be well you do not see more of him, and that his weakness does not lead +you further than you mean.”</p> +<p>A tottering step, and an almost agonized, though very short sob under +the crape veil, proved to Julius that his counsel, though chiming in +with her stronger, sterner judgment, was terrible to her, nor would +he have given it, if he had not had reason to fear that while she had +grown up, Frank had grown down; and that, after this illness, it would +have to be proved whether he were indeed worthy of the high-minded girl +whom he had himself almost thrown over in a passion.</p> +<p>But there was no room for such misgivings when the electric shock +of actual presence was felt—the thin hollow-cheeked face shone +with welcome, the liquid brown eyes smiled with thankful sweetness, +the fingers, fleshless, but cool and gentle, were held out; and the +faint voice said, “My darling! Once try to make me hear.”</p> +<p>And when, with all her efforts, she could only make him give a sort +of smile of disappointment, she would have been stonyhearted indeed +if she had not let him fondle her hand as he would, while she listened +to his mother’s report of his improvement. With those eyes +fixed in such content on her face, it seemed absolutely barbarous to +falter forth that she could come no more, for her father was taking +her away.</p> +<p>“My dear, you must be left with us,” cried Mrs. Poynsett. +“He cannot spare you.”</p> +<p>“Ah! but my poor father. He is lost without me. +And I came of age on Tuesday, and there are papers to sign.”</p> +<p>“What is it?” murmured Frank, watching their faces.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett gave her the pen, saying, “You must tell him, +if it is to be.”</p> +<p>She wrote: “My father takes me to London to-morrow, to meet +the lawyers.”</p> +<p>His face fell; but he asked, “Coming back—when?”</p> +<p>She shook her head, and her eyes filled with tears, as she wrote: +“Sirenwood is to be put up to auction.”</p> +<p>“Your sister?” began Frank, and then his eye fell on +her crape trimmings. He touched her sleeve, and made a low wail. +“Oh! is every one dead?”</p> +<p>It was the first perception he had shown of any death, though mourning +had been worn in his room. His mother leant down to kiss him, +bidding Lena tell him the truth; and she wrote:</p> +<p>“I am left alone with poor papa. Let me go—now +you can do without me.”</p> +<p>“Can I?” he asked, again grasping her hand.</p> +<p>She pointed to his mother and Anne; but he repeated, “You—you!”</p> +<p>“When you are better we will see how it is to be,” she +wrote.</p> +<p>He looked sadly wistful. “No, I can’t now. +Something was very wrong; but it won’t come back. By and +by. If you wouldn’t go—”</p> +<p>But his voice was now more weak and weary, tired by the effort, and +a little kneeling by him, allowing his tender touch, soothed him, enough +to say submissively, “Good-bye, then—I’ll come for +you”—wherewith he faltered into slumber.</p> +<p>Rosamond had just seen her off in the pony carriage, and was on the +way up-stairs, when she stumbled on a little council, consisting of +Dr. Worth, Mr. Charnock, and Grindstone, all in the gallery. “A +widow in her twenty-second year. Good heavens!” was the +echo she heard; and Grindstone was crying and saying, “She did +it for the best, and she could not do it, poor lamb, not if you killed +her for it;” and Dr. Worth said, “Perhaps Lady Rosamond +can. You see, Lady Rosamond, Mrs. Grindstone, whose care I must +say has been devoted, has hitherto staved off the sad question from +poor young Mrs. Poynsett, until now it is no longer possible, and she +is becoming so excited, that—”</p> +<p>Cecil’s bell rang sharply.</p> +<p>“I cannot—I cannot! In her twenty-second year!” +cried her father, wringing his hands.</p> +<p>Grindstone’s face was all tears and contortions; and Rosamond, +recollecting her last words with poor Cecil, sprang forward, both men +opening a way for her.</p> +<p>Cecil was sitting up in bed, very thin, but with eager eyes and flushed +cheeks, as she held out her hands. “Rosamond! Oh! +But aren’t you afraid?”</p> +<p>“No, indeed, I’m always in it now,” said Rosamond, +kissing her, and laying her down; “it has been everywhere.”</p> +<p>“Ah! then they sent him away—Raymond?” then clutching +Rosamond’s hand, and looking at her with searching eyes, “Tell +me, has his mother any right! Would you bear it if she kept <i>you</i> +apart?”</p> +<p>“Ah! Cecil, it was not her doing.”</p> +<p>“You don’t mean it was his own? Papa is not afraid. +You are not afraid. If it had been he, I wouldn’t have feared +anything. I would have nursed him day and night till—till +I made him care for me.”</p> +<p>“Hush, dear Cecil,” said Rosamond, with great difficulty. +“I know you would, and so would he have done for you, only the +cruel fever kept you apart.”</p> +<p>“The fever! He had it?”</p> +<p>“Yes, he <i>had</i> it.”</p> +<p>“But he is better. I am better. Let me be taken +to him. His mother is not there now. I heard them say she +was in Frank’s room. Call papa. He will carry me.”</p> +<p>“Oh! poor, poor Cecil. His mother only went to Frank +when he did not need her any more.” And Rosamond hid her +face on the bed, afraid to look.</p> +<p>Cecil lay back so white, that Grindstone approached with some drops, +but this made her spring up, crying, “No, no, don’t come +near me! You never told me! You deceived me!”</p> +<p>“Don’t, don’t, ma’am—my dear Miss Charnock—now. +It was all for the best. You would not have been here now.”</p> +<p>“And then I should be with him. Rosamond, send her away, +I can’t bear her. She sent him away from me that night. +I heard her.”</p> +<p>“My dear Cecil, this will not do. You are making your +father dreadfully unhappy. Dear Raymond stayed with you till he +really could not sit up any longer, and then he kissed you.”</p> +<p>“Kissed me! Oh, where? Did you see? No, don’t +ask Grindstone. She made me think he had left me, and fancy—oh, +Rosamond! such—such things! And all the time—”</p> +<p>The moaning became an anguish of distress, unable to weep, like terrible +pain, as the poor young thing writhed in Rosamond’s arms. +It was well that this one sister understood what had been in Cecil’s +heart, and did believe in her love for Raymond. Rosamond, too, +had caressing power beyond any other of the family, and thus she could +better deal with the sufferer, striving, above all, to bring tears by +what she whispered to her as she held her to her bosom. They were +a terrible storm at last, but Cecil clung to Rosamond through all, absolutely +screaming when Grindstone came near; poor Grindstone who had been so +devoted, though mistaken. Weakness, however, after the first violent +agitation was soothed, favoured a kind of stunned torpor, and Cecil +lay still, except when her maid tried to do anything for her, and then +the passion returned. When old Susan Alston came with a message, +she was at once recognized and monopolized, and became the only servant +whom she would suffer about her.</p> +<p>The inconvenience was great, but relapse was such an imminent danger, +that it was needful to give up everything to her; and Mr. Charnock, +regarding his daughter’s sufferings as the only ones worth consideration, +seemed to pursue Rosamond the instant she had sat down by the still +feeble, weary, convalescent Terry, imploring her to return to Cecil +with the irresistible force of tearful eyes and piteous descriptions; +and as Terry had a week’s start in recovery, and was not a widow +under twenty-two, he had to submit, and lie as contentedly as he could +in his solitude.</p> +<p>Susan could be better spared to Cecil’s morbid fancy of being +waited on by her who had attended her husband, for Miles and Anne were +sufficient for Mrs. Poynsett and Frank. The long-sundered husband +and wife scarcely saw each other, except over Frank’s bed, and +Mr. Charnock was on the Captain’s hands whenever he came beyond +it. On the Wednesday, however, Julius, who had only once spoken +to his brother alone, came up to the breakfast-table where he and Mr. +Charnock were sitting, and hurt the feelings of the latter by first +asking for Frank. “He had slept all night, and only half +woke when Miles and Anne changed watch and gave him beef-tea. +Cecil, very moaning and restless—more fever about her, poor dear. +When would Lady Rosamond come up?—she was asking for her.” +When she had seen to a few things at home, given her brother his breakfast, +and seen to poor Herbert; he had had a dreadful night, and that Cranstoun +<i>would</i> shut the window unless some one defended him. Mr. +Charnock began to resume his daughter’s symptoms, when Julius, +at the first pause, said:</p> +<p>“Have you finished, Miles? Could you speak to me in the +library a minute? I beg your pardon, Mr. Charnock, but my time +is short.”</p> +<p>“I hope—I quite understand. Do not let me be in +your way.” And the brothers repaired to the library, where +Julius’s first words were, “Miles, you must make up your +mind. They are getting up a requisition to you to stand for Wil’sbro’.”</p> +<p>“To me?”</p> +<p>“You are the most obvious person, and the feeling for dear +Raymond is so strong as to prevent any contest. Whitlock told +Bindon yesterday that you should have no trouble.”</p> +<p>“I can’t. It is absurd. I know nothing about +it. My poor mother bred up Raymond for nothing else. Don’t +you remember how she made him read history, volumes upon volumes, while +I was learning nothing but the ropes? I declare, Julius, there +he goes.”</p> +<p>“Who?”</p> +<p>“Why, that old ass, down to hunt up poor Rosamond; I don’t +believe he thinks there’s any one in the world but his daughter. +I declare I’ll hail him and stop him.”</p> +<p>“No, no, Miles, Rosamond can take care of herself. She +won’t come till she has seen to her patients down there; and, +after all, Cecil’s is the saddest case, poor thing. To return. +If you don’t take to politics in the end, I think you should let +them put you in now, if only as a stop-gap, or we shall get some one +whom it may not be easy to get rid of.”</p> +<p>“There’s something in that, but I can’t accept +without knowing my position, and I would not utter a word to disturb +my mother till it occurs to her of herself.”</p> +<p>“Now that Frank is better?”</p> +<p>“No. It will all come on her soon enough.”</p> +<p>“Would you stand if she made it right for you?”</p> +<p>“I can’t tell. There would be no punishment so +great to my poor Anne as to be dragged into society, and I don’t +know how she would bear it, even if she had no scruples. We never +thought of anything but settling in Glen Fraser, only I wanted her to +know you all. If that poor Cecil only had a child we could be +free to go back. Poor Anne!”</p> +<p>“Do you think she is still as homesick as at first?”</p> +<p>“Well, not quite, perhaps; but I never can get to talk to her, +and I know it is a terrible sacrifice to her to live here at all, and +I won’t have her forced into a style of thing against her conscience. +If they come to me, I shall tell them to take Mr. Bowater.”</p> +<p>“Poor Mr. Bowater! He will have little heart.”</p> +<p>“Who else is there? That fellow Moy would like it, I +suppose.”</p> +<p>“That fellow Moy may have to change his note,” said Julius. +“I think we have the means of clearing Archie, when we can see +how to use them.”</p> +<p>Miles gave a sort of leap as he stood by the fire. “Tell +me. Archie! I had no heart to write to him, poor fellow.”</p> +<p>“Write to him by all means, but say nothing here.” +And Julius briefly repeated what Gadley had said.</p> +<p>“I don’t see that the scoundrel Moy deserves any consideration.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know whether he does; but he has a good wife, +ailing and sickly, and a daughter. He has lived in good report +these many years, and I think it is due to him and to old Proudfoot +not to spread the report before giving him warning. In fact, I +am not sure whether we could proceed against him as things stand.”</p> +<p>“It is just what Raymond would have known,” said Miles, +with a sigh; “but you are right, Julius, one ought to give him +fair play. Ah! what’s that, Jenkins?—Note from Lord +Belfort? Wait for an answer. Can’t they give one any +peace?”</p> +<p>While Miles was reluctantly answering his note, Julius, resolving +to act before he was forbidden, mounted to Frank’s room, requested +to speak with his mother, and propelled her into the outer room, leaving +Anne on guard.</p> +<p>“Now then, my dear,” she said, “I have known a +talk must soon come. You have all been very good to me to leave +it so long.”</p> +<p>“I am come now without poor Miles’s knowledge or consent,” +said Julius, “because it is necessary for him to know what to +do.”</p> +<p>“He will give up the navy,” said his mother. “O, +Julius! does he require to be told that he—?” and she laid +her head on her son’s shoulder.</p> +<p>“It is what he cannot bear to be told; but what drives me on +is that Whitlock tells me that the Wil’sbro’ people want +to bring him in at once, as the strongest proof of their feeling for +Raymond.”</p> +<p>“Yes,” she raised her head proudly, “of course +he must come forward. He need have no doubt. Send him to +me, Julius, I will tell him to open letters, and put matters in train. +Perhaps you will write to Graves for me, if he does not like it, poor +boy.”</p> +<p>She had roused herself into the woman of business, and when Miles, +after some indignation at her having been disturbed, obeyed the summons, +she held out her arms, and became the consoler.</p> +<p>“Come, my boy,” she said, “we must face it sooner +or later. You must stand foremost and take up his work for him.”</p> +<p>“Oh, mother! mother! you know how little I am able,” +said Miles, covering his face with his hands.</p> +<p>“You do not bring his burthened heart to the task,” she +said. “If you had watched and felt with him, as perhaps +only his mother could, you would know that I can be content that the +long heartache should have ceased, where the weary are at rest. +Yes, Miles, I feel as if I had put him to sleep after a long day of +pain, as when he was a little child.”</p> +<p>They hardened themselves to the discussion, Mrs. Poynsett explaining +what she thought the due of her eldest son, only that Cecil’s +jointure would diminish the amount at her disposal. Indeed, when +she was once aroused, she attended the most fully; but when Miles found +her apologizing for only affording him the little house in the village, +he cried out with consternation.</p> +<p>“My dear,” she said, “it is best so; I will not +be a burthen on you young ones. I see the mistake.”</p> +<p>“I know,” stammered Miles, “my poor Anne is not +up to your mark—not clever like you or Jenny—but I thought +you did like her pretty handy ways.”</p> +<p>“I feel them and love them with all my heart; but I cannot +have her happiness and yours sacrificed to me. Yes, you boys love +the old nest; but even Julius and Rose rejoice in their own, and you +must see what she really wishes, not what she thinks her duty. +Take her out walking, you both need it badly enough.”</p> +<p>They ventured to comply, and eluding Mr. Charnock, went into the +park, silvery with the unstanched dews, and the leaves floating down +one by one like golden rain. “Not much like the Bush,” +said Miles.</p> +<p>“No,” was all Anne durst say.</p> +<p>“Poor Nan, how dreary it must have looked to you last year!”</p> +<p>“I am afraid I wrote very complaining letters!”</p> +<p>“Not complaining, but a direful little effort at content, showing +the more piteously, because involuntarily, what a mistake I had made.”</p> +<p>“No, no mistake. Indeed, Miles, it was not. Nothing +else would have cured me of the dreadful uncharitableness which was +the chief cause of my unhappiness, and if I had not been so forlorn, +I should never have seen how good and patient your mother was with me. +Yes, I mean it. I read over my old diary and saw how tiresome +and presumptuous I was, and how wonderfully she bore with me, and so +did Julius and Rosamond, while all the time I fancied them—no +Christians.”</p> +<p>“Ah! you child! You know I would never have done it if +I had known you were to be swamped among brides. At any rate, +this poor old place doesn’t look so woefully dismal and hateful +to you now.”</p> +<p>“It could not, where you are, and where I have so many to know +and love.”</p> +<p>“You can bear the downfall of our Bush schemes?”</p> +<p>“Your duty is here now.”</p> +<p>“Are you grieved, little one?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know. I should like to have seen mamma; +but she does not need me now as your mother does.”</p> +<p>“Then you are willing to be her daughter?”</p> +<p>“I have tried hard, and she is very kind; but I am far too +dull and ignorant for her. I can only wait upon her; but when +she has you and Julius to talk to, my stupidity will not matter.”</p> +<p>“Would you be content to devote yourself to her, instead of +making a home of our own?”</p> +<p>“She can’t be left alone in that great house.”</p> +<p>“The question is, can you be happy in it? or do you wish for +a house to ourselves?”</p> +<p>“You don’t, Miles, it is your own home.”</p> +<p>“That’s not the question.”</p> +<p>“Miles, why do you look at me so?”</p> +<p>“I was told to ascertain your wishes.”</p> +<p>“I don’t wish anything—now I have you—but +to be a comfort to your mother. That is my first earthly wish +just now.”</p> +<p>“If that be earthly, it has a touch of the heavenly,” +muttered Miles to himself. “You will make it clear to mother +then that you like to go on with her?”</p> +<p>“If she does not mind having me.”</p> +<p>“And Julius says it really cheered our dear Raymond to think +you would be the one to look after her! But that’s not all, +Nanny, I’ve only till to-morrow to decide whether I am to be Member +for Wil’sbro’.”</p> +<p>“Is that a duty?”</p> +<p>“Not such a duty as to bind me if it were altogether repugnant +to you. I was not brought up for it, and may be a mere stop-gap, +but it is every man’s duty to come to the front when he is called +for, and do his utmost for his country in Parliament, I suppose, as +much as in action.”</p> +<p>“I see; but it would be leaving your mother alone a great deal.”</p> +<p>“Not necessarily. You could stay here part of the time, +and I go backwards and forwards, as Raymond did before his marriage.”</p> +<p>“It would be better than your being at sea.”</p> +<p>“But remember,” he added, “there is much that can’t +be shirked. I don’t mean currying popularity, but if one +is in that position, there’s no shutting oneself up. It +becomes a duty to keep society going, and give it the sort of tone that +a nice woman can do. Do you see?”</p> +<p>“I think I do. Julius said so once.”</p> +<p>“So if we are to have such tears and despair as there were +about the ball in the Chimæra, then—”</p> +<p>“I was wrong then,” said Anne. “I did not +behave at all well to you all that time, dear Miles; I have been sorry +for it ever since I understood.”</p> +<p>“It was not you, little one, it was Mr. Pilgrim.”</p> +<p>“No, it was not Mr. Pilgrim who made me cross.”</p> +<p>“Yes, it was. He exacted pledges that he had no right +to lay on your conscience, and your poor little conscience was in terrible +straits, and I was too angry to feel for it. Never mind all that; +you have done with the fellow, and understand better now.”</p> +<p>“He thought he was right, and that only such abstinence could +guard me. And, Miles, a promise is a promise, and I do not think +I ought to dance or play at cards. It is not that I think them +wrong for others, but I cannot break my word. Except those—I +will do whatever is fitting for your wife.”</p> +<p>“Spoken like a heroine!”</p> +<p>“I don’t think I could ever give a tone. Rosamond +could, if she tried, but I have no readiness and no training; but I +do see that there is more good in being friendly like Jenny Bowater, +than in avoiding everything, and as long as one does it because it is +right and loving, it can’t be the world or worldliness.”</p> +<p>It was not lucidly expressed, but it satisfied the Captain.</p> +<p>“All right, my bonnie Nance, I’ll promise on my side +never to ask you to go against your real conscience, and if you must +have a Pope, I had rather it were Pope Julius than Pope Pilgrim.”</p> +<p>“Don’t, Miles. Popes are all wrong, and I don’t +know whether Mr. Pilgrim would give the right hand of fellowship to +Julius.”</p> +<p>Miles chuckled. “You may think yourself lucky you have +not to adjust that question, Madame Nan.”</p> +<p>“There’s the quarter chiming, Frank will want his beef-tea.”</p> +<p>Presently after Miles laid his hand on his mother’s shoulder, +and said, “Mother, here’s a daughter who thinks you want +to turn us out because she is too slow and stupid for your home child.” +And he drew Anne up blushing as if she were his freshly-won bride.</p> +<p>“My dear, are you sure you don’t want to go away from +the old woman? Should you not be happier with him all to yourself?”</p> +<p>“I could not be happy if you were left,” said Anne. +“May I go on as we did last winter? I will try to do better +now I have him to help me.”</p> +<p>“My own dear child!”</p> +<p>That was the way Anne forgot her own people and her father’s +house.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXIII<br /> +Herbert’s Victory</h2> +<blockquote><p>And of our scholars let us learn<br /> +Our own forgotten lore.—KEBLE</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Joan, Jenny, dearest old Joanie!” It was eagerly +spoken, though the voice was strangely altered that came from behind +the flowered curtain of that big bed, while the fingers drew it back, +and Rollo raised his black muzzle near at hand. “Oh, Jenny! +have you come to me?”</p> +<p>“My dear, dear, poor boy!”</p> +<p>“No kissing—it’s not safe,” and he burrowed +under the sheet.</p> +<p>“As if I did not mean to do more for you than that! Besides, +it is not catching.”</p> +<p>“So I said, till it caught me. What a jolly cold hand! +You’ve not come in cold and hungry though?”</p> +<p>“No, indeed, Rosamond forced me to sit down to a whole spread. +As if one could eat with a knot in one’s throat.”</p> +<p>“Mind you do, Jenny—it was what did for me. The +Rector ordered me never to go about unfed; but one could not always—and +there was something I have to tell you that drove all the rest out—”</p> +<p>“Dear Herbs! Papa can’t talk of what you have done +without tears. He longed to come, but we could not leave mamma +without one of us, and he thought I could do the most for you. +I have a note for you.”</p> +<p>“Forgiving me?”</p> +<p>“I should <i>think</i> so. It is in my bag—”</p> +<p>“No, not this moment; I like to know it. And mammy—poor +mammy—”</p> +<p>“She is as comforted as she can be that you have Cranky and +me; and then papa’s being proud of you has cheered her—oh! +so much.”</p> +<p>“I’m glad they can comfort themselves—”</p> +<p>“But, Herbert, dear, you must be much better; I did not expect +to see you so well.”</p> +<p>“I am not so bad between whiles,” said Herbert, wearily. +“And, while I can, I’ve got something to tell you that will +make it up to you, and a great deal more.”</p> +<p>“Make it up?” said Jenny, looking with bewildered eyes +at the dear face.</p> +<p>“Yes, I made Gadley consent. The Rector has it in writing, +and it will do quite as well if I die. O, Jenny, woman, think +of my never knowing what you had gone through!”</p> +<p>“Is it about Archie?” said Jenny, beginning to tremble.</p> +<p>“Yes. It will clear him.”</p> +<p>“I always knew he was clear.”</p> +<p>“Yes, but he can come back now all right. Eh! what an +ass I am! I’ve begun at the wrong end. He wasn’t +drowned—it was all a mistake; Miles saw him in Africa—Cranky, +I say, come to her.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Master Herbert, you’ve been talking a great deal +too much for your sister just off a journey. You’ll get +the fever on again. Miss Joanna, you ought to know better than +to let him run on; I sha’n’t be able to let you do nothing +for him if this is the way.”</p> +<p>“Was it too sudden, Joan?” said Herbert, wistfully, as +she bent to kiss his brow with trembling lips. “I couldn’t +let any one tell you but myself, while I could; but I don’t seem +able to go on. Is the Rector there, Cranky?”</p> +<p>“Yes, sir, waiting in the parlour.”</p> +<p>“Rector,” and Julius hurried in at once, “take +her and tell her. I can’t do it after all.”</p> +<p>“Is he alive?” whispered Jenny, so much overcome that +Julius had to hold her up for a moment as he led her into the other +room.</p> +<p>“Really! She thinks me delirious,” said Herbert, +rather amused. “Tell her all, Rector.”</p> +<p>“Really, Joan,” said Julius, putting her into the great +chair, and holding her trembling hand. “Miles has seen him, +has had him in his ship.”</p> +<p>“And you never told me!”</p> +<p>“He made Miles promise not to tell.”</p> +<p>“But he told you!”</p> +<p>“Yes, because it was Anne who gave the clue which led to his +discovery; but when he found we all thought him dead, he laid Miles +under the strictest charge to say nothing. He is on an ostrich +farm in Natal, Jenny, well, and all that he ever was, and more too. +He took your photograph from Miles’s book.”</p> +<p>“And I never knew,” moaned Jenny, quite overcome.</p> +<p>“He would not be persuaded that it was not more for your peace +not to know of his life, and when Miles was put on honour, what could +we do? But now it is all changed. Since Herbert’s +discovery he need not be a banished man any more.” And Julius +told Jenny the manner of the discovery. She listened, evidently +gathering all in, and then she asked: “And what have you done?”</p> +<p>“Nothing as yet.”</p> +<p>“Nothing! while there is this blot on Archie’s name, +and he is living in exile, and that Moy is revelling in prosperity. +Nothing! Why don’t you publish it to every one?”</p> +<p>“My dear Jenny, I have only known it a week, and I have not +been able to find out where Mr. Moy is.”</p> +<p>“What, to have him taken up?”</p> +<p>“Taken up, no; I don’t imagine he could be prosecuted +after this length of time and on this kind of evidence. No, to +give him warning.”</p> +<p>“Warning? To flee away, and never clear Archie! +What are you about, Julius? He ought to be exposed at once, if +he cannot be made to suffer otherwise.”</p> +<p>“Nay, Jenny, that would be hard measure.”</p> +<p>“Hard measure!” she interrupted; “what has my innocent +Archie had?”</p> +<p>“Think of the old man, his wife and daughter, Jenny.”</p> +<p>“She’s a Proudfoot.—And that girl the scandal of +the country! You want to sacrifice Archie to them, Julius?”</p> +<p>“You are tired and shaken, Jenny, or you would see that all +I want to do is to act with common consideration and honour.”</p> +<p>She interrupted again. “What honour do you mean? +You are not making it a secret of the confessional?”</p> +<p>“You are misunderstanding me, Joanna,” Julius gently +said. “Herbert’s vigil spared me from that difficulty, +but—”</p> +<p>“Then you would have sacrificed Archie to this imaginary—”</p> +<p>“Hush, Jenny! I fear he is wandering again. Alas! +it is the sad old <i>refrain</i>!”</p> +<p>As they came to the door together, Herbert’s voice, under that +strange change which wandering brings, was heard muttering, “Give +an account of thy stewardship, for thou mayest be no longer steward.” +And Mrs. Cranstoun received them, with her head shaking, and tearful +eyes. “It has come on again, sir; I was afraid it would +be too much for him.”</p> +<p>Herbert’s prayer had been granted, inasmuch as the horrible +ravings that he feared repeating never passed his lips. If he +had gone down to the smoke of Tartarus to restore his sister’s +lover, none of its blacks were cleaning to him; but whether conscious +or wandering, the one thought of his wasted year seemed to be crushing +him. It was a curious contrast between poor Mr. Fuller’s +absence of regret for a quarter of a century’s supineness, and +this lad’s repentance for twelve months’ idleness. +That his follies had been guileless in themselves might be the very +cause that his spirit had such power of repentance. His admiration +of Lady Tyrrell had been burnt out, and had been fancy, not heart, and +no word of it passed his lips, far less of the mirth with the Strangeways. +Habit sometimes brought the phrases of the cricket-field, but these +generally ended in a shudder of self-recollection and prayer.</p> +<p>The delirium only came with the accesses of fever, and when sensible, +he was very quiet and patient, but always as one weighed down by sense +of failure in a trust. He never seemed to entertain a hope of +surviving. He had watched too many cases not to be aware that +his symptoms were those that had been almost uniformly fatal, and he +noted them as a matter of course. Dr. Easterby came to see him, +and was greatly touched; Herbert was responsive, but it was not the +ordinary form of comfort that he needed, for his sorrow was neither +terror nor despair. His heart was too warm and loving not to believe +that his heavenly Father forgave him as freely as did his earthly father; +but that very hope made him the more grieved and ashamed of his slurred +task, nor did he view his six weeks at Wil’sbro’ as any +atonement, knowing it was no outcome of repentance, but of mere kindliness, +and aware, as no one else could be, how his past negligence had hindered +his full usefulness, so that he only saw his failures. As to his +young life, he viewed it as a mortally wounded soldier does, as a mere +casualty of the war, which he was pledged to disregard. He <i>did</i> +perhaps like to think that the fatal night with Gadley might bring Archie +back, and yet Jenny did not give him the full peace in her happiness +which he had promised himself.</p> +<p>Joanna had suffered terribly, far more than any one knew, and her +mind did not take the revulsion as might have been expected. Her +lighthouse was shining again when she thought it extinguished for ever, +but her spirits could not bear the uncertainty of the spark. She +could not enter into what Miles and Julius both alike told her, of the +impossibility of their mother beginning a prosecution for money embezzled +ten years back, when no living witness existed, nothing but the scrap +of paper written by Herbert, and signed by him and Margaret Strangeways, +authorizing Julius Charnock to use what had been said by the dying, +half-delirious man. What would a jury say to such evidence? +And when Julius said it only freed himself morally from the secrecy, +poor Jenny was bitter against his scruples, even though he had never +said more than that he should have been perplexed. The most bitter +anti-ritualist could hardly have uttered stronger things than she thought, +and sometimes said, against what seemed to her to be keeping Archie +in banishment; while the brothers’ reluctance to expose Mr. Moy, +and blast his reputation and that of his family, was in her present +frame of mind an incomprehensible weakness. People must bear the +penalty of their misdeeds, families and all, and Mrs. and Miss Moy did +not deserve consideration: the pretensions of the mother had always +been half scorn, half thorn, to the old county families, and the fast +airs of the daughter had been offensive enough to destroy all pity for +her. If an action in a Court of Justice were, as Miles and Julius +told her, impossible,—and she would not believe it, except on +the word of a lawyer,—public exposure was the only alternative +for righting Archie, and she could not, or would not, understand that +they would have undergone an action for libel rather than not do their +best to clear their cousin, but that they thought it due to Mr. Moy +to give him the opportunity of doing the thing himself; she thought +it folly, and only giving him time and chance for baffling them.</p> +<p>The strange thing was, that not only when she argued with the two +brothers, but when she brooded and gave way to these thoughts as she +kept her watch, it probably made her less calm—for an access of +restlessness and fever never failed to come on—with Herbert. +Probably she was less calm externally, and the fret of face and manner +communicated itself to him, for the consequences were so invariable +that Cranstoun thought they proved additionally what she of course believed, +that Miss Joan could not be trusted with her brother. At last +Jenny, in her distress and unwillingness to abandon Herbert to Cranky’s +closed windows, traced cause and effect, and made a strong resolution +to banish the all-pervading thought, and indeed his ever-increasing +weakness and danger filled her mind so as to make this easier and easier, +so that she might no longer have to confess to herself that Rollo was +a safer companion, since Herbert, with a hand on that black head, certainly +only derived soothing influences from those longing sympathetic eyes. +And he could not but like the testimony of strong affection that came +to him. The whole parish was in consternation, and inquiries, +and very odd gifts, which he was supposed to ‘fancy,’ came +from all over Compton as well as from Strawyers, and were continually +showering upon his nurses, so that Mrs. Hornblower and Dilemma spent +their lives in mournful replies over the counter, and fifty times a +day he was pronounced to be ‘as bad as he could be to be alive.’ +Old servants and keepers made progresses from Strawyers, to see Master +Herbert, and were terribly aggrieved because Miss Bowater kept them +out of his room, as much for their sake as his; and Mrs. Cranstoun pointed +to the open lattice which she believed to be killing him, as surely +as it gave aches to her rheumatic shoulder.</p> +<p>Julius thought almost as much as Jenny could do of the means of recalling +Archie; but it was necessary to wait until he could communicate with +Mr. Moy, and his hands were still over-full, for though much less fatal, +the fever smouldered on, both in Wil’sbro’ and Compton, +and as St. Nicholas was a college living which had hitherto been viewed +as a trump card, it might be a long time going the round of the senior +fellows.</p> +<p>Julius had just been at poor Mrs. Fuller’s, trying to help +her to put her complicated affairs in order, so as to be ready for a +move as soon as one daughter, who had the fever slightly, could be taken +away, and he was driving home again, when he overtook Mrs. Duncombe +and offered her a lift, for her step was weary. She was indeed +altered, pale, with cheek-bones showing, and all the lustre and sparkle +gone out of her, while her hat was as rigidly dowdy as Miss Slater’s.</p> +<p>She roused herself to ask feebly after the remaining patients.</p> +<p>“Cecil is really getting better at last,” he said. +“Her father wants to take her to Portishead next week.”</p> +<p>“And young Bowater?”</p> +<p>“No change. His strength seems to be going.”</p> +<p>“I wouldn’t pity him,” sighed Bessie Duncombe; +“he has only seen the best end of life, and has laid it down for +something worth! I’m sure he and your brother are the enviable +ones.”</p> +<p>“Nay, Mrs. Duncombe, you have much to work for and love in +this life.”</p> +<p>“And I must go away from everything just as I had learnt to +value it. Bob has taken a house at Monaco, and writes to me to +bring the children to join him there!”</p> +<p>“At Monaco?”</p> +<p>“At Monaco! Yes, and I know that it is all my own fault. +I might have done anything with him if I had known how. But what +could you expect? I never saw my mother; I never knew a home; +I was bred up at a French school, where if one was not a Roman Catholic +there was not a shred of religion going. I married after my first +ball. Nobody taught me anything; but I could not help having brains, +so I read and caught the tone of the day, and made my own line, while +he went on his.”</p> +<p>“And now there is a greater work for you to do, since you have +learnt to do it.”</p> +<p>“Ah! learnt too late. When habits are confirmed, and +home station forfeited—What is there left for him or my poor boys +to do?”</p> +<p>“A colony perhaps—”</p> +<p>“Damaged goods,” she said, smiling sadly.</p> +<p>“Then are you going?”</p> +<p>“As soon as I have seen this fever out, and can dispose of +the things here. I have just been to Moy’s office to see +about getting rid of the lease.”</p> +<p>“Is Mr. Moy come home?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Have you not heard?”</p> +<p>“What?—Not the fever?”</p> +<p>“No. Worse I should say. Gussie has gone off and +got married to Harry Simmonds.”</p> +<p>“The man at the training stables?”</p> +<p>“Yes. They put up their banns at the Union at Brighton, +and were married by the Registrar, then went off to Paris. They +say it will kill her mother. The man is a scoundrel, who played +Bob false, and won largely by that mare. And the girl has had +the cheek to write to me,” said Mrs. Duncombe, warming into her +old phraseology—“to <i>me</i>!—to thank me for opportunities +of meeting, and to tell me she has followed up the teaching of last +year.”</p> +<p>“What—the rights of women?”</p> +<p>“Ay. This is a civil marriage—not mocking her with +antiquated servile vows,” she says. “Ah, well, it +was my doing, I suppose. Clio Tallboys held forth in private, +I believe, to poor Gussie, on theories that were mere talk in her, but +which this poor girl has taken in earnest.”</p> +<p>“Very sad earnest she may find it, I fear. Can I do anything +for you?” as they reached the gate of Aucuba Villa.</p> +<p>“No, thank you, unless to get the house off my hands.”</p> +<p>“You are alone. Will you not come and spend the evening +with us?”</p> +<p>“That is very kind, but I have too much to do, and besides, +Sister Margaret is coming to spend the night with me.”</p> +<p>“I am glad to hear it.”</p> +<p>“Yes, Mr. Charnock, I trust I have learnt something in this +spell of work. I’ve not been for nothing in such scenes +with those Sisters and young Bowater. I’m more ignorant +than half the poor things that I’ve heard talk of their faith +and hope; but I see it is not the decorous humbug it once looked like. +And now that I would have learnt, here I go to Monaco.”</p> +<p>“You will learn. You have a work before you that will +teach you.”</p> +<p>“My boys are young enough to start with on a different tack,” +she said. “You will tell me—no—I’ll not +hinder you now. I shall see you again.”</p> +<p>Julius was too anxious to get home to refuse to be released, much +as he felt for this brave woman. The day before, Herbert had been +frightfully faint and exhausted by the morning’s attack of fever, +but had been so still ever since that there was a shade of hope that +the recurrence might not take place; and this hope grew stronger, when +Jenny came into the outer room to say that the usual time for the fever +was passing so quietly in a sort of sleep that Dr. Worth seemed to think +rally possible, if only there was no fresh access.</p> +<p>They stood over the fire, and Julius asked, “Can’t you +lie on the sofa, Jenny? I can stay.”</p> +<p>“No,” said Jenny, restlessly. “No, I can’t. +I know you have something to tell me.”</p> +<p>“Moy has come home, Jenny. He is in terrible trouble. +His daughter has eloped with young Simmonds at the training stables.”</p> +<p>“The most appropriate end of her bringing up,” said Jenny, +in the hard tone it was so difficult to answer—it was so unlike +herself—and her thought was that weak pity and forbearance would +hinder exertions in Archie’s cause. “Generous at other +folks’ expense,” said she to herself. “Sparing +the guilty and leaving the innocent to exile!”</p> +<p>But a moaning murmur, and Cranstoun’s movement at once summoned +them both to the bedside.</p> +<p>Alas! here was the attack that the doctor had evidently apprehended +as likely to be fatal. Hour after hour did sister, nurse, and +friend stand watching, and doing their best, their piteously little +best, while consciousness, if there was any, was far out of their reach.</p> +<p>Late into the night it went on, and then followed the collapse, with +locked teeth, which could hardly be drawn asunder to put the stimulus +hopelessly between them, and thus came the tardy December dawn, when +the church-bell made Jenny bid Julius not stay, but only first read +the commendatory prayer.</p> +<p>“I thought there was a little more revival just now,” +he said; “his hands are warmer, and he really did swallow.”</p> +<p>The old nurse shook her head. “That’s the way before +they go,” said she. “Don’t ye wish him, poor +lamb, it makes it the harder for him.”</p> +<p>Julius prayed the prayer, and as he tenderly laid his hand on the +brow, he wondered whether he should find the half-closed eyes shut for +ever on his return.</p> +<p>But as he went, there was a quiver of lip and flicker of eyelid, +the lightening, as Cranky called it, was evidently gaining ground. +Herbert’s faint whisper was heard again—“Jenny!”</p> +<p>“Dearest!”</p> +<p>“The Lord’s Prayer!”</p> +<p>She began,—his fingers tightened on hers. “Pray +it for old Moy,” he said; and as she paused, scarce hearing or +understanding, “He—he wants it,” gasped Herbert. +“No! One can’t pray it, without—” another +pause. “Help me, Jenny. Say it—O Lord, who savedst +us—forgive us. Help us to forgive from our hearts that man +his trespasses. Amen.”</p> +<p>Jenny said it. Herbert’s voice sank in the Amen. +He lay breathing in long gasps; but he thus breathed still when Julius +came back, and Jenny told him that a few words had passed, adding—</p> +<p>“Julius, I will say nothing bitter again. God help me +not to think it.”</p> +<p>Did Herbert hear? Was that the reason of the calm which made +the white wasted face so beautiful, and the strange soft cool hush throughout +the room?</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXIV<br /> +Silver Hair</h2> +<blockquote><p>And how should I your true love know<br /> +From another man?—Friar of Orders Gray</p> +</blockquote> +<p>“Please God, I can try again.”</p> +<p>Those were the words with which Herbert Bowater looked into his Rector’s +face on awaking in the evening of that same December day from one of +a series of sleeps, each sweeter and longer than the last, and which +had borne him over the dreaded hours, without fever, and with strengthening +pulse.</p> +<p>Julius had not ventured to leave the sick-room that whole day, and +when at last he went home and sank into the chair opposite Terry, for +the first time through all these weeks of trouble and tension, he burst +into a flood of tears.</p> +<p>He had hardly made the startled lad understand that life, not death, +had thus overcome him, when the door flew open, and in rushed Rosamond, +crying, “Julius, Julius, come! It is he or his ghost!”</p> +<p>“Who? What?”</p> +<p>“It is your hair! At Mrs. Douglas’s grave! +He’ll be gone! Make haste—make haste!”</p> +<p>He started up, letting her drag him along, but under protest. +“My dear, men <i>do</i> come to have hair like mine.”</p> +<p>“I tell you it was at our graves—our own—I touched +him. I had this wreath for Raymond, and there he was, with his +hat off, at the railing close to Mrs. Douglas’s. I thought +his back was yours, and called your name, and he started, and I saw—he +had a white beard, but he was not old. He just bowed, and then +went off very fast by the other gate, towards Wil’sbro’. +I did call, ‘Wait, wait,’ but he didn’t seem to hear. +Oh, go, go, Julius! Make haste!”</p> +<p>Infected by the wild hope, Julius hurried on the road where his wife +had turned his face, almost deriding himself for obeying her, when he +would probably only overtake some old family retainer; but as, under +the arch of trees that overhung the road, he saw a figure in the moonlight, +a thrill of recognition came over him as he marked the vigorous tread +of the prime of life, and the white hair visible in the moonlight, together +with something utterly indescribable, but which made him call out, “Archie! +Archie Douglas! wait for me!”</p> +<p>The figure turned. “Julius!” came in response; +the two cousins’ hands clasped, and there was a sob on either +side as they kissed one another as brothers.</p> +<p>“Archie! How could you!—Come back!” was all +that Julius could say, leaning breathlessly against him and holding +him tight.</p> +<p>“No! Do not know that I have been here. I was sent +to London on business. I could not help running home in the dark. +No one must know it. I am dead to them.”</p> +<p>“No, Archie, you are not. Gadley has confessed and cleared +you. Come home!”</p> +<p>“Cleared me!” The two arms were stretched up to +the sky, and there was the sound of a mighty sob, as though the whole +man, body, soul, and spirit, were relieved from an unspeakable burthen. +“Say it again, Julius!”</p> +<p>“Gadley, on his death-bed, has confessed that Moy and Proudfoot +took that money, incited by Tom Vivian.”</p> +<p>Archie Douglas could not speak, but he turned his face towards Compton +again, strode swiftly into the churchyard, and fell on his knees by +his mother’s grave. When at last he rose, he pointed to +the new and as yet unmarked mound, and said, “Your mother’s?”</p> +<p>“Oh no! Raymond’s! We have had a terrible +fever here—almost a pestilence—and we are scarcely breathing +after it.”</p> +<p>“Ah! some one in the train spoke of sickness at Wil’sbro’, +but I would ask no questions, for I saw faces I knew, and I would lead +to no recognition. I could not stay away from getting one sight +of the old place. Miles made it all burn within me; but here’s +my return-ticket for the mail-train.”</p> +<p>“Never mind return-tickets. Come home with me.”</p> +<p>“I shall startle your mother.”</p> +<p>“I meant my home—the Rectory. It was my wife who +saw you in the churchyard, and sent me after you. She is watching +for you.”</p> +<p>Archie, still bewildered, as if spell-bound by his ticket, muttered, +“I thought I should have time to walk over and look at Strawyers.”</p> +<p>“Joanna is here.”</p> +<p>“Julius! It is too much. You are sure I am awake? +This is not the old dream!” cried the exile, grasping his cousin’s +arm quite gainfully.</p> +<p>“I am a waking man, and I trust you are,” said Julius. +“Come into the light. No, that is not Jenny on the step. +It is my Rose. Yes, here he is!”</p> +<p>And as they came into the stream of light from the porch, Irish Rosamond, +forgetting that Archie was not a brother, caught him by both hands, +and kissed him in overpowering welcome, exclaiming, “Oh, I am +so glad! Come in—come in!”</p> +<p>There he stood, blinking in the lamplight, a tall, powerful, broad-chested +figure, but hardly a hero of romance to suit Terry’s fancy, after +a rapid summary of the history from Rosamond. His hair and beard +were as white as Julius’s, and the whole face was tanned to uniform +red, but no one could mistake the dazed yet intense gladness of the +look. He sank into a chair, clasped his hands over his face for +a moment, then surveyed them all one by one, and said, “You told +me she was here.”</p> +<p>“She is with her brother Herbert, at Mrs. Hornblower’s +lodgings. No, you must wait, Archie; he has barely in the last +few hours, by God’s great mercy, taken a turn for the better in +this fever, and I don’t see how she can leave him.”</p> +<p>“But she must hear it,” cried Rosamond. “I’m +going to make her or Cranky get some rest; but you ought to be the one +to tell her, Julius, you that have stood by her through all.”</p> +<p>“And aren’t you burning to do so, Rosey, woman? and I +think you had better, rather than that I should startle Herbert by returning; +but stay, mind your own rules—eat and drink before you go, and +give the same to Archie. I shall send up a note to Miles. +How is Cecil?”</p> +<p>“Very silent and broken, poor thing. She is to see your +mother to-morrow. How well it was that she kept me so late over +her wreath of camellias!”</p> +<p>Archie submitted to wait for food and fuller information,—indeed +the lady of the house manifested more impatience than he did, as she +flitted about making preparations, and he sat with hands locked together +over his knee, gazing fixedly at Julius, scarcely speaking, though eagerly +listening; and when the meal was brought in, he could not eat, only +eagerly drank off a cup of scalding tea, and watched Rosamond, as if +jealous of any delay over her cutlet. She did not abuse his patience.</p> +<p>“Now then?” she said, rising. “You shall +hear something of her before long.”</p> +<p>“Let me come to her door,” entreated Archie.</p> +<p>And as the light shone from the window of the sick-room, Rosamond +said, “Stand under that tree in the moonlight, and I will make +her look out.”</p> +<p>All was intensely quiet; Cranky fast asleep in the arm-chair in the +outer-room, and Jenny sitting by the bed, watching the smooth quiet +breath.</p> +<p>“You are to lie down on the sofa and sleep,” said Rosamond, +kissing her, and she shook her head, “You must. People want +strength for joy as well as grief. Trust him to me, for there +is some one for you to see to-morrow.”</p> +<p>“Not papa!” said Jenny, startled. “No, nor +Phil! Tell me, Rosamond. There is only one you could look +at me like that for!”</p> +<p>“Look out at the window.”</p> +<p>Trembling all over, Jenny went and put her face to the lattice. +The figure under the tree came nearer. Archie must have been able +clearly to see her face in the moonlight. He stretched up his +arms to her, then folded them together on his breast, and let himself +be led away by Julius, while Jenny slid down on her knees, with her +face buried, and the suppressed choking sobs made Herbert look up at +Rosamond, and whisper, “It is?”</p> +<p>“It is,” repeated Rosamond, who had thought him asleep, +or entirely absorbed in the trouble of living.</p> +<p>“Go to her,” he added.</p> +<p>Rosamond put her arm round her, and supported her into the next room; +for, after the month of hopeless watching, the long sleeplessness and +the struggle of this silent day to force her spirit to the forgiveness +she had promised, and then the sudden reaction, had overpowered her, +and the suppression and silence were beyond endurance. She did +not even know that Herbert was awake when Rosamond brought her out into +Mrs. Hornblower’s room, and said, “Have it out now, my dear, +no one will hear. Scream comfortably. It will do you good.”</p> +<p>But Jenny could not even scream. She was in the excited agony +when the mind is far too much for the body, and joy, unrealized, is +like grief. If her brother had that day passed away, and if nothing +had been heard of her lover, she would have been all calmness and resignation; +but the revulsion had overcome her, and at the moment she was more conscious +of strangulation than of anything else. Rosamond tended her for +full half an hour, and then she seemed almost asleep, though she resisted +the attempt to undress her, with the words, “I must go to Herbert.”</p> +<p>“I will take care of Herbert,” and Jenny was too much +spent not to acquiesce, and fell asleep almost before she was laid down +on the bed their landlady had given up to the watchers.</p> +<p>Rosamond’s task was a comfortable one, for every hour of sleep, +every mouthful of food seemed to do its work of restoration on the sound, +healthy frame, and a smile and word of thanks met her whenever she roused +her patient with the inevitable spoon.</p> +<p>When he awoke towards morning, he asked what day it was, and when +she told him, answered, “So I thought. Then I have not lost +count of time.”</p> +<p>“No, you have been wonderfully clear-headed.”</p> +<p>“I can’t see how there can have been time to write,” +he said. “It is true that he is come, is it not?”</p> +<p>“Quite true; but he came independently on business,” +and Rosamond told of Julius’s chase, bringing a look of amusement +on his face.</p> +<p>Jenny came in with the rising sun, pale indeed, but another creature +after her rest and in the sight of the restful countenance that greeted +her with a smile. The moaning, hoarse voice was gone too, it was +a faint shadow of Herbert’s own tones that said, “Is not +this good, Jenny? I didn’t think to have seen it.”</p> +<p>“My Herbert, you have given him back! You have given +me the heart to be glad!”</p> +<p>“You must go and see him,” said Herbert.</p> +<p>Jenny looked wistful and undecided; but Julius entered to say that +she must come at once, for Archie must go back to London by the ten +o’clock train to an appointment, and could not return for two +days.</p> +<p>Herbert smiled her away, for he was still in a state where it was +not possible to bear any engrossing of his head-nurse, and the lover’s +absence was, even to his unselfishness, good news.</p> +<p>Rosamond could not refrain from the pleasure of peeping down the +little dark stair as Archie and his Jenny met in the doorway, and she +walked demurely in their rear, wondering whether other eyes saw as much +as she did in the manner in which Jenny hung on his arm. She left +them to their dewy walk in the Rectory garden to the last minute at +which breakfast could be swallowed, and told Jenny that she was to drive +him in the pony-carriage to Hazlett’s Gate; she would take care +of Herbert.</p> +<p>“You ought to be asleep, you know,” said Jenny.</p> +<p>“My dear, I couldn’t sleep! There’s a great +deal better than sleep! Is not Herbert going to get well? and +aren’t you jolly again and Archie back again? Sleep!—why +I want to have wings and clap them—and more than all, is not Mr. +Charnock off and away to-morrow? Sleep indeed!—I should +like to see myself so stupid.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Charnock?” interrogatively said Archie.</p> +<p>“The head of the family—the original Charnock of Dunstone,” +said Rosamond, who was in wild spirits, coming on a worn-out body and +mind, and therefore perfectly unguarded. “Don’t shake +your head at me, Jenny, Archie is one of the family, and that makes +you so, and I must tell you of his last performance. You know +he is absolutely certain that his dear daughter is more infallible than +all the Popes, even since the Council, or than anybody but himself, +and that whatever goes wrong here is the consequence of Julius’s +faith in Dr. Easterby. So, when poor Cecil, uneasy in her mind, +began asking about the illness at Wil’sbro’, he enlivened +her with a prose about misjudging, through well-intentioned efforts +of clerical philanthropy to interfere with the sanitary condition of +the town—so that wells grew tainted, &c., all from ignorant +interference. Poor man he heard a little sob, and looked round, +and there was Cecil in a dead faint. He set all the bells ringing, +and sent an express for me.”</p> +<p>“But wasn’t he furious with Anne for mentioning drains +at all?”</p> +<p>“My dear Joan, don’t you know how many old women there +are of both sorts, who won’t let other people look over the wall +at what they gloat on in private? However, he had his punishment, +for he really thought that the subject had been too much for her delicacy, +and simply upset her nerves.”</p> +<p>“When was this?”</p> +<p>“Four or five days ago. She is better, but has said not +a word more about it. She is nothing like strong enough, even +for so short a journey as to Portishead; but they say change will be +the best thing for her, and the coming down into the family would be +too sad.”</p> +<p>“Poor thing! Yes indeed,” said Jenny; and feeling +universally benevolent, she added, “give her my love,” a +thing which so sincere a person could hardly have said a few weeks ago.</p> +<p>Reserve was part of Cecil’s nature, and besides, her father +was almost always with her; but when she had been for the first time +dressed in crape up to her waist, with the tiniest of caps perched toy-like +on the top of her passive head, the sight upset him completely, and +muttering, “Good heavens!—a widow at twenty-two!” +he hid himself from the sight over some business transactions with Mrs. +Poynsett and Miles.</p> +<p>Rosamond seized the opportunity of bringing Julius in to pay his +farewell visit, and presently Cecil said, “Julius, I should be +much obliged if you would tell me the real facts about this illness.”</p> +<p>“Do,” said Rosamond. “Her half knowledge +is most wearing.”</p> +<p>He gently told her what science had pronounced.</p> +<p>“Then it was Pettitt’s well?” she said.</p> +<p>“They tell us that this was the immediate cause of the outbreak; +but there would probably have been quite as much fatal illness the first +time any infectious disease came in. The whole place was in a +shameful state, and you were the only people who tried to mitigate it.”</p> +<p>“And did worse harm, because we would not listen to advice,” +said Cecil. “Julius, I have a great deal of money; can’t +I do anything now? My father wants me to give a donation to the +church as a memorial of <i>him</i>, but, somehow, I don’t feel +as if I deserved to do that.”</p> +<p>“I see what you mean, Cecil, but the town is being rated to +set the drainage to rights, and it will thus be done in the most permanent +and effectual way. There are some orphans who might be saved from +the Union, about whom I thought of asking you to help.”</p> +<p>Cecil asked the details of the orphans, and the consultation over +them seemed to be prolonged by her because, even now, she could not +resolve to go below the surface. It lasted until her father came +to ask whether she were ready to go with him to Mrs. Poynsett’s +sitting-room. She looked very fragile and childish as she stood +up, clinging to his arm to help her wavering, uncertain step, holding +out her hand to Julius and saying, “I shall see you again.”</p> +<p>He was a little disappointed to see her no older, and no warmer; +having gone thus far, it seemed as if she might have gone further and +opened more. Perhaps he did not understand how feelings, naturally +slow, were rendered slower by the languor of illness, which made them +more oppressive than acute. As Mr. Charnock and his daughter knocked, +the door was opened by Miles, who merely gave his hand, and went down. +Frank, who had been reading in a low easy-chair by the fire, drew it +close to his mother for her, and retreated to another seat, and the +mother and daughter-in-law exchanged a grave kiss. Cecil attempted +some civility about the chair, to which poor Frank replied, “I’m +afraid it is of no use to speak to me, Cecil, Miles can only just make +me hear.”</p> +<p>Regret for his misfortune, and inquiry as to the chance of restoration, +were a possible topic. Mr. Charnock gave much advice about aurists, +and examples of their success or non-success; and thence he diverged +to the invalid-carriage he had secured, and his future plans for expediting +his daughter’s recovery. Meanwhile Mrs. Poynsett and Cecil +sat grave, dry-eyed, and constrained, each feeling that in Mr. Charnock’s +presence the interview was a nullity, yet neither of them able to get +rid of him, nor quite sure that she would have done so if she could.</p> +<p>He, meanwhile, perfectly satisfied with his own considerate tact, +talked away the allotted half-hour, and then pronounced his daughter +pale and tired. She let him help her to rise, but held Mrs. Poynsett’s +hand wistfully, as if she wished to say something but could not; and +all Mrs. Poynsett could bring out was a hope of hearing how she bore +the journey. It was as if they were both frozen up. Yet +the next moment Cecil was holding Frank’s hand in a convulsive +clasp, and fairly pulling him down to exchange a kiss, when he found +her tears upon his cheek. Were they to his misfortune, or to his +much-increased resemblance to his brother?</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock kept guard over her, so that her other farewells were +almost as much restrained as these, and though she hung on Rosamond’s +neck, and seemed ready to burst forth with some fervent exclamation, +he hovered by, saying, “My dear child, don’t, don’t +give way to agitation. It does you honour, but it cannot be permitted +at such a moment. Lady Rosamond, I appeal to your unfailing good +sense to restrain her emotion.”</p> +<p>“I haven’t any good sense, and I think it only hurts +her to restrain her emotion,” said Rosamond, with one of her little +stamps, pressing Cecil in her arms. “There, there, my dear, +cry,—never mind, if it will comfort your poor heart.”</p> +<p>“Lady Rosamond! This is—Cecil, my dear child! +Your resolution—your resignation. And the boxes are packed, +and we shall be late for the train!”</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock was a little jealous of Lady Rosamond as a comforter +preferred to himself, and he spoke in a tone which Cecil had never resisted. +She withdrew herself from Rosamond, still tearless, though her chest +heaved as if there were a great spasm in it; she gave her hand to Miles, +and let him lead her to the carriage; and so Raymond’s widowed +bride left Compton Poynsett enfolded in that strange silence which some +called sullenness and pride; others, more merciful, stunned grief.</p> +<p>Poor Cecil! there was less pity to be spared to her because of the +intense relief it was to be free from her father, and to be able to +stand in a knot consulting on the steps, without his coming out to find +out what they were talking about, and to favour them with some Dunstone +counsel.</p> +<p>The consultation was about Mr. Moy. It was determined that +since Archie was in England, it would be better not to wait till Herbert +was recovered, but that Miles and Julius should go together at once +to see what effect they could produce on him.</p> +<p>They drove together to his office. He was a tall man, a few +years over forty, and had hitherto been portly and well-preserved, with +a certain serene air of complacent prosperity about him, that had always +been an irritation to the county families, with whom he tried to assert +an equality; but as he rose to greet the brothers, there was a bent +and shrunken look about him: the hair on his temples had visibly whitened, +his cheeks seemed to have sunk in, and there were deep furrows on them. +Altogether he had grown full twenty years older in appearance since +he had stood proposing a popular toast at the dinner at the town-hall. +There was something nervous and startled in his gray eye, as he saw +them enter, though he tried to assume his usual half-bland, half-easy, +manner.</p> +<p>“Good morning, Captain Charnock Poynsett. Good morning, +Mr. Charnock, I hope I see you well?” the words faltering a little, +as neither sailor nor clergyman took notice of his proffered hand; but +he continued his inquiries after the convalescents, though neither inquired +in return after Mrs. Moy, feeling, perhaps, that they would rather not +hear a very sad account of her state just before letting their inevitable +Nemesis descend; also, not feeling inclined for reciprocal familiarity, +and wanting to discourage the idea that Miles came for political purposes.</p> +<p>“It has been a terrible visitation,” said Moy, when he +had been reduced to replying to himself.</p> +<p>“It has,” said Julius. “Perhaps you have +heard that your tenant, Gadley, is dead?”</p> +<p>“Yes, I did hear it. A very melancholy thing—the +whole family swept-away,” said Mr. Moy, his eye again betraying +some uneasiness, which Julius increased by saying—</p> +<p>“We thought it right that you should hear that he made a disclosure +on his death-bed.”</p> +<p>“Indeed!” Mr. Moy sat erect—the hard, keen, watchful +lawyer.</p> +<p>“A disclosure that nearly affects the character of Mr. Archibald +Douglas,” proceeded Julius.</p> +<p>“May I ask what this may be?”</p> +<p>“Mr. Gadley then informed me that he had been in the outer +room, behind his desk, at the time when Mr. Douglas brought in the letter +from my mother, containing the missing cheque, and that after Douglas +was gone, he heard Mr. Vivian propose to those within to appropriate +the amount to their own debts.”</p> +<p>“Pardon me, Mr. Charnock, this is a very serious charge to +bring on the authority of a man in a raving fever. Was any deposition +taken before a magistrate?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Julius. “Mr. Lipscombe was fetched, +but he was unable to speak at the time. However, on reviving, +he spoke as is thus attested,” and he showed Herbert Bowater’s +slip of paper.</p> +<p>“Mr. Charnock,” said Mr. Moy, “without the slightest +imputation on the intentions of yourself or of young Mr. Bowater, I +put it to yourself and Captain Charnock Poynsett, whether you could +go before a jury with no fuller attestation than you have in your hand. +We know what Mr. Charnock and Mr. Bowater are. To a jury they +would simply appear—pardon me—a young clergyman, his still +more youthful curate, and a sister of mercy, attaching importance to +the words of a delirious man; and juries have become very incredulous +in such cases.”</p> +<p>“We shall see that,” said Miles sharply.</p> +<p>“The more cautious,” added Mr. Moy, “when it is +the raking up of a matter eleven years old, where the witnesses are +mostly dead, and where the characters of two gentlemen, also deceased, +would be implicated. Believe me, sir, this firm—I speak +as its present head—will be rejoiced to make any compensation +to Mrs. Poynsett for what went astray while coming to their hands. +It has been our desire to do so from the very first, as letters of which +I have copies testify; but our advances were met in a spirit of enmity, +which may perhaps be laid aside now.”</p> +<p>“No so-called compensation can be accepted, but the clearing +of Douglas’s character,” said Miles.</p> +<p>“It is a generous feeling,” said Mr. Moy, speaking apparently +most dispassionately, though Julius saw his hands trembling below the +table; “but even if the word of this delirious man were sufficient, +have you reflected, Captain Charnock Poynsett, on the unequal benefit +of justifying—allowing that you could justify—a young man +who has been dead and forgotten these eleven years, and has no relation +living nearer than yourself, at the expense of those also gone, but +who have left relations who could ill bear to suffer from such a revelation?”</p> +<p>“Justice is justice, whether a man be dead or alive,” +said Miles; “and Douglas is alive to demand his right.”</p> +<p>“Alive!” cried Mr. Moy, starting violently. “Alive! +Archie Douglas alive!”</p> +<p>“Alive, and in England,” said Julius. “He +slept in my house the night before last. He never was in the <i>Hippolyta</i>, +at all, but has been living in Africa all these years of exile.”</p> +<p>Mr. Moy’s self-command and readiness were all gone. He +sank back in his chair, with his hands over his face. The brothers +looked at one another, fearing he might have a stroke; but he revived +in a moment, yet with a totally different expression on his countenance. +The keen, defensive look was gone, there was only something piteously +worn and supplicating in the face, as he said—</p> +<p>“Then, gentlemen, I cannot resent anything you may do. +Believe me, but for the assurance of his death, I should have acted +very differently long ago. I will assist you in any way you desire +in reinstating Mr. Douglas in public opinion, only, if it be possible, +let my wife be spared. She has recently had the heaviest possible +blow; she can bear no more.”</p> +<p>“Mr. Moy, we will do nothing vindictive. We can answer +for my mother and Douglas,” began Julius; but Miles, more sternly, +would not let his brother hold out his hand, and said—</p> +<p>“You allow, then, the truth of Gadley’s confession?”</p> +<p>“What has he confessed?” said Moy, still too much the +lawyer not to see that his own complicity had never yet been stated.</p> +<p>Julius laid before him his own written record of Gadley’s words, +not only involving Moy in the original fraud, but showing how he had +bribed the only witness to silence ever since. The unhappy man +read it over, and said—</p> +<p>“Yes, Mr. Charnock, it is all true. I cannot battle it +further. I am at your mercy. I would leave you to proclaim +the whole to the world; if it were not for my poor wife and her father, +I would be glad to do so. Heaven knows how this has hung upon +me for years.”</p> +<p>“I can well believe it,” said Julius, not to be hindered +now from grasping Mr. Moy’s hand.</p> +<p>It seemed to be a comfort now to tell the whole story in detail. +Moy, the favoured and trusted articled clerk at first, then the partner, +the lover and husband of the daughter, had been a model of steadiness +and success so early, that when some men’s youthful follies are +wearing off, he had begun to weary of the monotony of the office, and +after beginning as Mentor to his young brother-in-law, George Proudfoot, +had gradually been carried along by the fascination of Tom Vivian’s +society to share in the same perilous pursuits, until both had incurred +a debt to him far beyond their powers, while he was likewise so deeply +involved, that no bonds of George Proudfoot would avail him.</p> +<p>Then came the temptation of Mrs. Poynsett’s cheque, suggested, +perhaps in jest, by Vivian, but growing on them as the feasibility of +using it became clear. It was so easy to make it appear to Archie +Douglas that the letter was simply an inquiry for the lost one. +Mr. Proudfoot, the father, was out of reach; Mrs. Poynsett would continue +to think the cheque lost in the post; and Tom Vivian undertook to get +it presented for payment through persons who would guard against its +being tracked. The sum exceeded the debt, but he would return +the overplus to them, and they both cherished the hope of returning +it with interest. Indeed, it had been but a half consent on the +part of either, elicited only by the dire alternative of exposure; the +envelope and letter were destroyed, and Vivian carried off the cheque +to some of the Jews with whom he had had only too many transactions, +and they never met him again.</p> +<p>Moy’s part all along had been half cowardice, half ambition. +The sense of that act and of its consequences had gnawed at his heart +through all his success; but to cast himself down from his position +as partner and son-in-law of Mr. Proudfoot, the keen, clever, trusted, +confidential agent of half the families around—to let his wife +know his shame and that of her brother, and to degrade his daughter +into the daughter of a felon—was more than he could bear; and +he had gone on trying to drown the sense of that one lapse in the prosperity +of his career and his efforts to place his daughter in the first ranks +of society. No doubt the having done an injury to the Poynsett +family had been the true secret of that enmity, more than political, +which he had always shown to Raymond; and after thinking Gadley safer +out of that office, and having yielded to his solicitations and set +him up at the Three Pigeons, he had been almost compelled to bid for +popularity by using his position as a magistrate to protect the blackguardism +of the town. He had been meant for better things, and had been +dragged on against his conscience and judgment by the exigencies of +his unhappy secret; and when the daughter, for whose sake he had sacrificed +his better self, had only been led by her position into the follies +and extravagances of the worst part of the society into which she had +been introduced, and threw herself into the hands of a dissipated gambler, +to whom her fortune made her a desirable prey—truly his sin had +found him out.</p> +<p>His fight at first had been partly force of habit, but he was so +entirely crushed that they could only have pity on him when he put himself +so entirely in their hands, only begging for forbearance to his wife +and her aged father, and entreating that principal, interest, and compound +interest might at once be tendered to Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>The brothers could answer for nothing. Archie must decide for +himself what he would accept as restoration of his character, and Mrs. +Poynsett could alone answer as to whether she would accept the compensation. +But neither of them could be hard on one so stricken and sorrowful, +and they did not expect hardness from their mother and cousin, especially +so far as old Mr. Proudfoot and his daughter were concerned.</p> +<p>That the confession was made, and that Archie should be cleared, +was enough for Julius to carry to Herbert’s room, while Miles +repaired to his mother. It was known in the sick-room where the +brothers had been, and Julius was watched as he crossed the street by +Jenny’s eager eye, and she met him at the door of the outer room +with a face of welcome.</p> +<p>“Come in and tell us all,” she said. “I see +it is good news.” Herbert was quite well enough to bear +good news in full detail as he lay, not saying much, but smiling his +welcome, and listening with ears almost as eager as his sister’s. +And as Julius told of the crushed and broken man, Jenny’s tears +rose to her eyes, and she pressed her brother’s hand and whispered, +“Thanks, dear boy!”</p> +<p>“Small thanks to me.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I can enjoy it now,” said Jenny; “thanks +to you for forcing the bitterness out of me.”</p> +<p>“Can you bear a little more good news, Herbert?” said +Julius. “Who do you think is to have St. Nicholas?”</p> +<p>“Not William Easterby? That’s too good to be true.”</p> +<p>“But so it is. All the Senior Fellows dropped it like +a red-hot coal.”</p> +<p>“I thought Dwight wanted to marry?”</p> +<p>“Yes, but the lady’s friends won’t hear of his +taking her there; so it has come down to young Easterby. He can’t +be inducted of course yet; but he has written to say he will come down +on Saturday and take matters in hand.”</p> +<p>“The services on Sunday? Oh!” said Herbert, with +as great a gasp of relief as if he had been responsible for them; and, +indeed, Rosamond declared that both her husband and Mr. Bindon looked +like new men since Wil’sbro’ was off their backs. +Archie was coming back that evening. Jenny much longed to show +her two treasures to each other, for it was a useless risk for the healthy +man, and the sick one was too weak and tired to wish for a new face, +or the trouble of speaking; nay, he could not easily bring himself to +cheerful acquiescence in even his favourite Lady Rose taking his sister’s +place to set her free for an evening with Archie at the Hall.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett was in the drawing-room. She had taken courage +to encounter the down-stair associations, saying she would make it no +sadder for the dear boy than she could help, and so Miles had carried +her down to meet one who had been always as one of her own sons.</p> +<p>And thus it was that she gathered him into her embrace, while the +great strong man, only then fully realizing all the changes, sobbed +uncontrollably beside her.</p> +<p>“My boy, my poor Archie,” she said, “you are come +at last. Did you not know you still had a mother to trust to?”</p> +<p>“I ought to have known it,” said Archie, in a choked +voice. “Oh that I had seen Jenny in London!”</p> +<p>For indeed it had become plain that it had been his flight that had +given opportunity and substance to the accusation. If he had remained, +backed by the confidence of such a family as the Poynsetts, Gadley would +have seen that testimony in his favour would be the safer and more profitable +speculation; and Moy himself, as he had said, would have testified to +the innocence of a living man on the spot, though he had let the blame +rest on one whom he thought in the depths of the sea. Archie’s +want of moral courage had been his ruin. It had led him to the +scene of temptation rather than resist his companions, and had thus +given colour to the accusation, and in the absence of both Joanna and +of his cousins, it had prevented him from facing the danger.</p> +<p>This sense made him the more willing to be forbearing, when, after +dinner, the whole council sat round to hear in full the history of the +interview with Mr. Moy; Anne taking up her position beside Frank, with +whom, between her pencil and the finger-alphabet, she had established +such a language as to make her his best interpreter of whatever was +passing in the room.</p> +<p>“One could not help being sorry for Moy,” said Miles, +as he concluded; “he turns out to be but half the villain after +all, made so rather by acquiescence than by his own free will.”</p> +<p>“But reaping the profit,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“Yes, though in ignorance of the injury he was doing, and thus +climbing to a height that makes his fall the worse. I am sorry +for old Proudfoot too,” added Julius. “I believe they +have not ventured to tell him of his granddaughter’s marriage.”</p> +<p>“I do not think the gain to me would be at all equal to the +loss to them,” said Archie. “Exposure would be ruin +and heartbreak there, and I don’t see what it would do for me.”</p> +<p>“My dear Archie!” exclaimed both Mrs. Poynsett and Joanna, +in amazement.</p> +<p>“So long as you and Mr. Bowater are satisfied, I care for little +else,” said Archie.</p> +<p>“But your position, my dear,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“We don’t care much about a man’s antecedents, +within a few years, out in the colonies, dear Aunt Julia,” said +Archie, smiling.</p> +<p>“You aren’t going back?”</p> +<p>“That depends,” said Archie, his eyes seeking Joanna’s; +“but I don’t see what there is for me to do here. +I’m spoilt for a solicitor anyway—”</p> +<p>“We could find an agency, Miles, couldn’t we?—or +a farm—”</p> +<p>“Thank you, dear aunt,” said Archie; “I don’t +definitely answer, because Mr. Bowater must be consulted; but I have +a business out there that I can do, and where I can make a competence +that I can fairly offer to Jenny here. If I came home, as I am +now, I should only prey on you in some polite form, and I don’t +think Jenny would wish for that alternative. I must go back any +way, as I have told her, and whether to save for her, or to make a home +for her there, it must be for her to decide.”</p> +<p>They looked at Jenny. She was evidently prepared; for though +her colour rose a little, her frank eyes looked at him with a confiding +smile.</p> +<p>“But we must have justice done to you, my dear boy, whether +you stay with us or not,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“That might have been done if I had not been fool enough to +run away,” said Archie; “having done so, the mass of people +will only remember that there has been something against me, in spite +of any justification. It is not worth while to blast Moy’s +character, and show poor old Proudfoot what a swindler his son was, +just for that. The old man was good to me. I should like +to let it rest while he lives. If Moy would sign such an exculpation +of me as could be shown to Mr. Bowater, and any other whom it might +concern, I should be quite willing to have nothing told publicly, at +least as long as the old gentleman lives.”</p> +<p>“I think Archie is right,” said Miles, in the pause, +with a great effort.</p> +<p>“Yes, right in the highest sense of the word,” said Julius.</p> +<p>“It is Christian,” Anne breathed across to her husband.</p> +<p>“I don’t like it,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“Let that scoundrel go unhung!” burst from Frank, who +had failed to catch the spirit of his interpreter.</p> +<p>“I don’t like it in the abstract, mother,” said +Miles; “but you and Frank have not seen the scoundrel in his beaten +down state, and, as Archie says, it is hard to blacken the memory of +either poor George Proudfoot or Tom Vivian, who have fathers to feel +it for them.”</p> +<p>“Poor Tom Vivian’s can hardly be made much blacker,” +said Mrs. Poynsett, “nor are Sir Harry’s feelings very acute; +but perhaps poor old Proudfoot ought to be spared, and there are considerations +as to the Vivian family. Still, I don’t see how to consent +to Archie going into exile again with this stigma upon him. I +am sure Raymond would not, and I do not think Mr. Bowater will.”</p> +<p>“Dear Aunt Julia,” said Archie, affectionately, coming +across to her, “it was indeed exile before, when I was dead to +all of you; but can it be so now the communication is open, and when +I am making or winning my home?” and his eyes brought Jenny to +him by her side.</p> +<p>“Yes, dear Mrs. Poynsett,” she said, holding her hand, +“I am sure he is right, and that it would spoil all our own happiness +to break that poor old father’s heart, and bring him and his wife +to disgrace and misery. When I think of the change in everything +since two days back—dear Herbert wrung a sort of forgiveness out +of me—I can’t bear to think of anybody being made miserable.”</p> +<p>“And what will your papa say, child?”</p> +<p>“I think he will feel a good deal for old Proudfoot,” +said Jenny. “He rather likes the old man, and has laughed +at our hatred of Miss Moy’s pretensions.”</p> +<p>“Then it is settled,” said Archie; “I will write +to Moy, for I suppose he had rather not see me, that I will say nothing +about it publicly while Mr. Proudfoot lives, and will not show this +confession of his, unless it should be absolutely necessary to my character. +Nor after old Proudfoot’s death, will I take any step without +notice to him.”</p> +<p>“Much more than he ought to expect,” said Mrs. Poynsett.</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” said Archie. “If he +had refused, it would not have been easy to bring him to the point, +I suppose I must have surrendered to take my trial, but after so many +years, and with so many deaths, it would have been awkward.”</p> +<p>“And the money, mother,” said Miles, producing a cheque. +“Poor Moy, that was a relief to him. He said he had kept +it ready for years.” Mrs. Poynsett waved it off as if she +did not like to touch it.</p> +<p>“I don’t want it! Take it, Archie. Set up +housekeeping on it,” she said. “You are not really +going back to that place?”</p> +<p>“Yes, indeed I am; I sail on Tuesday. Dear good Aunt +Julia, how comfortable it is to feel any one caring for me again; but +I am afraid even this magnificent present, were it ten times as much, +could not keep me; I must go back to fulfil my word to my partner out +there, even if I returned at once.”</p> +<p>“And you let him go, Jenny?”</p> +<p>“I must!” said Jenny. “And only think how +different it is now! For the rest, whether he comes back for me +at once, or some years hence, must depend on papa and mamma.”</p> +<p>She spoke with grave content beaming in her eyes, just like herself. +The restoration was still swallowing up everything else.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXV<br /> +Herbert’s Christmas</h2> +<blockquote><p>And when the self-abhorring thrill<br /> + Is past—as pass it must,<br /> +When tasks of life thy spirit fill,<br /> +Then be the self-renouncing will<br /> + The seal of thy calm trust.—Lyra Apostolica</p> +</blockquote> +<p>By Christmas Day Archie Douglas was in the Bay of Biscay; but even +to Joanna it was not a sorrowful day, for did not Herbert on that day +crawl back into his sitting-room, full dressed for the first time, holding +tight by her shoulder, and by every piece of furniture on his way to +the sofa, Rollo attending in almost pathetic delight, gazing at him +from time to time, and thumping the floor with his tail? He had +various visitors after his arrival—the first being his Rector, +who came on his way back from church to give his congratulations, mention +the number of convalescents who had there appeared, and speak of the +wedding he had celebrated that morning, that of Fanny Reynolds and her +Drake, who were going forth the next day to try whether they could accomplish +a hawker’s career free from what the man, at least, had only of +late learnt to be sins. It was a great risk, but there had been +a penitence about both that Julius trusted was genuine. A print +of the Guardian Angel, which had been her boy’s treasure, had +been hung by Fanny in her odd little bedroom, and she had protested +with tears that it would seem like her boy calling her back if she were +tempted again.</p> +<p>“Not that I trust much to that,” said Julius. “Poor +Fanny is soft, and likes to produce an effect; but I believe there is +sterling stuff in Drake.”</p> +<p>“And he never had a chance before,” said Herbert.</p> +<p>“No. Which makes a great difference—all indeed +between the Publicans, or the Heathens, and the Pharisees. He +can’t read, and I doubt whether he said the words rightly after +me; but I am sure he meant them.”</p> +<p>“I suppose all this has done great good?” said Jenny.</p> +<p>“It will be our fault if it do not do permanent good. +It ought,” said Julius, gravely. “No, no, Herbert, +I did not mean to load you with the thought. Getting well is your +business for the present—not improving the occasion to others.”</p> +<p>To which all that Herbert answered was, “Harry Hornblower!” +as if that name spoke volumes of oppression of mind.</p> +<p>That discussion, however, was hindered by Mrs. Hornblower’s +own arrival with one of her lodger’s numerous meals, and Julius +went off to luncheon. The next step on the stairs made Herbert +start and exclaim, “That’s the dragoon! Come in, Phil.”</p> +<p>And there did indeed stand the eldest brother, who had obtained a +few days’ leave, as he told them, and had ridden over from Strawyers +after church. He came in with elaborate caution in his great muddy +boots, and looked at Herbert like a sort of natural curiosity, exclaiming +that he only wanted a black cap and a pair of bands to be exactly like +Bishop Bowater, a Caroline divine, with a meek, oval, spiritual face, +and a great display of delicate attenuated fingers, the length of which +had always been a doubt and marvel to his sturdy descendants.</p> +<p>“Hands and all,” quoth Philip; “and what are you +doing with them?” as he spied a Greek Testament in the fingers, +and something far too ponderous for them within reach. “Jenny, +how dare you?” he remonstrated, poising the bigger book as if +to heave it at her head. “That’s what comes of your +encouraging followers, eh?”</p> +<p>“Ah!” said Jenny, pretending to dodge the missile, while +Rollo exercised great forbearance in stifling a bark, “Greek is +not quite so severe to some folks as dragoon captains think.”</p> +<p>“Severe or not he might let it alone,” said Phil, looking +much disposed to wrest away the little book, which Herbert thrust under +his pillow, saying—</p> +<p>“It was only the Lesson.”</p> +<p>“Why can’t you read the Lesson like a sensible man in +its native English? Don’t laugh, children, you know what +I mean. There’s no good in this fellow working his brain. +He can’t go up again before September, and according to the Bishop’s +letter to my father, he is safe to pass, if he could not construe a +line, after what he did at Wil’sbro’. The Bishop and +Co. found they had made considerable donkeys of themselves. Yes, +’tis the ticket for you to be shocked; but it is just like badgering +a fellow for his commission by asking him how many facets go to a dragon-fly’s +eye, instead of how he can stand up to a battery.”</p> +<p>“So I thought,” said Herbert; “but I know now what +it is to be in the teeth of the battery without having done my best +to get my weapons about me.”</p> +<p>“Come now! Would any of those poor creatures have been +the better for your knowing</p> +<blockquote><p>“How many notes a sackbut has,<br /> +Or whether shawms have strings,”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>or the Greek particles, which I believe were what sacked you?”</p> +<p>“They would have been the better if I had ever learnt to think +what men’s souls are, or my own either,” said Herbert, with +a heavy sigh.</p> +<p>“Ah! well, you have had a sharp campaign,” said Phil; +“but you’ll soon get the better of it when you are at Nice +with the old folks. Jolly place—lots of nice girls—something +always going on. I’ll try and get leave to take you out; +but you’ll cut us all out! Ladies won’t look at a +fellow when there’s an interesting young parson to the fore.”</p> +<p>Herbert made an action of negation, and his sister said—</p> +<p>“The doctors say Nice will not do after such an illness as +this. Papa asked the doctor there, and he said he could not advise +it.”</p> +<p>“Indeed! Then I’ll tell you what, Herbs, you shall +come into lodgings at York, and I’ll look after you there. +You shall ride Pimento, and dine at the mess.”</p> +<p>“Thank you, Phil,” said Herbert, to whom a few months +ago this proposal would have been most seducing, “but I am going +home, and that’s all the change I shall want.”</p> +<p>“Home! Yes, Ellen is getting ready for you. Not +your room—oh, no! but the state bedroom! When will you come? +My leave is only till Tuesday.”</p> +<p>“Oh! I don’t know how to think of the drive,” +sighed Herbert wearily.</p> +<p>“We must wait for a fine day, when he feels strong enough,” +said Jenny.</p> +<p>“All right,” said Phil; “but ten days or a fortnight +there will be quite enough, and then you’ll come. There +are some friends of yours, that only looked at me, I can tell you, for +the sake of your name—eh, Master Herbs?”</p> +<p>Herbert did not rise to the bait; but Jenny said, “The Miss +Strangeways?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Wouldn’t he be flattered to hear of the stunning +excitement when they heard of Captain Bowater, and how the old lady, +their mother, talked by the yard about him? You’ll get a +welcome indeed when you come, old fellow. When shall it be?”</p> +<p>“No, thank you, Phil,” said Herbert, gravely. “I +shall come back here as soon as I am well enough. But there is +one thing I wish you would do for me.”</p> +<p>“Well, what? I’ll speak about having any horse +you please taken up for you to ride; I came over on Brown Ben, but he +would shake you too much.”</p> +<p>“No, no, it’s about a young fellow. If you could +take him back to York to enlist—”</p> +<p>“My dear Herbert, I ain’t a recruiting-sergeant.”</p> +<p>“No, but it might be the saving of him,” said Herbert, +raising himself and speaking with more animation. “It is +Harry Hornblower.”</p> +<p>“Why, that’s the chap that bagged your athletic prizes! +Whew! Rather strong, ain’t it, Joan!”</p> +<p>“He did no such thing,” said Herbert, rather petulantly; +“never dreamt of it. He only was rather a fool in talking +of them—vaunting of me, I believe, as not such a bad fellow for +a parson; so his friends got out of him where to find them. But +they knew better than to take him with them. Tell him, Jenny; +he won’t believe me.”</p> +<p>“It is quite true, Phil,” said Jenny, “the poor +fellow did get into bad company at the races, but that was all. +He did not come home that night, but he was stupefied with drink and +the beginning of the fever, and it was proved—perfectly proved—that +he was fast asleep at a house at Backsworth when the robbery was committed, +and he was as much shocked about it as any one—more, I am sure, +than Herbert, who was so relieved on finding him clear of it, that he +troubled himself very little about the things. And now he has +had the fever—not very badly—and he is quite well now, but +he can’t get anything to do. Truelove turned him off before +the races for hanging about at the Three Pigeons, and nobody will employ +him. I do think it is true what they say—his mother, and +Julius, and Herbert, and all—that he has had a lesson, and wants +to turn over a new leaf, but the people here won’t let him. +Julius and Herbert want him to enlist, and I believe he would, but his +mother—as they all do—thinks that the last degradation; +but she might listen if Captain Bowater came and told her about his +own regiment—cavalry too—and the style of men in it—and +it is the only chance for him.”</p> +<p>Philip made a wry face.</p> +<p>“You see I took him up and let him down,” said Herbert, +sadly and earnestly.</p> +<p>“I really do believe,” said Jenny, clenching the matter, +“that Herbert would get well much faster if Harry Hornblower were +off his mind.”</p> +<p>Phil growled, and his younger brother and sister knew that they would +do their cause no good by another word. There was an odd shyness +about them all. The elder brother had not yet said anything about +Jenny’s prospects, and only asked after the party at the Hall.</p> +<p>“All nearly well, except Frank’s deafness,” said +Jenny. “In a day or two he is going up to London to consult +an aurist, and see whether he can keep his clerkship. Miles is +going with him, and Rosamond takes Terry up to see his brother in London, +and then, I believe, she is going on to get rooms at Rockpier, while +Miles comes home to fetch his mother there.”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Poynsett!” with infinite wonder.</p> +<p>“Oh yes, all this has really brought out much more power of +activity in her. You know it was said that there was more damage +to the nervous system than anything else, and the shock has done her +good. Besides, Miles is so much less timid about her than dear +Raymond, who always handled her like a cracked teapot, and never having +known much of any other woman, did not understand what was good for +her.”</p> +<p>“Miles has more pith in him than ever poor old Raymond had,” +said Phil. “Poor old Poynsett, I used to think he wanted +to be spoony on you, Joan, if he had only known his own mind. +If he had, I suppose he would have been alive now!”</p> +<p>“What a pleasing situation for Jenny!” Herbert could +not help muttering.</p> +<p>“Much better than running after ostriches in the wilderness,” +quoth Philip. “You ride them double, don’t you?”</p> +<p>“Two little negro boys at a time,” replied Jenny, “according +to the nursery-book. Will you come and try, Phil?”</p> +<p>“You don’t mean to go out?”</p> +<p>“I don’t know,” said Jenny; “it depends on +how mamma is, and how Edith gets on.”</p> +<p>Philip gave a long whistle of dismay. Herbert looked at him +wistfully, longing to hear him utter some word of congratulation or +sympathy with his sister; but none was forthcoming. Philip had +disliked the engagement originally—never had cared for Archie +Douglas, and was not melted now that Jenny was more valuable than ever. +She knew him too well to expect it of him, and did not want to leave +him to vex Herbert by any expression of his opinion on the matter, and +on this account, as well as on that of the fatigue she saw on her patient’s +features, she refused his kind offer of keeping guard while she went +in the afternoon to church, adding that Herbert must rest, as Mrs. Duncombe +was coming afterwards to take leave of him.</p> +<p>Philip shrugged his shoulders in horror, and declared that he should +not return again till <i>that</i> was over; but he should look in again +before he went home to settle about Herbert’s coming to York.</p> +<p>“York!” said Herbert, with a gasp, as Jenny brought his +jelly, and arranged his pillows for a rest, while the dragoon’s +boots resounded on the stairs. “Please tell him to say no +more about it. I want them all to understand that I’m not +going in for that sort of thing any more.”</p> +<p>“My dear, I think you had better not say things hotly and rashly; +you may feel so very differently by and by.”</p> +<p>“I know that,” said Herbert; “but after all it +is only what my ordination vows mean, though I did not see it then. +And this year must be a penance year; I had made up my mind to that +before I fell ill.”</p> +<p>“Only you must get well,” said Jenny.</p> +<p>“That takes care of itself when one is sound to begin with,” +said Herbert. “And now that I have been brought back again, +and had my eyes opened, and have got another trial given me, it would +be double shame to throw it away.”</p> +<p>“I don’t think you will do that.”</p> +<p>“I only pray that all that seems burnt out of me by what I +have seen, and heard, and felt, may not come back with my strength.”</p> +<p>“I could hardly pray that for you, Herbert,” said Jenny. +“Spirits are wanted to bear a clergyman through his work, and +though you are quite right not to <i>go in</i> for those things, I should +be sorry if you never enjoyed what came in your way.”</p> +<p>“If I never was tempted.”</p> +<p>“It need not be temptation. It would not be if your mind +were full of your work—it would only be refreshment. I don’t +want my boy to turn stern, and dry, and ungenial. That would not +be like your Rector.”</p> +<p>“My Rector did not make such a bad start, and can trust himself +better,” said Herbert. “Come, Jenny, don’t look +at me in that way. You can’t wish me to go to York, and +meet those rattling girls again?”</p> +<p>“No, certainly not, though Sister Margaret told Rosamond they +had never had such a sobering lesson in their lives as their share in +the mischief to you.”</p> +<p>“It was not their fault,” said Herbert. “It +was deeper down than that. And they were good girls after all, +if one only had had sense.”</p> +<p>“Oh!—”</p> +<p>“Nonsense, Jenny,” with a little smile, as he read her +face, “I’m not bitten—no—but they, and poor +Lady Tyrrell, and all are proof enough that it is easy to turn my head, +and that I am one who ought to keep out of that style of thing for the +future. So do silence Phil, for you know when he gets a thing +into his head how he goes on, and I do not think I can bear it now.”</p> +<p>“I am sure you can’t,” said Jenny, emphatically, +“and I’ll do my best. Only, Herbie, dear, do one thing +for me, don’t bind yourself by any regular renunciations of moderate +things now your mind is excited, and you are weak. I am sure Julius +or Dr. Easterby would say so.”</p> +<p>“I’ll think,” said Herbert. “But if +I am forgiven for this year, nothing seems to me too much to give up +to the Great Shepherd to show my sorrow. ‘Feed My sheep’ +was the way He bade St. Peter prove his love.”</p> +<p>Jenny longed to say it was feeding the sheep rather than self-privation, +but she was not sure of her ground, and Herbert’s low, quiet, +soft voice went to her heart. There were two great tears on his +cheeks, he shut his eyes as if to keep back any more, and turned his +face inwards on the sofa, his lips still murmuring over ‘Feed +My sheep.’ She looked at him, feeling as if, while her heart +had wakened to new glad hopes of earth, her brother, in her fulfilled +prayer, had soared beyond her. They were both quite still till +Mrs. Duncombe came to the door.</p> +<p>She was at the Rectory, her house being dismantled, and she, having +stayed till the last case of fever was convalescent, and the Sisters +recalled, was to go the next day to her mother-in-law’s. +She was almost as much altered as Herbert himself. Her jaunty +air had given way to something equally energetic, but she looked wiry +and worn, and her gold pheasant’s crest had become little more +than a sandy wisp, as she came quietly in and took the hand that Herbert +held out to her, saying how glad she was to see him on the mend.</p> +<p>He asked after some of the people whom they had attended together, +and listened to the details, asking specially after one or two families, +where one or both parents had been taken away. “Poor Cecil +Poynsett is undertaking them,” was the answer in each case. +Some had been already sent to orphanages; others were boarded out till +places could be found for them; and the Sisters had taken charge of +two.</p> +<p>Then one widow was to ‘do for’ the Vicar, who had taken +solitary possession of the Vicarage, but would soon be joined there +by one or more curates. He had been inducted into the ruinous +chancel of the poor old church, had paid the architect of the Rat-house +fifty pounds (a sum just equalling the proceeds of the bazaar) to be +rid of his plans; had brought down a first-rate architect; and in the +meantime was working the little iron church vigorously.</p> +<p>“Everything seems to be beginning there just as I go into exile!” +said Mrs. Duncombe. “It seems odd that I should have to +go from what I have only just learnt to prize. But you have taught +mo a good deal—”</p> +<p>“Every one must have learnt a good deal,” said Herbert +wearily. “If one only has!”</p> +<p>“I meant you yourself, and that is what I came to thank you +for. Yes, I did; even if you don’t like to hear it, your +sister does, and I must have it out. I shall recollect you again +and again standing over all those beds, and shrinking from nothing, +and I shall hold up the example to my boys.”</p> +<p>“Do hold up something better!”</p> +<p>“Can you write?” she said abruptly.</p> +<p>“I have written a few lines to my mother.”</p> +<p>“Do you remember what you said that night, when you had to +hold that poor man in his delirium, and his wife was so wild with fright +that she could not help?”</p> +<p>“I am not sure what you mean.”</p> +<p>“You said it three or four times. It was only—”</p> +<p>“I remember,” said Herbert, as she paused; “it +was the only thing I could recollect in the turmoil.”</p> +<p>“Would it tire you very much to write it for me in the flyleaf +of this Prayer-Book that Mr. Charnock has given me?”</p> +<p>Herbert pulled himself into a sitting posture, and signed to his +sister to give him the ink.</p> +<p>“I shall spoil your book,” he said, as his hand shook.</p> +<p>“Never mind,” she said, eagerly, “the words come +back to me whenever I think of the life I have to face, and I want them +written; they soothe me, as they soothed that frightened woman and raving +man.”</p> +<p>And Herbert wrote. It was only—‘The Lord is a very +present help in trouble.’</p> +<p>“Yes,” she said; “thank you. Put your initials, +pray. There—thank you. No, you can never tell what +it was to me to hear those words, so quietly, and gravely, and strongly, +in that deadly struggle. It seemed to me, for the first time in +all my life, that God is a real Presence and an actual Help. There! +I see Miss Bowater wants me gone; so I am off. I shall hear of +you.”</p> +<p>Herbert was exhausted with the exertion, and only exchanged a close +pressure of the hand, and when Jenny came back, after seeing the lady +to the door, she thought there were tears on his cheek, and bent down +to kiss him.</p> +<p>“That was just the way, Jenny,” his low, tired voice +said. “I never could recollect what I wanted to say. +Only just those few Psalms that you did manage to teach me before I +went to school, they came back and back.”</p> +<p>Jenny had no time to answer, for the feet of Philip were on the stairs. +He had been visiting Mrs. Hornblower, and persuading her that to make +a dragoon of her son was the very best thing for him—great promotion, +and quite removed from the ordinary vulgar enlistment in the line—till +he had wiled consent out of her. And though Philip declared it +was blarney, and was inclined to think it <i>infra dig</i>. to have +thus exerted his eloquence, it was certain that Mrs. Hornblower would +console herself by mentioning to her neighbours that her son was gone +in compliment to Captain Bowater, who had taken a fancy to him.</p> +<p>The relief to Herbert was infinite; but he was by this time too much +tired to do anything but murmur his thanks, and wish himself safe back +in his bed, and Philip’s strong-armed aid in reaching that haven +was not a little appreciated.</p> +<p>Julius looked in with his mother’s entreaty that Philip, and +if possible his sister, should come up to eat their Christmas dinner +at the Hall; and Herbert, wearily declaring that sleep was all he needed, +and that Cranky would be more than sufficient for him, insisted on their +accepting the invitation; and Jenny was not sorry, for she did not want +a <i>tête-à-tête</i> with Philip so close to her +patient’s room, that whatever he chose to hear, he might.</p> +<p>She had quite enough of it in the walk to the Hall. Phil, with +the persistency of a person bent on doing a kind thing, returned to +his York plan, viewing it as excellent relaxation for a depressed, over-worked +man, and certain it would be a great treat to ‘little Herb.’ +He still looked on the tall young man as the small brother to be patronized, +and protected, and dragged out of home-petting; so he pooh-poohed all +Jenny’s gentler hints as to Herbert’s need of care and desire +to return to his work, until she was obliged to say plainly that he +had entreated her to beg it might not be argued with him again, as he +was resolved against amusement for the present.</p> +<p>Then Phil grew very angry both with Herbert and Jenny.</p> +<p>“Did they suppose he wanted the boy to do anything unclerical?”</p> +<p>“No; but you know it was by nothing positively unclerical that +he was led aside before.”</p> +<p>Phil broke out into a tirade against the folly of Jenny’s speech. +In his view, Herbert’s conduct at Wil’sbro’ had confuted +the Bishop’s censure, and for his own part, he only wished to +amuse the boy, and give him rest, and if he did take him to a ball, +or even out with the hounds, he would be on leave, and in another diocese, +where the Bishop had nothing to do with him.</p> +<p>Jenny tried to make him understand that dread of the Bishop was the +last thing in Herbert’s mind. It was rather that he did +not think it right to dissipate away a serious impression.</p> +<p>That was worse than before. She was threatened with the most +serious displeasure of her father and mother, if she encouraged Herbert +in the morbid ascetic notions ascribed to Dr. Easterby.</p> +<p>“It was always the way with the women—they never knew +where to stop.”</p> +<p>“No,” said Jenny, “I did not know there was anywhere +to stop in the way of Heaven.”</p> +<p>“As if there were no way to Heaven without making a fool of +oneself.”</p> +<p>This answer made Jenny sorry for her own, as needlessly vexatious, +and yet she recollected St. Paul’s Christian paradoxes, and felt +that poor Herbert might have laid hold of the true theory of the ministry. +At any rate, she was glad that they were at that moment hailed and overtaken +by the party from the Rectory, and that Phil pounced at once on Julius, +to obtain his sanction to giving Herbert a little diversion at York.</p> +<p>Julius answered more warily, “Does he wish it?”</p> +<p>“No; but he is too weak yet, and is hipped and morbid.”</p> +<p>“Well, Phil, I would not put it into his head. No doubt +you would take very good care of him, but I doubt whether your father +would like the Bishop to hear of him—under the circumstances—going +to disport himself at the dragoon mess. Besides, I don’t +think he will be well enough before Lent, and then of course he could +not.”</p> +<p>This outer argument in a man’s voice pacified Phil, as Julius +knew it would, much better than the deeper one, and he contented himself +with muttering that he should write to his father about it, which every +one knew he was most likely not to do.</p> +<p>Who could have foretold last Christmas who would be the party at +that dinner? Mrs. Poynsett at the head of her own table, and Miles +in the master’s place, and the three waifs from absent families +would have seemed equally unlikely guests; while of last year’s +party—Charlie was in India, Tom De Lancey with the aunts in Ireland, +Cecil at Dunstone. Mrs. Duncombe was perfectly quiet, not only +from the subduing influence of all she had undergone, but because she +felt herself there like an intruder, and would have refused, but that +to leave her at home would have distressed her hostess. Mrs. Poynsett +had never seen her before, and after all she had heard about her, was +quite amazed at the sight of such an insignificant little person as +she was without her dash and sparkle, and in a dress which, when no +longer coquettish, verged upon the slovenly.</p> +<p>Poor thing, she was waiting till the Christmas visit of the elder +Mrs. Duncombe’s own daughter was over, so that there might be +room for her, and she was thankful for the reprieve, which left her +able to spend Christmas among the privileges she had only learnt to +value just as she was deprived of them. She looked at Mrs. Poynsett, +half in curiosity, half in compunction, as she remembered how she had +helped to set Cecil against her.</p> +<p>“But then,” as she said to Rosamond, in going home, “I +had prejudices about the genus <i>belle-mère</i>. And mine +always knew and said I should ruin her son, in which, alas! she was +quite right!”</p> +<p>“She will be pleased now,” said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“No, indeed, I believe she had rather I were rapidity personified +than owe the change to any one of your Rector’s sort. I +have had a letter or two, warning me against the Sisters, or thinking +there is any merit in works of mercy. Ah, well! I’ll +try to think her a good old woman! But if she had only not strained +the cord till it snapped, how much happier Bob and I should have been!”</p> +<p>What a difference there is between straining the cord for one’s +self and for other people! So Julius could not help feeling when +Herbert, in spite of all that could be said to him, about morbid haste +in renunciation, sent for the village captain of the cricket-club, and +delivered over to him the bat, which had hitherto been as a knightly +sword to him, resigning his place in the Compton Poynsett Eleven, and +replying to the dismayed entreaties and assurances of the young farmer +that he would reconsider his decision, and that he would soon be quite +strong again, that he had spent too much time over cricket, and liked +it too well to trust himself at it again.</p> +<p>That was the last thing before on a New Year’s Day, which was +like an April day, Herbert came into church once more, and then was +carried off in the Strawyers carriage, lying back half ashamed, half +astonished, at the shower of strange tears which the ecstatic shouts +and cheers of the village boys had called forth.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXVI<br /> +Rockpier</h2> +<blockquote><p>For Love himself took part against himself<br /> + To warn us off.—TENNYSON</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Rosamond was to have a taste of her old vocation, and go campaigning +for lodgings, the searching for which she declared to be her strongest +point. Rockpier was to be the destination of the family; Eleonora +Vivian, whose letters had been far fewer than had been expected of her, +was known to be there with her father, and this was lure sufficient +for Frank. Frank’s welfare again was the lure to Mrs. Poynsett; +and the benefit Rosamond was to derive from sea air, after all she had +gone through, made Julius willing to give himself the holiday that everybody +insisted on his having until Lent.</p> +<p>First, however, was sent off an advanced guard, consisting of Rosamond +and Terry, who went up to London with Frank, that he might there consult +an aurist, and likewise present himself to his chief, and see whether +he could keep his clerkship. All this turned out well, his duties +did not depend on his ears, and a month’s longer leave of absence +was granted to him; moreover, his deafness was pronounced to be likely +to yield to treatment, and a tube restored him to somewhat easier intercourse +with mankind, and he was in high spirits, when, after an evening spent +with Rosamond’s friends, the M’Kinnons, the trio took an +early train for Rockpier, where Rosamond could not detain Frank even +to come to the hotel with them and have luncheon before hurrying off +to Verdure Point, the villa inhabited by Sir Harry. All he had +done all the way down was to impress upon her, in the fulness of his +knowledge of the place, that the only habitable houses in Rockpier were +in that direction—the nearer to Verdure Point the more perfect!</p> +<p>Terry listened with smiling eyes, sometimes viewing the lover as +a bore, sometimes as a curious study, confirming practical statements. +Terry was thoroughly well, only with an insatiable appetite, and he +viewed his fellow convalescent’s love with double wonder when +he found it caused oblivion of hunger, especially as Frank still looked +gaunt and sallow, and was avowedly not returned to his usual health.</p> +<p>Rosamond set forth house-hunting, dropping Terry ere long at the +Library, where she went to make inquiries, and find the <i>sine quâ +non</i>. When she reached the sitting-room at the hotel, she found +Frank cowering over the fire in an arm-chair, the picture of despondency. +Of course, he did not hear her entrance, and she darted up to him, and +put her hand on his shoulder. He looked up to her with an attempt +at indifference.</p> +<p>“Well, Frank!”</p> +<p>“Well, Rose! How have you sped?”</p> +<p>“I have got a house; but it is in Marine Terrace. I don’t +know what you’ll say to me.”</p> +<p>“I don’t know that it signifies.”</p> +<p>“You are shivering! What’s the matter?”</p> +<p>“Only, it is very cold!”</p> +<p>(<i>Aside</i>. “Ring the bell, Terry, he is as cold as +ice.”) “Did you see her?”</p> +<p>“Oh yes. Did you have any luncheon?” (“Some +port-wine and hot water directly, please.”)</p> +<p>“Yes, I believe so. You are not ordering anything for +me? There’s nothing amiss—only it is so cold.”</p> +<p>“It is cold, and you are not to be cold; nor are we to be cold, +sir. You must go to bed early in the evening, Terry,” said +Rosamond, at last. “I shall make nothing of him while you +are by, and an hour’s more sleep will not be lost on you.”</p> +<p>“Will you come and tell me then, Rosey? I deserve something.”</p> +<p>“What, for sleeping there instead of here, when you’ve +nothing to do?”</p> +<p>“Indeed, but I have. I want to make out this little Chaucer. +I shall go down to the coffee-room and do it.”</p> +<p>“Well, if you like poking out your eyes with the gas in the +coffee-room, I have no objection, since you are too proud to go to bed. +Wish him good night first, and do it naturally.”</p> +<p>“Nature would be thrown away on him, poor fellow,” said +Terry, as he roused Frank with difficulty to have ‘Good night’ +roared into his ear, and give a listless hand. He was about to +deal with Rosamond in the same way, but she said—</p> +<p>“No, I am not going yet,” and settled herself opposite +to him, with her half-knitted baby’s shoe in her hands, and her +feet on the fender, her crape drawn up from the fire, disposed for conversation. +Frank, on the other hand, fell back into the old position, looking so +wretched that she could bear it no longer, picked up the tube, forced +it on him, and said, “Do tell me, dear Frank. You used to +tell me long ago.”</p> +<p>He shook his head. “That’s all over. You +are very good, Rosamond, but you should not have forced her to come +to me.”</p> +<p>“Not!”</p> +<p>“My life was not worth saving.”</p> +<p>“She has not gone back from you again?—the horrible girl!” +(<i>this last aside</i>).</p> +<p>“It is not that she has gone back. She has never changed. +It is I who have forfeited her.”</p> +<p>“You!—You!—She has not cast you off?”</p> +<p>“You know how it was, and the resolution by which she had bound +herself, and how I was maddened.”</p> +<p>“That! I thought it was all forgiven and forgotten!” +cried Rosamond.</p> +<p>“It is not a matter of forgiveness. She put it to me +whether it was possible to begin on a broken word.”</p> +<p>“Worse and worse! Why, when you’ve spoken a foolish +word, it is the foolishest thing in the world to hold to it.”</p> +<p>“If it were a foolish word!” said poor Frank. “I +think I could have atoned for that day, if she could have tried me; +but when she left me to judge, and those eyes of sweet, sorrowful—”</p> +<p>“Sweet! Sorrowful, indeed! About as sweet and sorrowful +as the butcher to the lamb. Left you to judge! A refinement +of cruelty! She had better have stayed away when I told her it +was the only chance to save your life.”</p> +<p>“Would that she had!” sighed Frank. “But +that was your doing, Rosamond, and what she did in mere humanity can’t +be cast back again to bind her against her conscience.”</p> +<p>“Plague on her conscience!” was my Lady’s imprecation. +“I wonder if it is all coquetry!”</p> +<p>“She deserves no blame,” said Frank, understanding the +manner, though the words were under Rosamond’s breath. “Her +very troubles in her own family have been the cause of her erecting +a standard of what alone she could trust. Once in better days +she fancied I came up to it, and when I know how far I have fallen short +of it—”</p> +<p>“Nonsense. She had no business to make the condition +without warning you.”</p> +<p>“She knows more of me than only that,” muttered poor +Frank. “I was an ass in town last summer. It was the +hope of seeing her that drew me; but if I had kept out of that set, +all this would never have been.”</p> +<p>“It was all for her sake.” (A substratum of ‘Ungrateful, +ungenerous girl.’)</p> +<p>“For her sake, I thought—not her true sake.” +Then there was a silence, broken by his exclaiming, “Rose, I must +get away from here!”</p> +<p>“You can’t,” she called back. “Here’s +your mother coming. She would be perfectly miserable to find you +gone.”</p> +<p>“It is impossible I should stay here.”</p> +<p>“Don’t be so chicken-hearted, Frank. If she has +a heart worth speaking of, she’ll come round, if you only press +hard enough. If not, you are well quit of her.”</p> +<p>He cried out at this, and Rosamond saw that what she called faintness +of heart was really reverence and sense of his own failings; but none +the less did she scorn such misplaced adoration, as it seemed to her, +and scold him in her own fashion, for not rushing on to conquer irresistibly; +or else being cool and easy as to his rejection. He would accept +neither alternative, was depressed beyond the power of comfort, bodily +weariness adding to his other ills, and went off at last to bed, without +retracting his intention of going away.</p> +<p>“Well, Terry, it is a new phase, and a most perplexing one!” +said Rosamond, when her brother came back with arch curiosity in his +brown eyes. “The girl has gone and turned him over, and +there he lies on his back prostrate, just like Ponto, when he knows +he deserves it!”</p> +<p>“Turned him over—you don’t mean that she is off? +I thought she was a perfect angel of loveliness and goodness.”</p> +<p>“Goodness! It is enough to make one hate goodness, unless +this is all mere pretence on her part. But what I am afraid of +is his setting off, no one knows where, before any one is up, and leaving +us to confront his mother, while he falls ill in some dog-hole of a +place. He is not fit to go about by himself, and I trust to you +to watch him, Terry.”</p> +<p>“Shall I lie on the mat outside his door?” said Terry, +half meaning it, and somewhat elated by the romantic situation.</p> +<p>“No, we are not come to quite such extremities. You need +not even turn his key by mistake; only keep your ears open. He +is next to you, is he not?—and go in on pretext of inquiry—if +you hear him up to mischief.”</p> +<p>Nothing was heard but the ordinary summons of Boots; and it turned +out in the morning that the chill had exasperated his throat, and reduced +him to a condition which took away all inclination to move, besides +deafening him completely.</p> +<p>Rosamond had to rush about all day, providing plenishing for the +lodging. Once she saw Sir Harry and his daughter in the distance, +and dashed into a shop to avoid them, muttering, “I don’t +believe she cared for him one bit. I dare say she has taken up +with Lorimer Strangeways after all! Rather worse than her sister, +I declare, for she never pretended to be too <i>good</i> for Raymond,” +and then as a curate in a cassock passed—“Ah! some of them +have been working on her, and persuading her that he is not good enough +for her. Impertinent prig! He looks just capable of it!”</p> +<p>Frank was no better as to cold and deafness, though somewhat less +uncomfortable the next day in the lodging, and Rosamond went up without +him to the station to meet the rest of the party, and arrange for Mrs. +Poynsett’s conveyance. They had accomplished the journey +much better than had been, hoped, but it was late and dark enough to +make it expedient that Mrs. Poynsett should be carried to bed at once, +after her most unwonted fatigue, and only have one glimpse and embrace +of Frank, so as to stave off the knowledge of his troubles till after +her night’s rest. He seconded this desire, and indeed Miles +and Anne only saw that he had a bad cold; but Rosamond no sooner had +her husband to herself, than she raved over his wrongs to her heart’s +content, and implored Julius to redress them, though how, she did not +well know, since she by turns declared that Frank was well quit of Lenore, +and that he would never get over the loss.</p> +<p>Julius demurred a good deal to her wish of sending him on a mission +to Eleonora. All Charnocks naturally swung back to distrust of +the Vivians, and he did not like to plead with a girl who seemed only +to be making an excuse to reject his brother; while, on the other hand, +he knew that Raymond had not been satisfied with Frank’s London +habits, nor had he himself been at ease as to his religious practices, +which certainly had been the minimum required to suit his mother’s +notions. He had been a communicant on Christmas Day, but he was +so entirely out of reach that there was no knowing what difference his +illness might have made in him; Eleonora might know more than his own +family did, and have good and conscientious reasons for breaking with +him; and, aware that his own authority had weight with her, Julius felt +it almost too much responsibility to interfere till the next day, when +his mother, with tears in her eyes, entreated him to go to Miss Vivian, +to find out what was this dreadful misunderstanding, which perhaps might +only be from his want of hearing, and implore her, in the name of an +old woman, not to break her boy’s heart and darken his life, as +it had been with his brother.</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett was tremulous and agitated, and grief had evidently +told on her high spirit, so that Julius could make no objection, but +promised to do his best.</p> +<p>By the time it was possible to Julius to call, Sir Harry and Miss +Vivian were out riding, and he had no further chance till at the gaslit +Friday evening lecture, to which he had hurried after dinner. +A lady became faint in the heated atmosphere, two rows of chairs before +him, and as she turned to make her way out, he saw that it was Eleonora, +and was appalled by seeing not only the whiteness of the present faintness, +but that thinness and general alteration which had changed the beautiful +face so much that he asked himself for a moment whether she could have +escaped the fever. In that moment he had moved forward to her +support; and she, seeming to have no one belonging to her, clung to +the friendly arm, and was presently in the porch, where the cool night +air revived her at once, and she begged him to return, saying nothing +ailed her but gas.</p> +<p>“No, I shall see you home, Lena.”</p> +<p>“Indeed, there is no need,” said the trembling voice, +in which he detected a sob very near at hand.</p> +<p>“I shall use my own judgment as to that,” said Julius, +kindly.</p> +<p>She made no more resistance, but rose from the seat in the porch, +and accepted his arm. He soon felt that her steps were growing +firmer, and he ventured to say, “I had been looking for you to-day.”</p> +<p>“Yes, I saw your card.”</p> +<p>“I had a message to you from my mother.” Lenore +trembled again, but did not dare to relax her hold on him. “I +think you can guess what it is. She thinks poor Frank must have +mistaken what you said.”</p> +<p>“No—I wrote it,” said Lena, very low.</p> +<p>“And you really meant that the resolution made last year is +to stand between you and Frank? I am not blaming you, I do not +know whether you may not be acting rightly and wisely, and whether you +may not have more reason than I know of to shrink from intrusting yourself +to Frank; but my mother cannot understand it, and when she sees him +heartbroken, and too unwell to act for himself—”</p> +<p>“Oh! is he ill?”</p> +<p>“He has a very bad cold, and could not get up till the afternoon, +and he is deafer than ever.”</p> +<p>Lena moaned.</p> +<p>He proceeded: “So as he cannot act for himself, my mother begged +me to come to an understanding.”</p> +<p>“I told him to judge,” said Lena faintly, but turning +Julius so as to walk back along the parade instead of to her abode.</p> +<p>“Was not that making him his own executioner?” said Julius.</p> +<p>“A promise is binding,” she added.</p> +<p>“Yet, is it quite fair?” said Julius, sure now which +way her heart went, and thinking she was really longing to be absolved +from a superstitious feeling; “is it fair to expect another person +to be bound by a vow of which you have not told him?”</p> +<p>“I never thought he could,” sighed she.</p> +<p>“And you know he was entrapped!” said Julius, roused +to defend his brother.</p> +<p>“And by whom?” she said in accents of deep pain.</p> +<p>“I should have thought it just—both by your poor sister +and by him—to undo the wrong then wrought,” said Julius, +“unless, indeed, you have some further cause for distrusting him?”</p> +<p>“No! no!” cried she. “Oh, Julius! I +do it for his own good. Your mother knows not what she wishes, +in trying to entangle him again with me.”</p> +<p>“Lenore, will you tell me if anything in him besides that unhappy +slip makes you distrust him?”</p> +<p>“I must tell the whole truth,” gasped the poor girl, +as they walked along in the sound of the sea, the dark path here and +there brightened by the gas-lights, “or you will think it is his +fault! Julius, I know more about my poor father than ever I did +before. I was a child when I lived here before, and then Camilla +took all the management. When we came to London, two months ago, +I soon saw the kind of people he got round him for his comforters. +I knew how he spent his evenings. It is second nature to him—he +can’t get put of it, I believe! I persuaded him to come +down here, thinking it a haven of peace and safety. Alas! +I little knew what old habits there were to resume, nor what was the +real reason Camilla brought us away after paying our debts. I +was a happy child <i>then</i>, when I only knew that papa was gone to +his club. Now I know that it is a billiard-room—and that +it is doing all the more harm because he is there—and I see him +with people whom he does not like me to speak to. I don’t +know whether I could get him away, and it would be as bad anywhere else. +I don’t think he can help it. And he is often unwell; he +can’t do without me when he has the gout, and I ought not to leave +him to himself. And then, if—if we did marry and he lived +with us in London, think what it would be for Frank to have such a set +brought about him. I don’t see how he could keep them off. +Or even an engagement bringing him down here—or anywhere, among +papa’s friends would be very bad for him. I saw it in London, +even with Camilla to keep things in check.” She was almost +choked with suppressed agony.</p> +<p>“I see,” said Julius, gravely and pitifully, “it +would take a man of more age and weight than poor Frank to deal with +the habits of a lifetime. The risk is great.”</p> +<p>“And when I saw it,” added Eleonora, “I felt I +must never, never bring him into it. And how could I tell him? +Your mother does not know, or she could not wish it!”</p> +<p>“It is plain that in the present state of things you ought +not to marry, and so far you are judging nobly,” said Julius; +“but next comes the question—how far it is well to make +that day at the races the pretext?”</p> +<p>“Don’t call it a pretext,” said Lenore, quickly. +“I meant what I said a year ago, with all my soul. Perhaps +it was hasty, when poor Camilla drove me into saying I did not mean +only an habitual gambler, but one who had ever betted. And now, +well as I know how cruelly she used that presumptuous vow of mine, and +how she repented of it at last, still I feel that to fly in its face +might be so wrong, that I should have no right to expect not to drag +Frank down.”</p> +<p>“Perhaps I am too much interested to judge fairly,” said +Julius. “I should like you to consult some one—say +Dr. Easterby—but it seems to me that it is just such a vow as +you may well be absolved from.”</p> +<p>“But is it not Frank’s protection?”</p> +<p>“Put yourself in that poor fellow’s place, Lena, and +see what it is to him to be cast off for such a reason. He did +the wrong, I know. He knew he ought not, apart from your resolution, +and he did thus prove his weakness and unfitness—”</p> +<p>“Oh no, no—it was not his fault.”</p> +<p>Julius laughed a little, and added, “I am not saying he deserves +you—hush!—or that it would be well to take him now, only +that I think to find himself utterly rejected for so insufficient a +reason, and when he was really deceived, would not only half kill him +now, but do his whole nature cruel harm.”</p> +<p>“What is to be done then?” sighed Eleonora.</p> +<p>“I should say, and I think my mother would put him on some +probation if you like, even before you call it an engagement; but give +him hope. Let him know that your attachment is as true and unselfish +as ever, and do not let him brood in misery, enhanced by his deafness.”</p> +<p>“I can’t marry while poor papa is like what he is,” +said she, as if trying to keep hold of her purpose.</p> +<p>“But you can be Frank’s light and hope—the prize +for which he can work.”</p> +<p>“If—your mother will have it so—then,” said +Eleonora, and the sigh that followed was one to relieve, not exhaust.</p> +<p>“May I tell her then?”</p> +<p>“You must, I suppose,” said the poor girl; “but +she can never wish it to go on!”</p> +<p>Julius left her at her own door and went home.</p> +<p>As Mrs. Poynsett said, she could expect nothing better of him. +“It is quite clear,” she said, “that poor Lena is +right, that Frank must not set up housekeeping with him. Even +if he were certain to be proof against temptation, it would be as bad +a connection as could be. I never thought of his being with them; +but I suppose there is nothing else to be done with him.”</p> +<p>“Frank ought not to be exposed to the trial. The old +man has a certain influence over him.”</p> +<p>“Though I should have thought such a hoary old wreck was nothing +but a warning. It has been a most unhappy affair from first to +last; but Lena is a good, unselfish girl, and nothing else will give +Frank a chance of happiness. Waiting will do them no harm, they +are young enough, and have no great sum to marry upon, so if you can +bring her to me to-morrow, Julius, I will ask her to grant my poor boy +leave to wait till she can see her way to marrying.”</p> +<p>Julius ventured to write down, ‘Hope on!’</p> +<p>To this Frank replied with rather a fiery look, “Mind, I will +not have her persuaded or worked on. It must be all her own doing. +Yes,” answering a look of his brother, “I see what you are +about. You want to tell her it is a superstition about her vow +and not using me fairly. So it may be in some points of view; +but the fact remains. She thought she might trust to my good sense +and principle, and it proved that she was wrong. After that it +is not right to force myself on her. I don’t dare to do +it, Julius. I have not been shut up with myself all these weeks +for nothing. I know now how unworthy I ever was to think of her +as mine. If I can ever prove my repentance she might in time forgive +me; but for her to be driven to take me out of either supposed justice +or mercy, I will not stand! A wretched deaf being like me! +It is not fitting, and I <i>will</i> not have it done!”</p> +<p>Julius wrote—“She is suffering greatly. She nearly +fainted at church, and I had to take her out.”</p> +<p>Frank’s face worked, and he put his hand over it as he said, +“You are all torturing her; I shall write a letter and settle +it myself.”</p> +<p>Frank did write the letter that very night, and when Julius next +saw Eleonora her eyes were swollen with weeping, and she said—</p> +<p>“Take me to him! I must comfort him!”</p> +<p>“You have heard from him?”</p> +<p>“Yes. Such a beautiful letter. But he must not +think it <i>that</i>.”</p> +<p>She did show the letter, reserved though she was. She was right +about it; Julius was struck with the humble sweetness, which made him +think more highly of poor Frank than ever he had done before. +He had decided against himself, feeling how much his fall at the race-ground +had been the effect of the manner in which he had allowed himself to +be led during the previous season in London, and owning how far his +whole aim in life fell short of what it ought to be, asking nothing +for himself, not even hope nor patience, though he could not refrain +from expressing his own undying love, and his one desire that if she +had not attached herself to one more worthy, he might in time be thought +to have proved his repentance. In the meantime she would and could +be only his beacon star.</p> +<p>Julius could not but take her home, and leave her with Frank, though +his mother was a little annoyed not to have first seen her; but when +Frank himself brought her to Mrs. Poynsett’s arms, it turned out +that the two ladies were quite of one mind as to the inexpediency of +Sir Harry living with Frank. They said it very covertly, but each +understood the other, and Eleonora went home wonderfully happier, and +looking as if her fresh beauty would soon return.</p> +<p>There was quite enough to dazzle Miles, whose first opinion was that +they were hard on Sir Harry, and that two ladies and a clergyman might +be making a great deal too much of an old man’s form of loitering, +especially in a female paradise of ritualism, as he was pleased to call +Rockpier, where all the male population seemed to be invalids.</p> +<p>However, it was not long before he came round to their view. +He found that Sir Harry, in spite of his gentlemanly speech and bearing, +was a battered old <i>roué</i>, who was never happy but when +gambling, and whose air and title were baits to victims of a lower class +than himself; young clerks and medical students who were flattered by +his condescension. He did not actually fleece them himself, he +had too little worldly wisdom for that; but he was the decoy of a coterie +of Nyms, Pistols, and Bardolphs, who gathered up the spoil of these +and any unwary youth who came to Rockpier in the wake of an invalid, +or to ‘see life’ at a fashionable watering-place. +Miles thought the old man was probably reduced to a worse style of company +by the very fact of the religious atmosphere of the place, where he +himself found so little to do that he longed for the opening of the +Session; but he was strongly impressed with the impracticability of +a <i>ménage</i> for Frank, with the baronet as father-in-law.</p> +<p>Not so, Sir Harry. He was rather fond of Frank, and had been +glad to be no longer bound to oppose the match, and he had benignantly +made up his mind to the great sacrifice of living in his house in London, +surrounding himself with all his friends, and making the young couple +supply him with pocket-money whenever he had a run of ill-luck. +They would grant it more easily than Camilla, and would never presume +to keep him under regulation as she had done. They would be too +grateful to him.</p> +<p>So, after a day or two, he demanded of Eleonora whether her young +man had given her up, or what he meant by his coolness in not calling? +Lena answered the last count by explaining how unwell he had been, and +how his hearing might be lost by a renewal of his cold. She was +however further pressed, and obliged to say how matters stood, namely, +that they were engaged, but meant to wait.</p> +<p>Whereupon, Sir Harry, quite sincerely, poor old man, grew compassionate +and grandly benignant. The young people were prudent, but he would +come to their aid. His pittance added to theirs—even now +would set all things straight. He would never stand in the way +of their happiness!</p> +<p>Mrs. Poynsett had bidden Lena cast the whole on her shoulders. +The girl was too truthful and generous to do this, fond as she still +was of her father.</p> +<p>“No, dear papa,” she said, “it is very kind in +you,” for she knew that so he meant it, “but I am afraid +it will not quite do. You see Frank must be very careful in his +situation—and I don’t think so quiet a way of life would +suit you.”</p> +<p>“Nonsense, child; I’m an old man, and I want no racketing. +Just house-room for myself and Victor. That fellow is worth two +women in a house. You’ll keep a good cook. I’ll +never ask for more than a few old friends to dinner, when I don’t +feel disposed to have them at the club.”</p> +<p>Old friends! Yes, Lenore knew them, and her flesh crept to +think of Frank’s chief hearing of them constantly at his house.</p> +<p>“I don’t think we should afford it, dear papa,” +she said. “We have agreed that I had better stay with you +for the present, and let Frank make his way.”</p> +<p>Then a thought occurred to Sir Harry. “Is this the Poynsetts’ +doing?”</p> +<p>“No,” said Eleonora, stoutly. “It is mine. +I know that—oh! papa, forgive me!—the things and people +you like would not be good for Frank, and I will not leave you nor bring +him into them. Never!”</p> +<p>Sir Harry swore—almost for the first time before her—that +this was that old hag Mrs. Poynsett’s doing, and that she would +make his child abandon him in his old age. He would not have his +daughter dragged into a long engagement. Wait—he knew what +waiting meant—wait for his death; but they should have her now +or not at all; and he flung away from her and her entreaties to announce +his determination to the suitor’s family.</p> +<p>He did not find this very easy to accomplish. Frank’s +ears were quite impervious to all his storming, and if he was to reduce +his words to paper, they came less easily. Miles, to whom he tried +to speak as a man of the world, would only repeat that his mother would +never consent to the marriage, unless the young couple were to live +alone; nay, he said, with a grain of justice, he thought that had been +Sir Harry’s own view in a former case. Would he like to +see Mrs. Poynsett? she is quite ready.</p> +<p>Again Sir Harry quailed at the notion of encountering Mrs. Poynsett; +but Miles, who had a great idea that his mother could deal with everybody, +and was the better for doing so, would not let him off, and ushered +him in, then stood behind her chair, and thoroughly enjoyed the grand +and yet courteous way in which she reduced to nothing Sir Harry’s +grand beneficence in eking out the young folks’ income with his +own. She knew very well that even when the estate was sold, at +the highest estimate, Eleonora would have the barest maintenance, and +that he could hardly expect what the creditors now allowed him, and +she made him understand that she knew this, and that she had a right +to make conditions, since Frank, like her other sons, could not enter +into possession of his share of his father’s fortune unless he +married with her consent.</p> +<p>And when he spoke of breaking off the engagement, she was callous, +and said that he must do as he pleased, though after young people were +grown up, she thought the matter ought to rest with themselves. +She did not wish her son to marry till his character was more confirmed.</p> +<p>He went home very angry, and yet crest-fallen, sought out Eleonora, +and informed her of his command, that her engagement should be broken +off.</p> +<p>“I do not know how that can be done, papa,” said Eleonora. +“We have never exactly made an engagement; we do not want to marry +at once, and we could not help loving each other if we tried.”</p> +<p>“Humph! And if I laid my commands on you never to marry +into that family?”</p> +<p>“I do not think you will do that, papa, after your promise +to Camilla.”</p> +<p>She had conquered. No further objection was made to her being +as much as she pleased with the Charnocks as long as they remained at +Rockpier, nor to her correspondence with Frank when he went away, not +to solitary lodgings as before, but to the London house, which Miles +and Anne only consented to keep on upon condition of their mother sharing +it with them.</p> +<h2>CHAPTER XXXVII<br /> +The Third Autumn</h2> +<blockquote><p>A good man ther was of religion,<br /> +That was a poure Persone of a toune;<br /> +But rich he was of holy thought and work,<br /> +He also was a learned man a clerk.—CHAUCER</p> +</blockquote> +<p>Autumn came round again, and brought with it a very different September +from the last.</p> +<p>Willansborough was in a state of commotion. That new Vicar +had not only filled the place with curates, multiplied services in the +iron church, and carried on the building of St. Nicholas in a style +of beauty that was quite affronting to those who were never asked to +contribute to it, but he gave people no peace in their easy conventional +sins, pricked them in their hearts with personal individual stings, +and, worse than all, protested against the races, as conducted at Wil’sbro’.</p> +<p>And their Member was just as bad! Captain Charnock Poynsett, +instead of subscribing, as part of his duty to his constituents, had +replied by sending his brother Raymond’s half-finished letter +to the club, with an equally strong and resolute one of his own, and +had published both in all the local papers.</p> +<p>Great was the fury and indignation of Wil’sbro’, Backsworth, +and all the squires around. Of course it was a delirious fancy +of poor Raymond Poynsett, and Miles had been worked upon by his puritanical +wife and ritualistic brother to publish it. Newspapers teemed +with abuse of superstition and pharisaism, and praise of this wholesome, +moral, and ‘truly English’ sport. Gentlemen, and ladies +too, took the remonstrance as a personal offence, and threatened to +visit no more at Compton; the electors bade him look to his seat, and +held meetings to invite ‘Mr. Simmonds Proudfoot,’ as he +now called himself, to represent them; and the last week, before the +races, the roughs mobbed him in Water Lane. He rode quietly through +them, with his sailor face set as if against a storm, but when he was +out of the place, he stopped his horse at Herbert Bowater’s lodgings, +that his black eye might be washed, and the streams of rotten egg removed +from his coat before he presented himself at home. Not that he +had much fear of startling his wife and mother. It was more from +the Englishman’s hatred of showing himself a hero, for Anne was +perfectly happy in the persecution he had brought on himself, for she +never had been so sure before that he was not of the world, worldly.</p> +<p>The races were exceptionally brilliant, and fully attended, but the +triumph of the roughs had made them more outrageously disgraceful in +their conduct than ever; and when Miles went to the quarter-sessions, +rather doubting whether he should not find himself landed in Coventry, +not only did the calendar of offences speak for itself, but sundry country +gentlemen shook him by the hand, lamenting that railways and rowdyism +had entirely altered races from what they used to be, that he was in +the right, and what they had seen so recently proved that the only thing +to be done was to withdraw from what respectable people could no longer +keep within bounds. Such withdrawal will not prevent them, but +it will hinder the demoralization from being so extensive as formerly, +since no one of much character to lose will attend them.</p> +<p>Mr. Bowater rejoiced in Miles’s triumph. None of that +family had been at these same races. They had all been much too +anxious about Herbert not to view Ember Week in a very different light +from that in which they had thought of it before.</p> +<p>Lent had brought the junior curate back from Strawyers, not much +more than a convalescent, but with his sister to look after him, and +both Rector and senior anxious to spare him; he had gone on well till +the family returned and resumed Jenny, when he was left to his own devices, +namely, ‘all work and no play.’ He was as fixed as +ever in his resolution of making this a penance year, and believed himself +so entirety recovered as to be able to do without relaxations. +Cricket, riding, dinners, and garden-parties alike he had given up, +and divided his time entirely between church and parish work and study. +Hard reading had never been congenial, and took a great deal out of +him, and in fact, all his theological study had hitherto been little +more than task-work, into which he had never fully entered, whereas +these subjects had now assumed such a force, depth, and importance, +that he did in truth feel constrained to go to the very foundation, +and work through everything again, moved and affected by them in every +fibre of his soul, which vibrated now at what it had merely acquiesced +in before. It was a phase that had come suddenly on him, when +his mind was in full vigour of development, and his frame and nerves +below par, and the effect could not but be severe. He was wrapped +up in these great realities, and seemed to care for no talk, except +discussing them with Julius or the senior curate, and often treated +things of common life like the dream that they really are.</p> +<p>Julius laid as little parish work on him as possible, only, indeed, +what seemed actually beneficial by taking him out; but it may be feared, +that in his present fervid state he was not nearly so winning to his +young clients as when he was less ‘terribly in earnest,’ +although the old women were perhaps more devoted to him, from the tender +conviction ‘that the poor dear young gentleman would not be here +long.’</p> +<p>For indeed it was true that he had never advanced in strength or +looks since his return, but rather lost ground, and thus every change +of weather, or extra exertion, told on him, till in August he was caught +in a thunder-storm, and the cold that ensued ran on into a feverish +attack, which barely left him in time for the Ordination, and then with +a depressed system, and nerves morbidly sensitive.</p> +<p>So sensible (or more than sensible) was he of his deficiencies, that +he would willingly have held back, and he was hardly well enough to +do himself justice; but there was no doubt that he would pass, and it +was plain that three more months of the strain of preparation might +leave permanent effects on his health.</p> +<p>As it was, the examining chaplain did not recognize the lean, pale, +anxious man, for the round-faced, rosy, overgrown boy of a year ago. +His scholarship and critical knowledge were fairly above the mark, in +spite of a racking headache; and his written sermon, together with all +that was elicited from him, revealed, all unconsciously to himself, +what treasures he had brought back from the deep waters which had so +nearly closed over him.</p> +<p>So superior had he shown himself, that he was appointed to read the +Gospel, a choice that almost shocked him, knowing that what had made +him excel had been an experience that the younger men had happily missed. +But the mark of approval was compensation to his parents and sisters +for the disappointment of the last year, and the only drawback was fear +of the effect of the long ceremonial, so deeply felt.</p> +<p>He met them afterwards, very white-faced, with head aching, and weary +almost beyond speech, but with a wonderfully calm, restful look on his +face, such as reminded Jenny of those first hours of his recovery.</p> +<p>They took him home and put him to bed, and there he lay, hardly speaking, +and generally sleeping. There he still was on the Monday, when +Julius came to inquire after him, and was taken up-stairs at once by +Jenny, with the greeting, “So the son and heir is come, Julius?”</p> +<p>“Yes, and I never saw my mother more exulting. When Rosamond +ran down to tell her, she put her arms round her neck and cried. +She who never had a tear through all last year. I met your father +and mother half-way, and they told me I might come on.”</p> +<p>“I think nothing short of such news would have made mamma leave +this boy,” said Jenny; “but she must have her jubilee with +Mrs. Poynsett.”</p> +<p>“And I’m quite well,” said Herbert, who had been +grasping Julius’s hand, with a wonderful look in his eyes; “yes, +really—the doctor said so.”</p> +<p>“Yes, he did,” said Jenny, “only he said we were +to let him alone, and that he was not to get up till he felt quite rested.”</p> +<p>“And I shall get up to dinner,” said Herbert, so sleepily, +that Julius doubted it. “I hope to come back before Sunday.”</p> +<p>“What does your doctor say to that?”</p> +<p>“He says,” replied Jenny, “that this gentleman +must be rational; that he has nothing the matter with him now, but that +he is low, and ripe for anything. Don’t laugh, you naughty +boy, he said you were ripe for anything, and that he must—yes, +he <i>must</i>—be turned out to grass somehow or other for the +winter, and do nothing at all.”</p> +<p>“I begin to see what you are driving at, Mrs. Joan, you look +so triumphant.”</p> +<p>“<i>Yes</i>,” said Jenny, blushing a little, and looking +quite young again; “I believe poor mamma would be greatly reconciled +to it, if Herbert were to see me out to Natal.”</p> +<p>“Is that to be the way?”</p> +<p>“It would be very absurd to make Archie come home again for +me,” said Jenny. “And everything else is most happily +smoothed for me, you know; Edith has come quite to take my place at +home; mamma learnt to depend on her much more than on me while I was +with Herbert.”</p> +<p>“And it has made her much more of a woman,” added Herbert.</p> +<p>“Then you know that full statement poor Mr. Moy put forth when +he left the place, on his wife’s death, quite removed all lingering +hesitation on papa’s part,” added Jenny.</p> +<p>“It ought, I am sure!” said Julius.</p> +<p>“So, now, if Herbert will go out with me, it seems to me to +be all right,” said Jenny, colouring deeply, as she made this +lame and impotent conclusion.</p> +<p>“My father wishes it,” said Herbert. “I believe +he meant to see you to-day to ask leave of absence for me. That +is what he wishes; but I have made up my mind that I ought to resign +the curacy—where I have never been any use to you—though, +if I had been well, I meant to have worked a year with you as a priest.”</p> +<p>“I don’t like to lose you, but I think you are right. +Your beginning with me was a mistake. There is not enough work +for three of us; but you know Easterby would be delighted to have you +at St. Nicholas. He says his most promising people talk of what +you said to them when they were ill, and he asked me if you could possibly +come to him.”</p> +<p>“I think it would be better to begin in a new place, further +from home,” said Herbert, quietly.</p> +<p>And both knew what he meant, and how hard it would be to be the clergyman +he had learnt to wish to be, if his mother were at hand to be distressed +by all he did or did not do.</p> +<p>“But, any way,” added Herbert, “I hope to have +some time longer at Compton before I go. Next Sunday, if I only +<i>can</i>.”</p> +<p>His mind was evidently full of the Feast of the Sunday, and Julius +answered, “Whichever Sunday you are strong enough, of course, +dear fellow. You had better come with him, Jenny, and sleep at +the Rectory.”</p> +<p>“Oh! thank you. I should like nothing so much; and I +think they will spare me that one day.”</p> +<p>“You will come in for a grand gathering, that is, if poor Cecil +accepts. Miles thinks she ought to be godmother.”</p> +<p>“Oh!”</p> +<p>“And no one has said a word of any cloud. It is better +he should know nothing.”</p> +<p>“And oh! Julius, is it true that her father has bought Sirenwood +for her?”</p> +<p>“Quite true. You know it was proposed at first, but the +trustees doubted of the title; but when all that was cleared up, it +turned out to be a better investment than Swanslea, and so they settled +it, without much reference to her.”</p> +<p>“She will let it, of course?”</p> +<p>“I suppose so.”</p> +<p>“You don’t think she will come to the christening?”</p> +<p>“I cannot tell; Rose has had one or two very sad letters from +her. She wanted us very much to come to Dunstone, and was much +disappointed that we were prevented. I fancy her heart has turned +to us, and that it is very sore, poor thing.”</p> +<p>Julius was right. Cecil did return an answer, whose warmth +quite amazed all but Miles and Anne, who thought nothing too much for +their son; and she gladly came to attend the christening of the young +Raymond. Gladly—yes, she was glad to leave Dunstone. +She had gone home weary and sick of her lodging and convalescence, and +hoping to find relief in the home that had once been all-sufficient +for her, but Dunstone was not changed, and she was. She had not +been able to help outgrowing its narrow opinions and formal precisions; +and when she came home, crushed with her scarcely realized grief, nothing +there had power to comfort her.</p> +<p>There was soothing at first in her step-mother’s kindness, +and she really loved her father; but their petting admiration soon grew +oppressive, after the more bracing air of Compton; and their idolatry +of her little brother fretted and tried her all the more, because they +thought he must be a comfort to her, and any slight from her might be +misconstrued. Mr. Venn’s obsequiousness, instead of rightful +homage, seemed deprivation of support, and she saw no one, spoke to +no one, without the sense of Raymond’s vast superiority and her +own insensibility to it, loving him a thousand times more than she had +loved him in life, and mourning him with an anguish beyond what the +most perfect union would have left. She had nothing to do. +Self-improvement was a mere oppression, and she longed after nothing +so much as the sight of Rosamond, Anne, Julius, or even Frank, and her +amiable wishes prevailed to have them invited to Dunstone; but at the +times specified there were hindrances. Anne had engagements at +home, and Rosamond appeared to the rest of the family to be a perpetual +refuge for stray De Lanceys, while Frank had to make up for his long +enforced absence by a long unbroken spell of work.</p> +<p>Cecil therefore had seen none of the family till she arrived at Compton. +She was perfectly well, she said, and had become a great walker, and +so, indeed, she showed herself, for she went out directly after breakfast +every morning, and never appeared again till luncheon time; and would +take long rides in the afternoon. “It was her only chance +of sleep,” she said, when remonstrated with. She did not +look ill, but there was a restless, worn air that was very distressing +on her young features, and was the more piteous to her relations, that +she was just as constrained as ever in her intercourse with them. +She was eagerly attentive to Mrs. Poynsett, and evidently so anxious +to wait on her that Anne left to her many little services, but if they +were alone together, they were tongue-tied, and never went deeper than +surface subjects. Mrs. Poynsett never discussed her, never criticized +her, never attempted to fathom her, being probably convinced that there +was nothing but hard coldness to be met with by probing. Yet there +was something striking in Cecil’s having made people call her +Mrs. Raymond Poynsett, surrendering the Charnock, which she had once +brandished in all their faces, and going by the name by which her husband +had been best known.</p> +<p>To Anne she was passively friendly, and neither gave nor sought confidences, +and Anne was so much occupied with her baby, and all the little household +services that had grown on her, as well as with her busy husband, that +there was little leisure for them; and though the meeting with Rosamond +was at first the most effusive and affectionate of all, afterwards she +seemed to avoid <i>têtes-à-têtes</i> with her, and +was shyer with her than with Anne.</p> +<p>It was Miles that she got on with best. He had never so fully +realized the unhappiness of his brother’s married life as those +who had watched it; and he simply viewed her as Raymond’s loved +and loving widow and sincere mourner, and treated her with all brotherly +tenderness and reverence for her grief; while she responded with a cordiality +and gratitude which made her, when talking to him, a pleasanter person +than she had ever been seen at Compton before.</p> +<p>But it was not to Miles, but to Rosamond, that she brought an earnest +question, walking in one autumn morning to the Rectory, amid the falling +leaves of the Virginian-creeper, and amazing Rosamond, who was writing +against time for the Indian mail, by asking—</p> +<p>“Rosamond, will you find out if Mrs. Poynsett would mind my +coming to live at Sirenwood?”</p> +<p>“You, Cecil!”</p> +<p>“Yes, I’m old enough. There’s no place for +me at home, and though I must be miserable anywhere, it will be better +where I have something to do, of some real use to somebody. I’ve +been walking all round every day, and seeing what a state it is in—in +the hands of creditors all these years.”</p> +<p>“But you would be quite alone!”</p> +<p>“I am quite alone as it is.”</p> +<p>“And would your father consent?”</p> +<p>“I think he would. I am a burthen to them now. +They cannot feel my grief, nor comfort it, and they don’t like +the sight of it, though I am sure I trouble them with it as little as +possible.”</p> +<p>“Dear Cecil!” and the ready tears welled up in Rosamond’s +gray eyes.</p> +<p>“I don’t want to talk of it,” said Cecil. +“If I felt worthy to grieve it would be less dreadful; but it +all seems like hypocrisy. Rosamond, if you were to lose Julius +to-morrow, you would not be as unhappy as I am.”</p> +<p>“Don’t, don’t!” cried Rosamond, making a +gesture of horror. “But does not coming here make it worse?”</p> +<p>“No, real stabs are better than dull aching; and then you—you, +Rosamond, did know how it really was, and that I would—I would—”</p> +<p>Cecil wept now as Rosamond had longed to see her weep when she had +left Compton, and Rosamond spoke from her tender heart of comfort; but +the outburst did not last long, and Cecil said, recovering herself—</p> +<p>“After all, my most peaceful times of late have been in walking +about in those woods at Sirenwood; I should like to live there. +You know <i>he</i> always wished it to be the purchase, because it joins +Compton, and I should like to get it all into perfect order and beauty, +and leave it all to little Raymond.”</p> +<p>“I should have thought the place would have been full of ghosts.”</p> +<p>“I tried. I made the woman let me in, and I sat where +poor Camilla used to talk to me, and I thought I was the better for +facing it out. The question is whether Mrs. Poynsett will dislike +it. She has a right to be consulted.”</p> +<p>Perhaps Cecil could not be gracious. Certainly, Raymond would +have been thankful for even this admission.</p> +<p>“You wish me to find out?”</p> +<p>“If you would be so good. I would give it up at once +if she has any feeling against it, and go somewhere else—and of +course she has! She never can forget what I did!”</p> +<p>Rosamond caressed Cecil with that sweetness which saw everything +in the most consoling manner; but when the poor young widow was out +of sight, there was a revulsion of feeling.</p> +<p>“No, Mrs Poynsett must always feel that that wretched marriage +broke her son’s heart, and murdered him!—murdered him!” +said Rosamond to herself, clenching that soft fist of hers. “It +ought not to be broached to her!”</p> +<p>But Julius—when she stated it to him rather less broadly, but +still saying that she did not know whether she could bear the sight +of Cecil, except when she was before her eyes, and how could his mother +endure her at all—did not see it in the same light. He thought +Sirenwood gave duties to Cecil, and that she ought not to be hindered +from fulfilling them. And he said his mother was a large-minded +woman, and not likely to have that personal bitterness towards Cecil +that both the ladies seemed to expect, as her rival in her son’s +affections, and the means of his unhappiness and death.</p> +<p>He was right; Mrs. Poynsett was touched by finding that Cecil clung +to them rather than to her sublime family, and especially by the design +as to little Raymond, though she said that must never be mentioned; +nothing must bind so young a creature as Cecil, who really did not know +what love was at all.</p> +<p>“She is afraid the sight of her is distressing to you,” +said Rosamond.</p> +<p>“Poor child, why should she?” said Mrs. Poynsett. +“She was the victim of an unsuccessful experiment of my dear boy’s, +and the unsuspecting instrument of poor Camilla’s vengeance. +That is all I see in her.”</p> +<p>“Mrs. Poynsett, how can you!” cried Rosamond, impetuously. +“With all I know of her sorrow, I rage at her whenever I am out +of sight of her.”</p> +<p>“I can’t do that,” said Mrs. Poynsett, half smiling, +“any more than I could at a doll. The poor thing was in +a false position, and nobody was more sorry for her than Raymond himself; +but you see he had fancied that marriage must bring the one thing it +would not in that short time.”</p> +<p>“It would, if she had not been a little foolish donkey.”</p> +<p>“Or if Camilla Tyrrell had let her alone! It is of no +use to rake up these things, my dear Rosamond. Let her come to +Sirenwood, and do such good as she can there, if it can comfort her. +It was for my sake that the unconscious girl was brought here to have +her life spoilt, and I would not stand in the way of what seems to be +any relief.”</p> +<p>“But is it no pain?” persisted Rosamond.</p> +<p>“No, my dear. I almost wish it was. I shall never +get on with her; but I am glad she should come and be near you all; +and Miles likes her.”</p> +<p>Mr. Charnock demurred at first, and wanted to saddle Cecil with her +old governess as a companion, but when he found that Mrs. Poynsett and +Miles made no objection, and remembered that she would be under their +wing, and would be an inestimable adviser and example to Anne, he consented; +and Cecil’s arrangements were made with startling rapidity, so +that she was in possession before Christmas, which she insisted on spending +there. Dunstone had stereotyped hospitalities, which she could +not bear, and would not prevent, and now that her first year of widowhood +was over, the sorrow was not respected, while it seemed to her more +oppressive than ever.</p> +<p>So there she was in vehement activity; restless rather than religious +in her beneficence still, though the lesson she had had showed itself +in her constantly seeking the advice of Miles, who thought her the most +sensible woman in the world, except his Nan. Whether this constant +occupation, furnishing, repairing, planning, beautifying her model cottages, +her school chapel, and all the rest, were lessening the heartache, no +one knew, but the sharp black eyes looked as dry and hard, the lines +round the mouth as weary as ever; and Rosamond sometimes thought if +Sirenwood were not full of ghosts to her, she was much like a ghost +herself who came</p> +<blockquote><p>“Hovering around her ancient home,<br /> + To find no refuge there.”</p> +</blockquote> +<p>There was another who could not help seeing her somewhat in that +light, and this was Eleonora Vivian, who had come to Compton to be with +Frank, when he was at last able to enjoy a well-earned holiday, and +with ears restored to their natural powers, though he always declared +that his eight months of deafness had done him more good than anything +that had ever befallen him in his life. It had thrown him in on +his real self, and broken all the unfortunate associations of his first +year in London. His first few months, while he was still in need +of care, had been spent with Miles and Anne, and that tender ministry +to him which his sister-in-law had begun in his illness had been with +him when he was tired, dispirited, or beset by the trials of a tardy +convalescence. As his interpreter, too, and caterer for the pleasures +his infirmity allowed, Anne had been educating herself to a degree that +‘self’ improvement never would have induced.</p> +<p>And when left alone in London, he was able to take care of himself +in all ways, and had followed the real leadings of his disposition, +which his misdirected courtship had interrupted for the time, returning +to the intellectual pursuits which were likely to be beneficial, not +only as pleasures, but in an economical point of view; and he was half +shy, half proud of the profits, such as they were, of a few poems and +essays which he certainly had not had it in him to write before the +ordeal he had undergone.</p> +<p>Eleonora’s elder sister, Mrs. Fanshaw, had come home from India +with her husband, newly made a Major-General. Frank had gone to +Rockpier early in January, to be introduced to them, and after spending +a day or two there, to escort Lena to Compton. Mrs. Poynsett needed +but one glance to assure her that the two were happier than their wooing +had ever made them before, save in that one brief moment at Cecil’s +party. Eleonora looked more beautiful, and the look of wistful +pain had left her brow, but it had made permanent lines there, as well +had seemed likely, and though her laugh would never have the <i>abandon</i> +of Rosamond’s, still it was not so very rare, and though she was +still like a beautiful night, it was a bright moonlight one.</p> +<p>A few private interviews made the cause of the change apparent. +The sister, Mary Fanshaw, had something of Camilla’s dexterity, +but having been early married to a good man, she had found its use instead +of its abuse; and though Lena’s trust had come very slowly, she +had given it at last, and saw that her elders could deal with her father +as she could never do. Sir Harry respected the General enough +to let himself be restrained by him, and the husband and wife were ready +to take the charge—removing, however, from Rockpier, for the religious +atmosphere of which they were unprepared, and which General Fanshaw +thought very dull. Affairs were in course of being wound up on +the sale of Sirenwood, and the General had talked to Frank, as one of +the family, in a way that had proved to him his own manhood more than +anything that had happened to him. Out of the wreck, nothing remained +to the old man, and the portion which had been secured by the mother’s +marriage settlements to younger children, though hitherto out of reach, +was felt by the daughters to be due to the creditors, so that only two +thousand pounds apiece had been secured to each of them; and this the +General consulted Frank about appropriating for Sir Harry’s use +during his lifetime, himself retaining the management, so as to secure +the attendance of the favourite valet, the keeping of a horse, and a +fair amount of <i>menus plaisirs.</i></p> +<p>It was also made plain to Frank that Lena’s filial duties and +scruples need no longer stand in the way of the marriage. Mrs. +Fanshaw had two girls almost come out, and perhaps she did not wish +them to be overshadowed by the aunt, who, however retiring, could not +help being much more beautiful. So all that remained was that +Mrs. Poynsett should be willing to supplement Frank’s official +income with his future portion. She was all the more rejoiced, +as this visit showed her for the first time what Lena really was when +brought into the sunshine without dread of what she might hear or see, +or of harm being done by her belongings; and her gratitude for the welcome +with which she was received was most touching.</p> +<p>The rest of her family were in course of removing to their new home, +where Mrs. Fanshaw would be mistress of the house, and so Eleonora’s +stay at Compton was prolonged till the general migration to London, +which was put off till Easter. Just before this, Herbert Bowater +came back from Natal, and walked from Strawyers with all his happy dogs, +as strong and hearty and as merry as ever; his boyish outlines gone, +but wholesome sunburn having taken the place of his rosiness, and his +bonny smile with its old joyousness. He had married Jenny and +Archie himself, and stayed a month on their ostrich farm, which he declared +was a lesson on woman’s rights, since Mrs. Ostrich was heedless +and indifferent as to her eggs, but was regularly hunted back to the +duties by her husband, who always had two wives, and regularly forced +them to take turns in sitting; a system which Herbert observed would +be needful if the rights of women were to work. He had brought +offerings of eggs and feathers to Lady Rosamond, and pockets full of +curiosities for all his village friends; also, he had been at the Cape, +had seen Glen Fraser, rejoiced the inhabitants with his accounts of +Anne, and brought home a delightful budget for her.</p> +<p>But the special cause of his radiance was a letter he brought from +his father to Mr. Bindon. The family living, which had decided +his own profession, had fallen vacant, and his father, wishing perhaps +not to be thought cruel and unnatural by his wife, had made no appointment +until Herbert’s return, well knowing that he would decide against +himself: and feeling that, as things stood, it would be an awkward exercise +of patronage to put him in at once. Herbert had declared that +nothing would have induced him to accept what he persuaded his father +to let him offer to James Bindon, whom he had found to have an old mother +in great need of the comfortable home, which, without interest, or any +talent save for hard work, he could scarcely hope to secure to her.</p> +<p>“And you, Herbert,” said Julius, “can I ask you +to come back to me, now that we shall have a fair amount to do between +us?”</p> +<p>Herbert smiled and shook his head, as he took out an advertisement +for a curate in one of the blackest parishes of the Black Country. +“I’ve written to answer that,” he said.</p> +<p>Julius did not try to hinder him. What had been exaggerated +had parsed away, and he was now a brave man going forth in his strength +and youth to the service he had learnt to understand; able still keenly +to enjoy, but only using pleasure as an incidental episode for the delight +of others, and as subordinate to the true work of his life.</p> +<p>He asked for his fellow-worker, Mrs. Duncombe. There were tidings, +but disappointing ones. She had written a long letter to Julius, +full of her reasons for being received into the Roman Communion, where +she rapturously declared she had for the first time found peace. +Anne and Rosamond took the change most bitterly to heart, but Julius, +though believing he could have saved her from the schism, by showing +her the true beauty and efficiency of her own Church, could not wonder +at this effect of foreign influences on one so recently and imperfectly +taught, and whose ardent nature required strong forms of whatever she +took up. And the letters she continued to write to Julius were +rapturous in the cause of the Pope and as to all that she had once most +contemned. She had taken her children with her, but her husband +remained tolerant, indifferent, and so probably he would do while his +health lasted.</p> +<p>Early in the summer Frank and Eleonora were married, and a pretty +little house in the outskirts of London found for them, suiting with +the grace of the one and the poetry of the other. It was a small, +quiet household, but could pleasantly receive those literary friends +of Frank’s whom he delighted to present to his beautiful and appreciative +wife, whose sweetness and brightness grew every day under the influence +of affection and confidence. The other augury of poor Lady Tyrrell, +that their holidays would be spent at Compton Hall, was fulfilled, but +very pleasantly for both parties, for it was as much home to Lena as +to Frank.</p> +<p>Miles’s geniality made all at ease that came near him, and +Anne, though never a conversational person, was a quietly kind hostess, +much beloved by all who had experienced her gentleness, and she had +Frank and Lena to give distinction in their different ways to her London +parties, as at Compton, Rosamond never failed to give everything a charm +where she assisted in planning or receiving.</p> +<p>Rosamond would never cease to love society. Even had she been +a grandmother she would have fired at the notion of a party, enjoy, +and render it enjoyable; and the mere announcement of a new face would +be as stimulating to her as it was the reverse to Anne. But she +had grown into such union with her husband, and had so forgotten the +Rathforlane defence, as to learn that it was pleasanter to do as he +liked than to try to make him like what she did, and a look of disapproval +from him would open her eyes to the flaws in any scheme, however enchanting +at first.</p> +<p>She was too necessary an element in all hospitalities of Cecil or +of Anne not to get quite as much diversion as so thorough a wife and +mother could find time for, since Julia did not remain by any means +an only child, and besides her permanent charge of Terence, relays of +De Lanceys were constantly casting up at the Rectory for mothering in +some form or other.</p> +<p>Cecil depended on her more than on any one else for sympathy, not +expressly in feeling, but in all her pursuits. In three years’ +time Sirenwood was in perfect order, the once desolate garden blazed +with ribbons, triangles and pattipans of verbena, scarlet geranium and +calceolaria, with intervals of echiverias, pronounced by Tom to be like +cabbages trying to turn into copper kettles; her foliage plants got +all the prizes at horticultural shows, her poultry were incomparable +at their exhibitions, her cottages were models, her school machinery +perfect, and if a pattern in farming apparatus were wanted, people went +to Mrs. Raymond Poynsett’s steward. She had people of note +to stay with her every winter, went to London for the season, and was +made much of, and all the time she looked as little, and pinched, and +weary, and heart-hungered as ever, and never seemed to thaw or warm, +clinging to no one but to Miles for counsel, and to Rosamond for the +fellow-feeling it was not always easy to give—when it was apparently +only about an orchid or a churn—and yet Rosamond tried, for she +knew it was starvation for sympathy.</p> +<p>The Charnock world murmured a little when, after a succession of +De Lancey visitors for four months, the Rectory was invaded by Rosamond’s +eldest brother, Lord Ballybrehon, always the most hair-brained of the +family, and now invalided home in consequence of a concussion of the +brain while pigsticking in India. He was but a year older than +Rosamond, and her favourite of all, whose scrapes she had shared, befriended, +defended, and scolded in turn, very handsome, very lazily daring, droll +and mischievous, a sort of concentration of all the other De Lanceys. +His sister loved him passionately, he fascinated the Rector, and little +Julia was the adorer of Uncle Bally.</p> +<p>But Rosamond was rather aghast to find Bally making such love as +only an Irishman could do to the prim little widow at Sirenwood, dismayed +and a little bit ashamed of her unspoken conviction that Bally, after +all his wild freaks and frolics, had come to have an eye to the needs +of the Rathforlane property; and what were her feelings when, instead +of finding the wild Irishman contemned, she perceived that he was believed +in and met fully half way? The stiffness melted, the eyes softened +and sparkled, the lips parted in soft agitated smiles, the cheeks learnt +to blush, and Cecil was absolutely and thoroughly in love!</p> +<p>Yes, she had found her heart and was won—won in spite of the +Dunstone dislike to the beggarly title—in spite of Miles’s +well-considered cautions—in spite of all her original self. +And if Ballybrehon began from mere desire to try for the well-endowed +widow, he had the warm loving nature that was sure to kindle and reciprocate +the affection he evoked, enough to make him a kind husband.</p> +<p>And yet, could any one have wished Cecil Poynsett a more trying life +than one of her disposition must needs have with impetuous, unpunctual, +uncertain, scatter-brained, open-handed Ballybrehon, always in a scramble, +always inviting guests upon guests without classification, and never +remembering whom he had invited!</p> +<p>Rosamond herself declared she should be either in a rage or worn +to fritters by a month of it. How Cecil liked it never appeared. +Some thought that they squabbled and worried each other in private, +but it is certain that, as Terry said, Bally had turned the block into +living flesh and blood, and Lady Ballybrehon was wondrously livelier, +brighter, and sweeter ever since she had been entirely conquered by +the tyrant love, and had ceased to be the slave of her own way.</p> +<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE THREE BRIDES***</p> +<pre> + + +***** This file should be named 12485-h.htm or 12485-h.zip****** + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/4/8/12485 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Yonge + +Release Date: June 1, 2004 [eBook #12485] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: US-ASCII + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE THREE BRIDES*** + + +Transcribed by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk + + + + +THE THREE BRIDES + + + + +CHAPTER I +The Model And Her Copies + + +There is sure another Flood toward, that so many couples are +coming to the Ark.--As You Like It + +"Ah! it is a pitiable case!" + +"What case, boys?" + +"Yours, mother, with such an influx of daughters-in-law." + +"I suspect the daughters-in-law think themselves more to be pitied." + +"As too many suns in one sphere." + +"As daughters-in-law at all." + +"There's a ready cure for that. Eh, Charlie?" + +"The sight of the mother-in-law." + +"Safe up on the shelf? Ha, you flattering boys!" + +"Well, each of the three bridegrooms has severally told us that his +bride was a strong likeness of the mother, so she will have the +advantage of three mirrors!" + +"Ay, and each married solely for her benefit. I wonder which is the +truest!" + +"Come, Baby Charles, don't _you_ take to being cynical and +satirical," said the mother. "It would be more to the purpose to +consider of the bringing them home. Let me see, Raymond and his +Cecil will be at Holford's Gate at 5.30. They must have the +carriage in full state. I suppose Brewer knows." + +"Trust the ringers for scenting it out." + +"Julius and Rosamond by the down train at Willansborough, at 4.50. +One of you must drive old Snapdragon in the van for them. They will +not mind when they understand; but there's that poor wife of +Miles's, I wish she could have come a few days earlier. Her friend, +Mrs. Johnson, is to drop her by the express at Backsworth, at 3.30." + +"Inconvenient woman!" + +"I imagine that she cannot help it; Mrs. Johnson is going far north, +and was very good in staying with her at Southampton till she could +move. Poor little thing! alone in a strange country! I'll tell you +what! One of you must run down by train, meet her, and either bring +her home in a fly, or wait to be picked up by Raymond's train. Take +her Miles's letter." + +The two young men glanced at one another in dismay, and the elder +said, "Wouldn't nurse do better?" + +"No, no, Frank," said the younger, catching a distressed look on +their mother's face, "I'll look up Miles's little African. I've +rather a curiosity that way. Only don't let them start the bells +under the impression that we are a pair of the victims. If so, I +shall bolt." + +"Julius must be the nearest bolting," said Frank. "How he +accomplished it passes my comprehension. I shall not believe in it +till I see him. There, then, I'll give orders. Barouche for the +squire, van for the rector, and the rattling fly for the sailor's +wife. So wags the course of human life," chanted Frank Charnock, as +he strolled out of the room. + +"Thanks, Charlie," whispered his mother. "I am grieved for that +poor young thing. I wish I could go myself. And, Charlie, would +you cast an eye round, and see how things look in their rooms? You +have always been my daughter." + +"Ah! my vocation is gone! Three in one day! I wonder which is the +best of the lot. I bet upon Miles's Cape Gooseberry.--Tired, mother +darling? Shall I send in nurse? I must be off, if I am to catch +the 12.30 train." + +He bent to kiss the face, which was too delicately shaped and tinted +to look old enough to be in expectation of three daughters-in-law. +No, prostrate as she was upon pillows, Mrs. Charnock Poynsett did +not look as if she had attained fifty years. She was lady of +Compton Poynsett in her own right; and had been so early married and +widowed, as to have been the most efficient parental influence her +five sons had ever known; and their beautiful young mother had been +the object of their adoration from the nursery upwards, so that she +laughed at people who talked of the trouble and anxiety of rearing +sons. + +They had all taken their cue from their senior, who had always been +more to his mother than all the world besides. For several years, +he being as old of his age as she was young, Mr. and Mrs. Charnock +Poynsett, with scarcely eighteen years between their ages, had often +been taken by strangers for husband and wife rather than son and +mother. And though she knew she ought to wish for his marriage, she +could not but be secretly relieved that there were no symptoms of +any such went impending. + +At last, during the first spring after Raymond Charnock Poynsett, +Esquire, had been elected member for the little borough of +Willansborough, his mother, while riding with her two youngest boys, +met with an accident so severe, that in two years she had never +quitted the morning-room, whither she had at first been carried. +She was daily lifted to a couch, but she could endure no further +motion, though her general health had become good, and her +cheerfulness made her room pleasant to her sons when the rest of the +house was very dreary to them. + +Raymond, always the home son, would never have absented himself but +for his parliamentary duties, and vibrated between London and home, +until, when his mother had settled into a condition that seemed +likely to be permanent, and his two youngest brothers were at home, +reading each for his examination, the one for a Government +clerkship, the other for the army, he yielded to the general +recommendation, and set out for a journey on the Continent. + +A few weeks later came the electrifying news of his engagement to +his second cousin, Cecil Charnock. It was precisely the most +obvious and suitable of connections. She was the only child of the +head of the family of which his father had been a cadet, and there +were complications of inheritance thus happily disposed of. Mrs. +Poynsett had not seen her since her earliest childhood; but she was +known to have been educated with elaborate care, and had been taken +to the Continent as the completion of her education, and there +Raymond had met her, and sped so rapidly with his wooing, that he +had been married at Venice just four weeks previously. + +Somewhat less recent was the wedding of the second son Commander +Miles Charnock. (The younger sons bore their patronymic alone.) +His ship had been stationed at the Cape and there, on a hunting +expedition up the country, he had been detained by a severe illness +at a settler's house; and this had resulted in his marrying the +eldest daughter, Anne Fraser. She had spent some months at Simon's +Bay while his ship was there, and when he found himself under orders +for the eastern coast of Africa, she would fain have awaited him at +Glen Fraser; but he preferred sending her home to fulfil the mission +of daughterhood to his own mother. + +The passage had been long and unfavourable, and the consequences to +her had been so serious that when she landed she could not travel +until after a few days' rest. + +The marriage of the third son had been a much greater surprise. +Compton Poynsett was not a family living; but the patron, hearing of +Julius Charnock as a hard-working curate in a distant seaport, wrote +to offer it to him; and the same letter to Mrs. Poynsett to offer it +to him; and the same letter to Mrs Poynsett which conveyed this +gratifying intelligence, also informed her of his having proposed to +the daughter of the commanding officer of the regiment stationed at +the town where lay his present charge. Her father enjoyed the +barren honours of the Earldom of Rathforlane, an unimprovable estate +in a remote corner of Ireland, burthened with successive families of +numerous daughters, so that he was forced to continue in the +service, and the marriage had been hastened by the embarkation of +the regiment for India only two days later. The Rectory had, +however, been found in such a state of dilapidation, that demolition +was the only cure; and thus the Reverend Julius and Lady Rosamond +Charnock were to begin their married life in the family home. + +The two youngest sons, Francis and Charles, stood on the other side +of a gap made by the loss of two infants, and were only twenty-one +and nineteen. Frank had passed through Oxford with credit, and had +been promised a Government office; while Charles was intended for +the army; and both had been reading with a tutor who lived at +Willansborough, and was continually employed in cramming, being +reported of as the best 'coach' in the country. Charlie, however, +had passed a week previously, and was to repair to Sandhurst in +another fortnight. + +At half-past four there was a light tap at Mrs. Poynsett's door, and +Charlie announced, "Here's the first, mother!" as he brought in a +gray-cloaked figure; and Mrs. Poynsett took a trembling hand, and +bestowed a kiss on a cheek which had languor and exhaustion in the +very touch. + +"She was tired to death, mother," said Charlie, "so we did not wait +for the train." + +"Quite right!" and as the newcomer sank into the chair he offered-- +"My dear, you are sadly knocked up! You were hardly fit to come." + +"Thank you, I am quite well," answered the fagged timid voice. + +"Hark!" as the crash of a peal of bells came up. "Dear child, you +will like to rest before any fresh introductions. You shall go to +your room and have some tea there." + +"Thank you." + +"Charlie, call Susan.--She is my boys' old nurse, now mine. Only +tell me you have good accounts from my boy Miles." + +"Oh yes;" and the hand tightly clasped the closely-written letter +for which the mother's eyes felt hungry. "He sent you his love, and +he will write to you next time. He was so busy, his first +lieutenant was down in fever." + +"Where was he?" + +"Off Zanzibar--otherwise the crew was healthy--the 12th of August," +she answered, squeezing out the sentences as if constrained by the +mother's anxious gaze. + +"And he was quite well when you parted with him?" + +"Quite." + +"Ah! you nursed my boy, and we must nurse you for him." + +"Thank you, I am quite well." But she bit her lip, and spoke +constrainedly, as if too shy and reserved to give way to the rush of +emotion; but the coldness pained Mrs. Poynsett, whose expansiveness +was easily checked; and a brief silence was followed by Charlie's +return to report that he could not find nurse, and thought she was +out with the other servants, watching for the arrival; in another +moment, the approaching cheers caused him to rush out; and after +many more noises, showing the excitement of the multitude and the +advance of the bridal pair, during which Mrs. Poynsett lay with +deepening colour and clasped hands, her nostrils dilating with +anxiety and suppressed eagerness, there entered a tall, dark, +sunburnt man bringing on his arm a little, trim, upright, girlish +figure; and bending down, he exclaimed, "There, mother, I've brought +her--here's your daughter!" + +Two little gloved hands were put into hers, and a kiss exchanged, +while Raymond anxiously inquired for his mother's health; and she +broke in by saying, "And here is Anne--Miles's Anne, just arrived." + +"Ah, I did not see you in the dark," said Raymond. "There, Cecil, +is a sister for you--you never had one." + +Cecil was readier with greeting hand and cheek than was Anne, but at +the same moment the tea equipage was brought in, and Cecil, quite +naturally, and as a matter of course, began to preside over the low +table, while Raymond took his accustomed chair on the further side +of his mother's sofa, where he could lean over the arm and study her +countenance, while she fondled the hand that he had hung over the +back. He was describing the welcome at the station, and all through +the village--the triumphal arches and shouts. + +"But how they _did_ miss you, mother," said Charlie. "Old Gurnet +wrung my hand in tears as he said, 'Yes, sir, 'tis very fine, but it +beats the heart out of it that madam bain't here to see.'" + +"Good old Gurnet!" responded Raymond. "They are famously loyal. +The J. C. P. crowned all above all the Cs and Rs, I was happy to +see." + +"J. was for Julius--not Julia," said the mother. + +"No; J. H. C. and R. C. had a separate device of roses all to +themselves. Hark! is that a cheer beginning again? Had we not +better go into the drawing-room, mother? it will be so many for you +all together." + +"Oh no, I must see you all." + +The brothers hurried out with their welcome; and in another minute, +a plump soft cheek was pressed to the mother's, devouring kisses +were hailed on her, and a fuller sweeter tone than had yet been +heard answered the welcome. + +"Thank you. So kind! Here's Julius! I'll not be in your way." + +"Dearest mother, how is it with you?" as her son embraced her. +"Rose has been longing to be with you." + +"And we've all come together! How delicious!" cried Rosamond, +enfolding Anne in her embrace; "I didn't know you were come!--See, +Julius!" + +But as Julius turned, a startled look came over Anne's face; and she +turned so white, that Rosamond exclaimed, "My dear--what--she's +faint!" And while Cecil stood looking puzzled, Rosamond had her arm +round the trembling form, and disappeared with her, guided and +assisted by Nurse Susan. + +"Isn't she--?" exclaimed Julius, in a voice of triumph that made all +smile. + +"Full of sweet kindness," said Mrs. Poynsett; "but I have only seen +and heard her yet, my dear Julius. Susan will take her to her room-- +my old one." + +"Oh, thank you, mother," said Julius, "but I hardly like that; it +seems like your giving it up." + +"On the contrary, it proves that I do not give it up, since I put in +temporary lodgers like you.--Now Cecil is housed as you preferred, +Raymond--in the wainscot-rooms." + +"And where have you put that poor Mrs. Miles?" asked Raymond. "She +looks quite knocked up." + +"Yes, she has been very ill on the voyage, and waited at Southampton +to gather strength for the journey.--I am so grateful to your good +Rose, Julius.--Why, where is the boy? Vanished in her wake, I +declare!" + +"His venerable head is quite turned," said Frank. "I had to get +inside alone, and let them drive home outside together to avoid +separation." + +Raymond repeated his question as to the quarters of Miles's wife. + +"I had the old schoolroom and the bedroom adjoining newly fitted +up," answered Mrs. Poynsett. "Jenny Bowater was here yesterday, and +gave the finishing touches. She tells me the rooms look very nice.-- +Cecil, my dear, you must excuse deficiencies; I shall look to you +in future." + +"I hope to manage well," said Cecil. "Had I not better go up now? +Will you show me the way, Raymond?" + +The mother and her two younger sons remained. + +"Haven't I brought you home a splendid article?" was Frank's +exclamation. "Julius has got the best of it." + +"I back my Cape Gooseberry," returned Charles. "She has eyes and +hair and skin that my Lady can't match, and is a fine figure of a +woman besides." + +"Much you know of Rosamond's eyes!" + +"Or you either, boxed up in the van." + +"Any way, they have made roast meat of his Reverence's heart! The +other two take it much more easily." + +"She's a mere chicken," said Charlie. "Who would have thought of +Raymond being caught by a callow nestling?" + +"And so uncommonly cool," added Frank. + +"It would take much to transform Raymond," interposed the mother. +"Now, boys, away with you; I must have a little quiet, to repair +myself for company after dinner." + +Charlie settled her cushions with womanly skill, and followed his +brother. "Well, Frank, which is the White Cat? Ah, I thought so-- +she's yet to come." + +"Not one is fit to hold a candle to _her_. You saw that as plain as +I did, Charlie; Eleonora beats them all." + +"Ah, you're not the youngest brother, remember. It was he who +brought her home at last. Come, you need not knock me down; I shall +never see any one to surpass the mother, and I'll have no one till I +do." + + + + +CHAPTER II +The Population of Compton Poynsett + + +He wanted a wife his braw hoose to keep, +But favour wi' wooin' was fashous to seek.--Laird o' Cockpen + +In the bright lamplight of the dining-table, the new population +first fully beheld one another, and understood one another's looks. + +There was much family resemblance between the five brothers. All +were well-grown well-made men, strong and agile, the countenance +pleasing, rather square of mould, eyebrows straight and thick, nose +well cut and short, chin firm and resolute-looking, and the +complexion very dark in Raymond, Frank, and the absent Miles. +Frank's eyes were soft, brown, rather pensive, and absent in +expression; but Raymond's were much deeper and darker, and had a +steadfast gravity, that made him be viewed as formidable, especially +as he had lost all the youthful glow of colouring that mantled in +his brother's olive cheek; and he had a short, thick, curly brown +beard, while Frank had only attained to a black moustache, that +might almost have been drawn on his lip with charcoal. + +Charlie was an exception--fair, blue-eyed, rosy, and with a soft +feminine contour of visage, which had often drawn on him reproaches +for not being really the daughter all his mother's friends desired +for her. + +And Julius, with the outlines of the others, was Albino, with +transparent skin mantling with colour that contrasted with his snowy +hair, eyebrows, and the lashes, veiling eyes of a curious coral hue, +really not unpleasing under their thick white fringes, but most +inconveniently short of sight, although capable of much work; in +fact, he was a curiously perfect pink-and-white edition of his dark +and bronzed brother the sailor. + +The dark eyes came from the father's side; Cecil had them, and very +observing orbs they seemed to be, travelling about from one face to +another, and into every corner of the room, scrutinizing every +picture or piece of plate, and trying to see into the conservatory, +which had a glass door opening from one end of the room. She was +the youngest of the brides, and her features and form seemed hardly +developed, nor had she attained the air of a matron; her fashionable +dress of crisp white worked muslin with blue trimmings, and blue +ribbons in her brown hair, only gave her the air of a young girl at +her first party, in spite of her freedom from all shyness as she sat +at the head of the table in contented self-possession, her little +slender figure as upright as a perfect spine could make it. + +Very different was the bride on Raymond's right hand. She was of +middle height, soft, round, and plump, carrying her head a little +tenderly on one side with a delightful degagee kind of ease, and air +of vivacious indolence. Her complexion was creamy and colourless, +her nose rather retrousse, her lips full and parting in a delicious +roguish smile, answering to the sleepily twinkling eyes, whose +irides seemed to shade so imperceptibly into the palest gray, that +there was no telling where the pupils ended, especially as the lids +were habitually half closed, as if weighed down by the black length +of their borders. The habit of arching up one or other of the +eyebrows, in surprise or interrogation, gave a drollery to the +otherwise nonchalant sweetness of the countenance. The mass of +raven black hair was only adorned by a crimson ribbon, beneath which +it had been thrust into a net, with a long thing that had once been +a curl on the shoulder of the white tumbled bodice worn over a gray +skirt which looked as if it had done solitary duty for the five +weeks since the marriage, and was but slightly relieved by a crimson +sash. + +Rosamond made some apology when she saw Cecil's dainty equipment. +"Dressed, you correct little thing! You put me to shame; but I had +no notion which box my evening things are in, and it would have been +serious to irritate the whole concern." + +"And she was some time with Anne," added Julius. + +"Ah! with my good will Anne should not have been here!" rejoined +Rosamond. "Didn't I meet old Mrs. Nurse at your threshold, with an +invitation from Mrs. Poynsett to dine with her in her room, and +didn't we find the bird flown at the first stroke of the gong?" + +"Oh, I am very well!" repeated Anne. + +Yet she was far more colourless than Julius, for her complexion was +not only faded by sickness, but was naturally of the whitest blonde +tint; the simple coils of her hair "lint white," and her eyes of the +lightest tint of pure blue. The features were of Scottish type, all +the more so from being exaggerated by recent illness; but they were +handsome enough to show that she must have been a bonnie lassie when +her good looks were unimpaired. Her figure far surpassed in height +that of both the other ladies, and was very slender, bending with +languor and fatigue in spite of her strenuous attempts to straighten +it. She was clad in a perfectly plain, almost quaker-looking light +dove-coloured silk dress, fitting closely, and unrelieved by any +ribbon or ornament of any description, so that her whole appearance +suggested nothing but the words "washed out." + +It was clear that to let her alone was merciful, and there was no +lack of mutual communications among the rest. Frank and Charlie +gave their account of the condition of the game. + +"Do you let your tenants shoot rabbits?" exclaimed Cecil, as if +scandalized. "We never do at Dunstone." + +"It prevents an immense amount of discontent and ill-will and +underhand work," said Raymond. + +"My father never will listen to any nonsense about rabbits," +proceeded Cecil. "If you once begin there is no end to it, they are +sure to encroach. He just sends them a basket of game at the +beginning and end of the season." + +"By the bye," said Raymond, "I hope ours have all been sent out as +usual." + +"I can answer for a splendid one at our wedding breakfast," said +Rosamond. "The mess-man who came to help was lost in admiration. +Did you breakfast on ortolans, Cecil?" + +"Or on nightingales' tongues?" added Charlie. + +"You might as well say fatted dormice and snails," said Frank. "One +would think the event had been eighteen hundred years ago." + +"Poor Frank! he's stuffed so hard that it is bursting out at all his +pores!" exclaimed Charlie. + +"Ah! you have the advantage of your elder, Master Charles!" said +Raymond, with a paternal sound of approbation. + +"Till next time," said Frank. "Now, thank goodness, mine is once +for all!" + +The conversation drifted away to Venice and the homeward journey, +which Raymond and Cecil seemed to have spent in unremitting sight- +seeing. The quantities of mountains, cathedrals, and pictures they +had inspected was quite appalling. + +"How hard you must have worked!" exclaimed Rosamond. "Had you never +a day's rest out of the thirty?" + +"Had we, Cecil? I believe not," said Raymond. + +"Sundays?" gasped Anne's low voice at his elbow. + +"Indeed," triumphantly returned Cecil, "between English service and +High Mass, and Benediction, and the public gardens, and listening to +the band, we had not a single blank Sunday." + +Anne started and looked aghast; and Raymond said, "The opportunity +was not to be wasted, and Cecil enjoyed everything with unwearied +vigour." + +"Why, what else should we have done? It would have been very dull +and stupid to have stayed in together," said Cecil, with a world of +innocent wonder in her eyes. Then turning to her neighbour, +"Surely, Julius, you went about and saw things!" + +"The sea at Filey Bridge, and the Church Congress at Leeds," he +answered, smiling. + +"Very shocking, is it not, Cecil?" said Rosamond, with mock gravity; +"but he must be forgiven, for he was tired to death! I used to +think, for my part, that lovers were a sort of mild lunatics, never +to be troubled or trusted with any earthly thing; but that's one of +the things modern times have changed! As he was to be going, all +the clerical staff of St. Awdry's must needs have their holiday and +leave him to do their work; indeed, one was sent off here. For six +weeks I never saw him, except when he used to rush in to say he +couldn't stay; and when at last we were safe in the coupe, he fairly +went to sleep before we got to the first station.--Hush! you _know_ +you did! And no wonder, for he had been up two nights with some +sort of infidel who was supposed to be dying. Then that first week +at Filey, he used to bring out his poetry books as the proper sort +of thing, and try to read them to me on the sands: but by the time +he had got to the bottom of a page, I used to hear the words +dragging out slower and slower-- + +Whereon the--lily--maid--of--Astolat +Lay--smiling--like--a--star-fish--fast--asleep." + +Wherewith Rosamond dropped her head and closed her eyes; while the +brothers shouted with mirth, except Frank, whose countenance was 'of +one hurt on a vulnerable side.' + +"Disrespect to Elaine? Eh, Frank?" said Charlie; "how many pegs has +Julius gone down in your estimation?" + +Frank would not commit himself, but he was evidently at the era of +sensitiveness on the poetical side. Cecil spoke for him. "How very +provoking! What did you do to him, Rosamond?" + +"I kept off the sand-flies! I can't say but I was glad of a little +rest, for I had been packing up for the whole family for ten days +past, with interludes of rushing out into the town; for whatever we +had not forgotten, the shops had not sent home! Oh! what a paradise +of quiet it was under the rocks at Filey--wasn't it, Julius?" + +"We will go there again next time we have a chance," said Julius, +looking blissful. + +"I would never go again to the same place," cried Cecil. "That's +not the way to acquire new ideas." + +"We are too old to acquire new ideas, my dear," drawled Rosamond, +sleepily. + +"What did you go to the Church Congress for!" asked Charlie. + +"I hope Julius was awake by that time," said Frank. + +"Not if we are to have all the new ideas tried on us," said Raymond, +dryly. + +"I went to a Congress once!" exclaimed Cecil. + +"Indeed!" said her husband, surprised. + +"Yes. We thought we ought to encourage them. It was the Congress +of Sunday-school managers for our archdeaconry." + +"Did you acquire any new ideas?" asked Frank; while Rosamond's very +eyelashes seemed to curl with suppressed diversion. + +"Oh yes. We explained our system of tickets, and the Arch-deacon +said it was a very good one, and ought to be adopted everywhere." + +This mode of acquisition of new ideas was quite too much for Julius +and Charlie, who both exploded; but Frank retained composure enough +to ask, "Did you explain it in person?" + +"No. We made Mr. Venn." + +"The schoolmaster?" said Julius. + +"No. He is _our_ clergyman, and he always does as _we_ tell him; +and _so_ Dunstone is quite the model parish of the archdeaconry." + +Julius could not help making an odd little bend of the head, half +deferential, half satirical; and Raymond said, "Cecil, I believe it +rests with you to make the move." An ingenuous girlish blush +mantled on her cheek as she looked towards Rosamond and moved. + +The drawing-room adjoined the dining-room, and likewise had a glass +door leading into the conservatory; but this, like the other +windows, was concealed by the pale-blue damask curtains that +descended from cornices gilded like the legs of the substantial +chairs and sofas. There was, however, no lack of modern light cane +and basket seats round the fire, and it looked cheery and +comfortable. Rosamond put an arm round Anne's waist--"Poor tired +dear, come and lie on the sofa." + +"Oh no, I couldn't. The gentlemen will come in." + +"All brothers! What, will you only be satisfied with an easy-chair! +A charming room, and a charming fire!" + +"Not so nice as a library," said Cecil, stabbing the fire with the +poker as a sort of act of possession. "We always sit in the library +at Dunstone. State rooms are horrid." + +"This only wants to be littered down," said Rosamond. "That's my +first task in fresh quarters, banishing some things and upsetting +the rest, and strewing our own about judiciously. There are the +inevitable wax-flowers. I have regular blarney about their being so +lovely, that it would just go to my heart to expose them to the +boys." + +"You have always been on the move," said Cecil, who was standing by +the table examining the ornaments. + +"You may say so! there are not many of Her Majesty's garrisons that +I have not had experience of, except my native country that I wasn't +born in. It was very mean of them never once to send us to +Ireland." + +"Where were you born?" said Cecil, neither of the two catching at +the bull which perhaps Rosamond had allowed to escape by way of +trying them. + +"At Plymouth. Dick and I were both born at Plymouth, and Maurice at +Scutari; then we were in the West Indies; the next two were born all +up and down in Jamaica and all the rest of the Islands--Tom and +Terry--dear boys, I've got the charge of them now they are left at +school. Three more are Canadians; and little Nora is the only +Irish-born one amongst us." + +"I thought you said you had never been in Ireland." + +"Never quartered there, but on visits at Rathforlane," said +Rosamond. "Our ten years at home we have been up and down the +world, till at last you see I've ended where I began--at Plymouth." + +"Oh, what a lovely Florentine mosaic!" exclaimed Cecil, who had +taken but slight interest in this itinerary. "It is just like a +weight at Dunstone." Then opening a miniature-case, "Who is this-- +Mrs. Poynsett when she was young?" + +"Most likely," said Rosamond. "It is like her now, and very like +Charlie." + +"Yes. Charles is quite unlike the family." + +"What family?" said Rosamond. + +"The Charnocks, of course. Raymond is a perfect Charnock!" + +"A vast advantage," murmured Rosamond. + +"Of course," said Cecil, taking it quite seriously. "No one else +could be the same thing to us. Papa said there was not a match in +the whole world that could have gratified him so much." + +"How old are you, Cecil?" quoth Rosamond, with a ripple in her +voice. + +"Oh, his age was no matter. I don't like young men. That's not the +drawback; no, it is that horrid Poynsett at the end of the name." + +"You see you had better have waived your objections to youth, and +taken a younger son." + +"I couldn't," said this naive young person. "Besides, there is much +more of a field for me here than at Dunstone since papa's marriage." + +Whatever Rosamond had on the tip of her tongue was averted by the +entrance of the three younger brothers. Julius seated himself +beside her in the cushioned fireside corner; and Cecil asked where +Raymond was. + +"Just stepped in to see my mother," said Frank. "This room opens +into hers. Will you come to them?" + +"Not yet," said Cecil. "I want you to tell me about the +neighbourhood." + +"Just what I want," said Rosamond. "Whenever I ask, Julius always +says there's Dr. Easterby." + +Frank and Charlie burst out laughing. + +"Dr. Easterby is one of the greatest men in the English Church," +said Julius. + +"Precisely! But what is the regiment at Backsworth?" and as Charlie +named it, "Oh, what fun! That's where Laurie Cookson exchanged. He +will be sure to send us cards for everything." + +"At Dunstone we never used to go to garrison gaieties," said Cecil, +gravely. + +"Oh! I'm a military pariah," said Rosamond, hastily. + +"Who are the land-owners?" continued Cecil. "There was a place I +saw from the line, but Raymond didn't hear when I asked whose it +was. Close to the station, I mean." + +"That is Sirenwood," said Charles. "Sir Harry Vivian's. He is just +come back there with his two daughters." + +"I thought Emily Vivian was dead," said Julius. "You don't mean +_that_ women!" + +"_That_ woman?" laughed his wife. "What has she done to be a _that_ +woman?" + +"Offended his Reverence," said Frank, in that sort of jocose tone +which betrays annoyance. + +"A heartless mischievous woman!" said Julius. + +Rosamond cocked up her left eyebrow with an ineffably droll look, +which encouraged Charlie to say, "Such fierceness can only be +prompted by personal experience. Look out, Rosamond!" + +"Come 'fess, Julius," said she, merrily. "'Fess and make it up." + +"I--I have nothing to confess," said Julius, seriously. + +"Hasn't he indeed?" said she, looking at the brothers. + +"Oh! don't ask us," said Charlie. "His youthful indiscretions were +over long before our eyes had risen above the horizon!" + +"Do you mean that they have really come home to live here?" demanded +Julius, with singular indifference to the personal insinuations. + +"I am sorry it is so painful to you," said I Frank, somewhat +ironically; "but Sir Harry thinks it right to return and end his +days among his own people." + +"Is he ill, then?" + +"I can't gratify you so far," returned Frank; "he is a fine old +fellow of sixty-five. Just what humbugging papers call a regular +specimen of an old English gentleman," he added to Cecil. + +"Humbugging indeed, I should hope," muttered Julius. "The old +English gentleman has reason to complain!" + +"There's the charity of the clergy!" exclaimed Frank. "No +forgiveness for a man who has spent a little in his youth!" + +"As an essential of the old English gentleman?" asked Julius. + +"At any rate, the poor old fellow has been punished enough," said +Charlie. + +"But what is it? Tell me all about it," said Cecil. "I am sure my +father would not wish me to associate with dissipated people." + +"Ah! Cecil," said Rosamond. "You'll have to take refuge with the +military, after all!" + +"It is just this," said Charlie. "Sir Harry and his only son were +always extravagant, one as bad as the other--weren't they, Julius? +Phil Bowater told me all about it, and how Tom Vivian lost fifteen +thousand pounds one Derby Day, and was found dead in his chambers +the next morning, they said from an over-dose of chloroform for +neuralgia. Then the estate was so dipped that Sir Harry had to give +up the estate to his creditors, and live on an allowance abroad or +at watering-places till now, when he has managed to come home. That +is to say, the house is really leased to Lady Tyrrell, and he is in +a measure her guest--very queer it must be for him in his own +house." + +"Is Lady Tyrrell _that_ woman?" asked Rosamond. + +"I conclude so," said Charlie. "She was the eldest daughter, and +married Lord Tyrrell, who died about two years ago. She has no +children, so she has taken the family in charge, patches up Sir +Harry's affairs with her jointure, and chaperons her sister." + +"What is she like?" + +"Ask Frank," said Charlie, slyly. + +"No!" said Frank, with dignity. "I shall say no more, I only excite +prejudice." + +"You are right, Frank," said Julius, who had evidently recovered +from the shock. "It is not fair to judge people now from what they +were eleven years ago. They have had some terrible lessons, and may +be much changed." + +"Ay," said Frank; "and they have been living in an atmosphere +congenial to you, at Rockpier, and are hand and glove with all the +St. Chrysostom folk there. What do you say to that, Julius? I can +tell you they are enchanted with your curate!" + +"They are not in this parish." + +"No, but they turn up here--the ladies, at least--at all the +services at odd times that Bindon has begun with." + +"Ah! by the bye, is Herbert Bowater come?" + +"Yes, the whole family came over to his installation in Mrs. +Hornblower's lodgings." + +"I saw him this morning, poor old Herbs," added Frank, "looking +uncommonly as if he felt himself in a strait waistcoat." + +"What, are there two curates?" demanded Cecil, in a tone of +reprobation. + +Julius made a gesture of assent, with a certain humorous air of +deprecation, which, however, was lost upon her. + +"We never let Mr. Venn have one," continued Cecil, "except one +winter when he was ill, and then not a young one. Papa says idle +young clergymen are not to be encouraged." + +"I am entirely of Mr. Charnock's opinion. But if I have exceeded +the Dunstone standard, it was not willingly. Herbert Bowater is the +son of some old friends of my mother's, who wanted to keep their son +near home, and made it their request that I would give him a title." + +"And the Bowaters are the great feature in the neighbourhood," added +Frank. "Herbert tells me there are wonderful designs for +entertaining the brides." + +"What do they consist of?" asked Rosamond. + +"All the component parts of a family," said Frank. "The eldest +daughter is a sort of sheet-anchor to my mother, as well as her own. +The eldest son is at home now. He is in the army." + +"In the Light Dragoons?" asked Rosamond. "Oh! then I knew him at +Edinburgh! A man with yellow whiskers, and the next thing to a +stutter." + +"I declare, Julius, she is as good as any army list," exclaimed +Charlie. + +"There's praise!" cried Frank. "The army list is his one book! +What a piece of luck to have you to coach him up in it!" + +"I dare say Rosamond can tell me lots of wrinkles for my outfit," +said Charles. + +"I should hope so, having rigged out Dick for the line, and Maurice +for the artillery!" + +Charlie came and leant on the mantel-shelf, and commenced a +conversation sotto voce on the subject nearest his heart; while +Cecil continued her catechism. + +"Are the Bowaters intellectual?" + +"Jenny is very well read," said Julius, "a very sensible person." + +"Yes," said Frank; "she was the only person here that so much as +tried to read Browning. But if Cecil wants intellect, she had +better take to the Duncombes, the queerest firm I ever fell in with. +He makes the turf a regular profession, actually gets a livelihood +out of his betting-book; and she is in the strong-minded line-- +woman's rights, and all the rest of it." + +"We never had such people at Dunstone," said Cecil. "Papa always +said that the evil of being in parliament was the having to be civil +to everybody." + +Just then Raymond came back with intelligence that his mother was +about to go to bed, and to call his wife to wish her good night. +All went in succession to do the same. + +"My dear," she said to Anne, "I hoped you were in bed." + +"I thought I would wait for family worship." + +"I am afraid we don't have prayers at night, my dear. We must +resume them in the morning, now Raymond and Julius are come." + +Poor Anne looked all the whiter, and only mumbled out a few answers +to the kind counsels lavished upon her. Mrs. Poynsett was left to +think over her daughters-in-law. + +Lady Rosamond did not occupy her much. There was evidently plenty +of good strong love between her and her husband; and though her +training might not have been the best for a clergyman's wife, there +was substance enough in both to shake down together in time. + +But it was Raymond who made her uneasy--Raymond, who ever since his +father's death had been more than all her other sons to her. She +had armed herself against the pang of not being first with him, and +now she was full of vague anxiety at the sense that she still held +her old position. Had he not sat all the evening in his own place +by her sofa, as if it were the very kernel of home and of repose? +And whenever a sense of duty prompted her to suggest fetching his +wife, had he not lingered, and gone on talking? It was indeed of +Cecil; but how would she have liked his father, at the honeymoon's +end, to prefer talking of her to talking with her? "She has been +most carefully brought up, and is very intelligent and industrious," +said Raymond. His mother could not help wondering whether a Roman +son might not thus have described a highly accomplished Greek slave, +just brought home for his mother's use. + + + + +CHAPTER III +Parish Explorations + + + A cry more tuneable +Was never holla'd to, nor cheer'd with horn, +In Crete, in Sparta, nor in Thessaly: +Judge, when you hear.--But, soft; what nymphs are these? +Midsummer Night's Dream + +It was quite true that Cecil Charnock Poynsett was a very +intelligent industrious creature, very carefully brought up--nay, if +possible, a little too much so. "A little wholesome neglect" had +been lacking. + +The only child of her parents who had lived to see a second birthday +was sure to be the centre of solicitude. She had not been spoilt in +the usual acceptation of the word, for she had no liberty, fewer +indulgences and luxuries than many children, and never was permitted +to be naughty; but then she was quite aware that each dainty or each +pleasure was granted or withheld from a careful consideration of her +welfare, and that nothing came by chance with her. And on her rare +ebullitions of self-will, mamma, governess, nurse, nay even papa, +were all in sorrowful commotion till their princess had been brought +to a sense of the enormity of her fault. + +She lost her mother at fourteen, but the same anxious training was +carried on by her father; and after three years he married her +mother's most intimate friend, avowedly that the perfect system +might be continued. Cecil's gaieties as a come-out young lady were +selected on the same judicious principles as her childish +diversions; and if ever the Dunstone family favoured an +entertainment not to their taste, it was after a debate on the need +of condescension and good-nature. She had, however, never had a +season in London--a place her father hated; but she was taken abroad +as soon as she was deemed old enough thoroughly to appreciate what +she was to see there; and in Switzerland her Cousin Raymond, who had +at different times visited Dunstone, overtook the party, and ere +long made his proposals. He was the very man to whom two or three +centuries ago Mr. Charnock would have betrothed the heiress in her +infancy; and Cecil had never liked any one so well, feeling that her +destiny came to a proper culmination in bestowing her hand on the +most eligible Charnock, an M.P., and just a step above her father in +rank and influence. + +Her step-mother was under orders to spend the winter in Italy and +the wedding had therefore taken place in Venice, so that Cecil might +finish her journey as a wife. She had been very happy and fully +occupied; Raymond, being younger and stronger than her parents, was +more competent to escort her to every height or depth to which she +wished to go, hunted up information for her, and was her most +obedient servant, only resisting any prolongation of the journey +beyond the legitimate four weeks; nor indeed had Cecil been desirous +of deferring her introduction to her new sphere. + +There she stood, her hair and pretty Parisian winter dress arranged +to perfection, contemplating with approval the sitting-room that had +been appropriated to her, the October sunshine lighting up the many- +tinted trees around the smooth-shaven dewy lawn, and a bright fire +on the hearth, shelves and chiffoniers awaiting her property, and +piles of parcels, suggestive of wedding presents, awaiting her hand. +She was standing at the table, turning out her travelling-bag with +the comfortable sensation that it was not to be immediately re- +packed, and had just disinterred a whole library of note-books, when +her husband opened the door. "I believe Jenkins is waiting for your +appearance to bring in the urn, my dear." + +"I'm coming; but surely there ought to be a bell or gong to assemble +the family." + +"It might disturb my mother. What sleep she gets is in the morning. +I never go to her till eleven o'clock, unless I am going out for the +day." + +"And what will she want me to do for her?" asked Cecil, glancing at +her empty shelves. + +"A woman's tact will soon find out. All I wish is that she should +be your first object." + +It was a much larger _all_ than could be realized by the son whose +happiest moments had been spent in devotion to her, and who thought +the motherless girl must rejoice doubly in such a mother. + +"But I am free till eleven," said Cecil. + +"Free always, I hope," he returned, with a shade of vexation. +Therewith they descended the broad stairs into the panelled hall, +where a great fire was blazing on the hearth, and Rosamond and the +two young brothers were standing chatting merrily before it. + +Julius, she said, had his primary sermon heavy on his mind, and had +risen before day to attack it; and she sped away to summon him from +Mrs. Poynsett's beautiful old dressing-room, where he sat writing +amid all the old associations. Anne was discovered hanging over the +dining-room fire, looking whiter and more exhausted than the night +before, having indeed been the first to come down-stairs. She was +rebuked for fatiguing herself, and again murmured something about +family worship. + +"We must begin to-morrow," said Raymond. "We have got a chaplain +now." + +Julius, however, on entering excused himself, saying that after +Sunday he should be at Matins at nine o'clock; whereupon Anne looked +at him in mute astonishment. + +Raymond, feeling that he ought to cultivate the solitary sister-in- +law, began asking about Miles; but unlike the typical colonist, she +was very silent, and her replies were monosyllabic, till Rosamond +created a diversion by talking to Frank; and then Raymond elicited +that Glen Fraser was far up the country--King Williamstown nearer +than any other town. They had sent thither for a doctor for Miles, +and he stayed one night, but said that mother's treatment was quite +right; and as it was thirty miles off he did not come again. Thirty +miles! what sort of roads? Not bad for wagons. It only took two +days to get there if the river was not in flood. Had she not been +married there? Yes, they all rode in thither for the purpose. Was +it the nearest church, then? There was one only nine miles off, to +which papa went when there was service--one Sunday in three, "for he +is an Episcopalian, you know." + +"And not your mother?" asked Cecil. + +"I don't think she was at home," said Anne. + +"Then had you a Presbyterian Kirk?" asked Cecil, remembering that in +Scotland gentle blood and Anglicanism did not go together as +uniformly as she believed them to do in England. + +"There was one at Schneyder's Kloof, but that was Dutch." + +"Then did you go nowhere?" asked Cecil. + +"There was Mr. Pilgrim's." + +"A clergyman?" + +"No, a settler. He used to pray and expound every Sunday." + +"What does he call himself?" said Cecil, growing more severe. + +"I don't know," said Anne. "He gathers together a little flock of +all denominations, who only care to hear the word." + +"Such a voice in the wilderness as often does good service," said +Julius, with a perception that the side with which he least agreed +best deserved support. + +He and Rosamond were bent on a tour of parochial inspection, as were +Raymond and Cecil on a more domestic one, beginning with the +gardens. + +Cecil was the first lady down-stairs, all in claret colour trimmed +with gray fur, with a little fur and velvet cap upon her head. + +"There! it is a clear morning, and you can see the view," said +Raymond, opening the hall door. + +"Very prettily undulating ground," she said, standing on the steps, +and looking over a somewhat rapid slope scattered with trees to the +opposite side of the valley, where a park with a red mansion in the +midst gleamed out among woods of green, red, orange, and brown +tints. "How you are shut in! That great Spanish chestnut must be a +perfect block when its leaves are out. My father would never let it +stand so near the house." + +"It is too near, but it was planted at the birth of my mother's +brother." + +"Who died?" + +"Yes, at seven years old. It was her first grief." + +"Then it would vex her if you cut it." + +Raymond laughed. "It is hers, not mine." + +"I forgot." There was a good deal in the tone; but she added, "What +is that place opposite?" + +"Sirenwood. It belongs to Sir Harry Vivian; but he does not live +there." + +"Yes, he does," said Cecil. "Your brothers say he has come back +with his two daughters." + +"There is only one unmarried." + +"There is a widow come to keep house for him--Lady Tyrrell." + +"Very likely," said Raymond; "my mother only writes with difficulty, +so I hear little when I am from home." + +"Is it true that they are horrid people, very dissipated, and not +fit for me to associate with?" + +"That is putting it strongly," said Raymond, quietly. "They are not +likely to be very desirable acquaintances for you, but there is no +reason you should not associate with them on ordinary terms of +courtesy." + +"Ah! I understand--as member's wife." + +"I don't see what that has to do with it," said Raymond. "Ah! +Rosamond!" as she came down in a Galway cloak over her black +velveteen, "on the way to view your domain?" + +"Yes, and yours," she said, nodding to Cecil. "You appreciate such +English apple-pie order. It looks as if you never suffered a stray +leaf to dance without an old woman to hunt it down. And what's that +red house smiling across the valley?" + +"Sirenwood," repeated Raymond; then to Julius he said, "Did you know +it was inhabited again?" + +"Frank said so," answered Julius, without further remark, giving his +arm to his wife, who clasped both hands on it; while the other +couple looked on as if doubtful whether this were a trying duty +incumbent on them. + +"What is it all about?" said Rosamond, as they walked down the +avenue of walnuts leading to the iron gates in the opposite +direction from Sirenwood. "Which of you was _that woman's_ victim? +Was it a sailor love of Miles's? I hope not! That poor little +African might not stand a gay ghost cropping up again." + +"Miles is far removed from the conventional sailor." + +"Then it is reduced to the grave Raymond." + +"I wish I had betrayed nothing." + +"Now you may as well proceed to betray the rest, instead of leaving +me to exercise my fancy." + +"It is no secret, only such things are best not brought up again. +Camilla Vivian was poor Raymond's grande passion, and you may +imagine what a grief that was to my mother, especially as the poor +brother was then living--one of the most fascinating, dangerous men +I ever saw; and the whole tone of the place was ultra gay and +thoughtless, the most reckless extravagance. However, he was set +upon it, and my mother was forced to consent to the engagement. She +seemed equally devoted to him, till she met Lord Tyrrell at some +country house, and then a quarrel was picked, either by her mother +or herself, about my mother retaining the headship of her own house. +It was a palpable excuse, but it served to break the affair off, and +Raymond was cruelly cut up. My mother made herself everything to +him from that moment, gave up all her former habits to be with him, +sent the little boys to school, and fairly dragged him through the +trouble!" + +"How long ago was it?" + +"Ten years--yes, ten years. So far as ceasing to care a straw for a +heartless woman like that, he has got over it, no doubt; but it has +made a graver man of him for life, and I doubt whether, but for my +mother's accident, he ever would have married." + +"Did you marry for your mother's sake, Julius, or only tell her so?" + +"For shame, my Lady Mischief!" + +"And do you think the fair Camilla returned with plans that she +finds disconcerted?" + +"How can I tell? I have not seen her since I was a lad of +eighteen.--Ah! how d'ye do, Betty?" in a tone of relief; "you've not +seen my wife." + +This was the first of a long series of introductions. Compton +Poynsett was a straggling village, with the church, schools, and +Rectory, ten minutes' walk from the park gates. It had not been +neglected, so that Julius had not the doubtful satisfaction of +coming like a missionary or reformer. The church, though not +exactly as with his present lights he would have made it, was in +respectable order, and contained hardly anything obnoxious to his +taste; the schools were well built, properly officered, and the +children under such discipline that Rosamond declared she could no +more meddle with them than with her father's regiment. + +The Rectory was at that moment level with the ground, and Julius +explaining the plans, when up came the senior curate. Mr. Bindon, +whom she, as well as Julius, greeted as an old friend, was the +typical modern priest, full of his work, and caring for nothing +besides, except a Swiss mountain once a year; a slight, spare, +small, sallow man, but with an enormous power of untiring energy. + +Scarcely had Rosamond shaken hands with him, standing where her +drawing-room rug was to be in future days, when a merry whistle came +near, and over the wall from the churchyard leapt first a black +retriever, secondly a Skye terrier, thirdly a bull ditto, fourthly a +young man, or rather an enormous boy, who for a moment stood amazed +and disconcerted at the unexpectedly worshipful society into which +he had jumped! + +"Ha! Herbert! is that you?" laughed Julius. + +"I beg your pardon!" he breathlessly exclaimed. "I was just taking +the short cut! I had no idea--Here, Mungo, you ruffian!" as the +Skye was investigating Lady Rosamond's boot. + +"Oh, I like him of all things! I am glad to welcome you to our +future house!" as she held out her hand to the Reverend Herbert +Bowater, the junior curate, a deacon of a fortnight's standing, +whose round open happy blue eyes, ruddy cheeks, merry lips, and +curly light hair, did not seem in keeping with the rigidly straight +collar and waistcoat, and the long black coat, at present +plentifully streaked with green tree-moss, while his boots and +trousers looked as if they had partaken of the mud-bath which his +dogs had evidently been wallowing in. + +"Off! off!" were his words, as he shook hands with his rectoress. +"Get away, Rollo!" with an energetic shove of the foot to the big +dog, who was about to shake his dripping coat for the ladies' +special benefit. "I saw you arrive last evening," he said, in the +conversational tone of a gentlemanly school-boy; "didn't you find it +very cold?" + +"Not very. I did not see you, though." + +"He was organizing the cheers," said Mr. Bindon. "You shone in +that, Bowater. They kept such good time." + +"You were very good to cheer us at all," said Julius, "coming in the +wake of the Squire as we did." + +"The best of it was," said the junior, "that Charlie was so awfully +afraid that he and poor Miles's wife would be taken for the Squire, +that he dashed in on his way to warn me to choke them off. If she +hadn't been ill, I must have set the boys on for a lark! How is +she, though?" he asked in a really kind tone. + +"She looks very ill, poor thing," said Julius. + +Here the bull terrier became assiduous in his attentions to +Rosamond; and between his master's calls and apologies, and her +caresses and excuses, not much more was heard, till Julius asked +with mock gravity, "And are these all you've brought over, Herbert?" + +"Yes, all; I'd half a mind to bring the two greyhounds, but my +father thought they would get into trouble in the preserves, and +there isn't room at Mrs. Hornblower's place," he answered, with +apologetic simplicity. + +"What a pity Durham has been reduced!" said Mr. Bindon, dryly. "It +would have been the right preferment for Bowater. The Bishop was +obliged by statute to keep a pack of hounds." + +"But, sir," expostulated the deacon, turning to the Rector, +colouring all over his honest rosy face, "you don't object! You +know, of course, I've given up sport," he added ruefully; "but only +just as companions!--Ain't you, Rollo?" he added, almost with tears +in his eyes, and a hand on the smooth black head, belonging to such +a wise benignant face, that Rosamond was tempted to pronounce the +dog the more clerical looking of the two. + +"You are very welcome," said Julius, laughing, "provided you can +manage with the old women's cats. I should find such companions +rather awkward in pastoral visits." + +"I'll teach them, sir! You may depend on it! We did have a little +flare-up yesterday, but I showed them the sense of it. You might +teach those dogs anything!--Ha! what then, Tartar! Halloo, Mungo! +Rats, rats, rats!" + +A prodigious scratching and snorting was audible in what had been a +cellar of the quondam Rectory; and Rollo, becoming excited, dashed +up to the scene of action, with a deep bass war-cry, while, to +Rosamond's great amusement, "rats" was no less a peal to Rector and +senior; and for the next quarter of an hour the three clergymen +moved bricks, poked with their sticks, and cheered on the chase till +the church clock struck one, the masons began to return from dinner, +and the sounds of the bell at the Hall recalled the party to order. + +"There, Rose! Our first day!" said Julius, aghast. + +"You'd better come to lunch at my rooms," said the young curate, +eagerly. "Do! Mother has brought the jolliest hamper! Game-pie, +and preserved magnum-bonums, and pears off the old jargonelle.-- +Come, Lady Rosamond, do.--Come along, Bindon! There's such a dish +of damson-cheese! Do!" + +That "_do_," between insinuation and heartiness, was so boyish, that +it was quite irresistible to the lady, who consented eagerly, while +Julius wrote a word or two on a card, which he despatched to the +Hall by the first child he encountered. In a few minutes they +reached the nice clean bay-windowed room over the village shop, +comically like an undergraduate's, in spite of the mother's and +sister's recent touches. + +There ensued a resolute quieting of the dogs, and a vigorous +exertion of hospitality, necessitating some striding up and down +stairs, and much shouting to Mrs. Hornblower and her little niece, +who rejoiced in the peculiar name of Dilemma; while Rosamond petted +Tartar upon her lap, and the two elder clergymen, each with an elbow +against the window-frame and a knee on the seat, held council, based +on the Rector's old knowledge of the territory and the curate's +recent observations during his five weeks' sojourn. + +The plans to be put in force next week were arranged during the +meal, and the junior observed that he would walk home to-night and +back on Saturday evening, since after that he should be tied pretty +fast. + +And he started with Julius and Rosamond on their further progress, +soon, however, tumbling over another stone wall with all his dogs, +and being only heard hallooing to them as they yelped after the +larks. + +"That is a delicious boy!" said Rosamond, laughing merrily. "A nice +fellow--but we mustn't make it a custom to be always going in to +partake of his hampers, or we shall prey inordinately on Mrs. +Bowater's preserves." + +"He was just like the hero of + +"Oh, I have a plum-cake, +And a rare feast I'll make." + +I do like a boy with a sweet tooth!" + +"Like him! Of course I do. The Bowaters are like one's own +kindred! I only hope I shall not spoil him." + +"Hasn't his mother done that for you?" + +"I wish he had spent a year or two at Cuddesdon! I ought to have +seen him before consenting to give him a title at once, but his +father and Jenny wished it so much. Ah! come in here. Bindon said +Lucy Martin was a case for a lady." + +Rosamond's hearty good-nature was much more at ease among ailing old +women than prim school-children, and she gave great satisfaction in +the cottages. + +Julius did not of course come as a stranger, and had a general +impression as to names and families; but he had been absent, except +on short visits, for five years, so that Rosamond declared that this +was a staple of his conversation: "Then it was Tom Deane--no, it +was John Deane that married Blake's son--no, it was Blake's daughter +that died who is living in the next house." + +They finished with a long and miry lane, lying along the valley, and +leading to the cottages of a little clan, the chief of whom seemed +to be a large-boned lively-eyed old dame, who, after minute +inquiries after "the Lady Poynsett," went on, "And be it true, +Master Julius, as that young gentleman of Squire Bowater's is one of +your passons?" + +Julius admitted the fact. + +"And be ye going to put he up in the pulpit to preach to we? 'Pon +my word of honour, says I to Sally when her telled I, we shall have +little Dick out of the infant-school next!" + +"We're all young, Betty! Can't you put up with any one that is not +older than yourself! I'm afraid he would hardly be able to get up +the pulpit stair." + +The Rector's reply delighted Betty; but she returned to the charge. +"No, no, sir, I be coming to hear ye next Sunday. Sally have turned +my black bonnet a purpose. It be one of the Lady Poynsett's, as her +gave I when my old gentleman was took two years after the Squire-- +when bonnets was bonnets, you know, ma'am. Now tell me true, be ye +to preach morning or arternoon, sir?" + +"In the morning, I hope, Betty." + +"Then I'll be there, Master Julius, to the third seat from the +front; but it ain't becoming for a woman of my age, seventy-nine +come Christmas, to sit under a slip of a lad as hasn't got the taste +of the birch off his back." + +"That's too bad, Betty," broke in Rosamond, speaking out of +conviction. "Mr. Bowater isn't so young as he looks, and he was too +good a boy ever to need the birch." + +"All the wuss for he," retorted the undaunted Betty. "Spare the +rod, and spile the child." + +The village wit was left triumphant, and Julius proposed to return +by a cross-road leading into the plantations. Suddenly a scud of +rain mixed with whirling yellow leaves sent them hurrying into a +cart-shed, where, with a sudden start, they found themselves rushing +in on some one. Who was it? A girl--a young lady. That was +evident, as Rosamond panted out, "I beg your pardon!" and the next +moment there was the exclamation, "Mr. Julius Charnock! You don't +remember me? Eleonora Vivian!" + +"Miss Vivian! you have the advantage of me," said Julius, a little +stiffly. "Let me introduce my wife." + +The hands met, and Rosamond perceived in the failing light a very +fine-looking maiden, with a superbly carried head and neck, simply +dressed in gray cloth. "Are you sheltering here, or are you +sketching?" she asked, seeing some paper and drawing materials. + +"I was giving a lesson. See," exhibiting some bold outlines on +large paper. "Does not my pupil do me credit?" + +"Very spirited," said Rosamond. "Where is she?" + +"_He_ is gone to fetch me his grandmother's umbrella. He is the +little Gurth of these parts." + +"Of whom you are making a Giotto?" asked Julius, thawing a little. + +"Exactly; I found him drawing on a barn-door with such zeal and +spirit, that I could not help offering him some lessons. Only see, +does he not get on? I wish I could get him to the school of +design." + +"May I ask what becomes of his pigs?" demanded Julius. + +"Don't you hear?" as sundry grunts and squeals of those eminently +conversational animals were audible through the walls. "They are +driven home to this rick-yard, so here I meet the boy." + +"Who is he?" asked the Rector. + +"I only know that he answers to the name of Joe. And here he +comes," as a boy about ten years old came lumbering up in big boots, +with a heavy plaid shawl on one arm, and an immense green umbrella +in the other. + +"Thank you, Joe. Make your bow to the lady and gentleman." + +This was a pull of the flaxen forelock; for Joe was a slender, +pretty, fair boy, of that delicately-complexioned English type which +is not roughened till after many years of exposure. + +"That's right, my man," said Julius, kindly. "What is your name?" + +"Please, sir, Joshua Reynolds." + +"Instinct," whispered Rosamond. + +"Or influence of a name," returned Miss Vivian. + +"Are you one of Dan Reynolds's boys, or Tim's?" proceeded + +"No, I bides with granny." + +Julius made no further attempt at disentangling the pedigree but +inquired about his employments. Did he go to school? + +"When there ain't nothing to be done." + +"And what can be done by such a mite?" asked Rosamond. + +"Tell the lady," said the Rector; "what work can you do?" + +"Bird-starving." + +"Well!" + +"And stoon-picking, and cow-herding, and odd jobs up at Farmer +Light's; but they won't take I on for a carter-boy not yet 'cause I +bean't not so lusty as some on 'em." + +"Have you learnt to read?" + +"Oh yes, very nicely," interposed Miss Vivian. + +"Did you teach him?" said Rosamond. + +"No! He could read well before I came to the place. I have only +been at home six weeks, you know, and I did not know I was poaching +on your manor," she added sotto voce to Julius, who could not but +answer with warm thanks. + +It was discovered that the rain had set in for the night, and an +amicable contest ensued between the ladies as to shawl and umbrella, +each declaring her dress unspoilable, till it ended in Eleonora +having the shawl, and both agreeing to share the umbrella as far as +the Sirenwood lodge. + +However, the umbrella refused to open, and had to be given to the +boy, who set his teeth into an extraordinary grin, and so dealt with +the brazen gear as to expand a magnificent green vault, with a +lesser leathern arctic zone round the pole; but when he had handed +it to Miss Vivian, and she had linked her arm in Lady Rosamond's, it +proved too mighty for her, tugged like a restive horse, and would +fairly have run away with her, but for Rosamond's holding her fast. + +"Lost!" they cried. "Two ladies carried away by an umbrella!" + +"Here, Julius, no one can grapple with it but you," called Rosamond. + +"I really think it's alive!" panted Eleonora, drawn up to her tip- +toes before she could hand it to Julius, who, with both clinging to +his arm, conducted them at last to the lodge, where Julius could +only come in as far as it would let him, since it could neither be +let down nor left to itself to fly to unknown regions. + +A keeper with a more manageable article undertook to convey Miss +Vivian home across the park; and with a pleasant farewell, husband +and wife plodded their way home, along paths the mud of which could +not be seen, only heard and felt; and when Rosamond, in the light of +the hall, discovered the extent of the splashes, she had to leave +Julius still contending with the umbrella; and when, in spite of the +united efforts of the butler and footman, it still refused to come +down, it was consigned to an empty coach-house, with orders that +little Joe should have a shilling to bring it down and fetch it home +in the morning! + + + + +CHAPTER IV +Shades In Sunshine + + +My friends would be angered, + My minnie be mad.--Scots Song + +"Whom do you think we met, mother?" said Julius, coming into her +room, so soon as he had made his evening toilette, and finding there +only his two younger brothers. "No other than Miss Vivian." + +"Ah! then," broke in Charlie, "you saw what Jenkins calls the +perfect picture of a woman." + +"She is very handsome," soberly returned Julius. "Rose is quite +delighted with her. Do you know anything of her?" + +"Jenny Bowater was very fond of poor Emily," rejoined the mother. +"I believe that she had a very good governess, but I wish she were +in better hands now." + +"I cannot think why there should be a universal prejudice for the +sake of one early offence!" exclaimed Frank. + +"Oh, indeed!" said Julius, amazed at such a tone to his mother. + +"I only meant--mother, I beg your pardon--but you are only going by +hearsay," answered Frank, in some confusion. + +"Then you have not seen her?" said Julius. + +"I! I'm the last person she is likely to seek, if you mean +Camilla." + +"She inquired a great deal after you, mother," interposed Frank, +"and said she longed to call, only she did not know if you could see +her. I do hope you will, when she calls on Cecil. I am sure you +would think differently. Promise me, mother!" + +"If she asks for me, I will, my boy," said Mrs. Poynsett, "but let +me look! You aren't dressed for dinner! What will Mistress Cecil +say to you! Ah! it is time you had ladies about the house again." + +The two youths retreated; and Julius remained, looking anxiously and +expressively at his mother. + +"I am afraid so," she said; "but I had almost rather he were +honestly smitten with the young one than that he believed in +Camilla." + +"I should think no one could long do that," said Julius. + +"I don't know. He met them when he was nursing that poor young +Scotsman at Rockpier, and got fascinated. He has never been quite +the same since that time!" said the mother anxiously. "I don't +blame him, poor fellow!" she added eagerly, "or mean that he has +been a bit less satisfactory--oh no! Indeed, it may be my fault for +expressing my objection too' plainly; he has always been reserved +with me since, and I never lost the confidence of one of my boys +before!" + +That Julius knew full well, for he--as the next eldest at home--had +been the recipient of all his mother's perplexities at the time of +Raymond's courtship. Mrs. Poynsett had not been a woman of intimate +female friends. Her sons had served the purpose, and this was +perhaps one great element in her almost unbounded influence with +them. Julius was deeply concerned to see her eyes glistening with +tears as she spoke of the cloud that had risen between her and +Frank. + +"There is great hope that this younger one may be worthy," he said. +"She has had a very different bringing up from her sister, and I did +not tell you what I found her doing. She was teaching a little pig- +herd boy to draw." + +"Ah! I heard Lady Tyrrell was taking to the education of the people +line." + +"I want to know who the boy is," said Julius. "He called himself +Reynolds, and said he lived with granny, but was not a son of +Daniel's or Timothy's. He seemed about ten years old." + +"Reynolds? Then I know who he must be. Don't you remember a +pretty-looking girl we had in the nursery in Charlie's time? His +'Fan-fan' he used to call her." + +"Ah, yes, I remember; she was a Reynolds, for both the little boys +could be excited to fury if we assumed that she was a fox. You +don't mean that she went wrong?" + +"Not till after she had left us, and seemed to be doing well in +another place; but unfortunately she was allowed to have a holiday +in the race week, and a day at the course seems to have done the +mischief. Susan can tell you all about it, if you want to know. +She was as broken-hearted as if Fanny had been her own child--much +more than the old mother herself, I fear." + +"What has become of the girl?" + +"Gone from bad to worse. Alas! I heard a report that she had been +seen with some of the people who appear on the race-course with +those gambling shooting-galleries, or something of that sort." + +"Ah! those miserable races! They are the bane of the country. I +wish no one would go near them." + +"They are a very pleasant county gathering." + +"To you, mother, and such as you; but you could have your county +meeting without doing quite so much harm. If Raymond would only +withdraw his subscription." + +"It would be as much as his seat is worth! Those races are the one +great event of Wil'sbro' and Backsworth, the harvest of all the +tradespeople. Besides, you know what is said of their expedience as +far as horses are concerned." + +"I would sacrifice the breed of horses to prevent the evils," said +Julius. + +"_You_ would, but--My boy, I suppose this is the right view for a +clergyman, but it will never do to force it here. You will lose all +influence if you are over-strained." + +"Was St. Chrysostom over-strained about the hippodrome?" said +Julius, thoughtfully. + +Mrs. Poynsett looked at him as he leant upon the chimney-piece. +Here was another son gone, in a different way, beyond her reach. +She had seen comparatively little of him since his University days; +and though always a good and conscientious person, there had been +nothing to draw her out of secular modes of thought; nor had she any +connection with the clerical world, so that she had not, as it were, +gone along with the tone of mind that she had perceived in him. + +He did not return to the subject, and they were soon joined by his +elder brother. At the first opportunity after dinner, Frank got +Rosamond up into a corner with a would-be indifferent "So you met +Miss Vivian. What did you think of her?" + +Rosamond's intuition saw what she was required to think, and being +experienced in raving brothers, she praised the fine face and figure +so as to find the way to his heart. + +"I am so glad you met her in that way. Even Julius must be +convinced. Was not he delighted?" + +"I think she grew upon him." + +"And now neither of you will be warped. It is so very strange in my +mother, generally the kindest, most open-hearted woman in the world, +to distrust and bear a grudge against them all for the son's +dissipation--just as if that affected the ladies of a family!" + +"I did not think it was entirely on his account," said Rosamond. + +"Old stories of flirtation!" said Frank, scornfully; "but what are +they to be cast up against a woman in her widowhood? It is so +utterly unlike mother, I can't understand it." + +"Would not the natural conclusion be that she knew more, and had her +reasons?" + +"I tell you, Rosamond, I know them infinitely better than she does. +She never saw them since Lady Tyrrell's marriage, when Eleonora was +a mere child; now I saw a great deal of them at Rockpier last year. +There was poor Jamie Armstrong sent down to spend the winter on the +south coast; and as none of his own people could be with him, we-- +his Oxford friends, I mean--took turns to come to him; and as I had +just gone up for my degree, I had the most time. The Vivians had +been living there ever since they went on poor Emily's account. +They did not like to leave the place where she died you see; and +Lady Tyrrell had joined them after her husband's death. Such a +pleasant house! no regular gaieties, of course, but a few friends in +a quiet way--music and charades, and so forth. Every one knew +everybody there; not a bit of our stiff county ways, but meeting all +day long in the most sociable manner." + +"Oh yes, I know the style of place." + +"One gets better acquainted in a week than one does in seven years +in a place like this," proceeded Frank. "And you may tell Julius to +ask any of the clerics if Lenore was not a perfect darling with the +Vicar and his wife, and her sister too; and Rockpier is a regular +tip-top place for Church, you know. I'm sure it was enough to make +a fellow good for life, just to see Eleonora walking up the aisle +with that sweet face of hers, looking more like heaven than earth." + +Rosamond made reply enough to set him off again. "Lady Tyrrell +would have been content to stay there for ever, she told me, but she +thought it too confined a range for Eleonora; there was no formation +of character, though I don't see how it could have formed better; +but Lady Tyrrell is a thoroughly careful motherly sister, and +thought it right she should see a little of the world. So they +broke up from Rockpier, and spent a year abroad; and now Lady +Tyrrell is making great sacrifices to enable her father to come and +live at home again. I must say it would be more neighbourly to +welcome them a little more kindly!" + +"I should think such agreeable people were sure to win their way." + +"Ah! you don't know how impervious our style of old squire and +squiress can be! If even mother is not superior to the old +prejudice, who will be? And it is _very_ hard on a fellow; for +three parts of my time is taken up by this eternal cramming--I +should have no heart for it but for her--and I can't be going over +to Sirenwood as I used to go to Rockpier, while my mother vexes +herself about it, in her state. If she were up and about I should +not mind, or she would know better; but what can they--Lenore, I +mean--think of me, but that I am as bad as the rest?" + +"Do you mean that anything has passed between you?" + +"No, not with Lenore. Her sister spoke to me, and said it was not +right when she had seen nothing but Rockpier; but she as good as +promised to stand my friend. And when I get to the office, in two +years, I shall have quite enough to begin upon, with what my mother +allows us." + +"Then you hope she will wait for that?" + +"I feel sure of it--that is, if she is not annoyed by this +abominable usage from my family. Oh! Rosamond, you will help us +when you get into your own house, and you will get Julius to see it +in a proper light. Mother trusts to him almost as much as to +Raymond; but it is our misfortune to be so much younger that she +can't believe us grown up." + +"O, Frank," said Charlie, coming in, "here's Price come up about the +puppies.--What, Rosamond, has he got hold of you? What a blessing +for me! but I pity you." + +Frank and Charlie went off together; and Julius was in the act of +begging Cecil to illuminate a notice of the services, to be framed +and put into the church porch, when Raymond came in from the other +room to make up a whist-table for his mother. Rosamond gladly +responded; but there was a slight accent of contempt in Cecil's +voice, as she replied, "I never played a game at cards in my life." + +"They are a great resource to my mother," said Raymond. "Anne, you +are too tired to play?--No, Julius, the pack is not there; look in +the drawer of the chiffonier." + +Julius handed the list he had been jotting down to Cecil, and +followed his brother, with his hands full of cards, unconscious of +the expression of dismay, almost horror, with which Anne was gazing +after him. + +"Oh! let us be resolute!" she cried, as soon as the door was shut. +"Do not let us touch the evil thing!" + +"Cards?" said Cecil. "If Mrs. Poynsett cannot be amused without +them, I suppose we shall have to learn. I always heard she was such +an intellectual woman." + +"But we ought to resist sin, however painful it may be," said Anne, +gathering strength; "nay, even if a minister sets the example of +defection." + +"You think it wicked," said Cecil. "Oh no, it is stupid and silly, +and an absurd waste of time, but no more." + +"Yes, it is," said Anne. "Cards are the bane of thousands." + +"Oh yes, gambling and all that; but to play in the evening to amuse +an invalid can have no harm in it." + +"An invalid and aged woman ought to have her mind set upon better +things," said Anne. "I shall not withdraw my testimony, and I hope +you will not." + +"I don't know," said Cecil. "You see I am expected to attend to +Mrs. Poynsett; and I have seen whist at Dunstone when any dull old +person came there. What a troublesome crooked hand Julius writes-- +just like Greek! What's all this? So many services--four on +Sunday, two every day, three on Wednesdays and Fridays! We never +had anything like this at Dunstone." + +"It is very superstitious," said Anne. + +"Very superfluous, I should say," amended Cecil. "I am sure my +father would consent to nothing of the kind. I shall speak to +Raymond about it." + +"Yes," said Anne; "it does seem terrible that a minister should try +to make up for worldly amusements by a quantity of vain ceremonies." + +"I wish you would not call him a minister, it sounds like a +dissenter." + +"I think ministers their best name, except pastors." + +"Both are horrid alike," said Cecil. "I shall teach all the people +to call Julius the Rector. That's better than Mr. Charnock--what +Raymond ought to be." + +Anne was struck dumb at this fearful display of worldliness; and +Cecil betook herself to the piano, but the moment her husband +appeared she showed him the list. + +"He has cut out plenty of work," said Raymond, "but three of them +must want a field for their energies." + +"It is preposterous. I want you to speak to him about it." + +"You are not expected to go to them all," Raymond made answer. + +"Then there's no sense in having them," responded Cecil. "Evening +services are very bad for the people, bringing them out late. You +ought to tell him so." + +"He is Rector, and I am not," said Raymond. + +"Mr. Venn did nothing without papa's consent," exclaimed + +"My dear Cecil, don't let your loyalty make a Harry the Eighth of +your father," said Raymond; "the clergyman ought to be a free +agent." + +"You don't approve?" + +"I don't approve or disapprove. It is not a matter I know anything +about." + +"But I assure you it has been all thought over at Dunstone." + +"Come, my mother wants to go to bed, and you are keeping her +waiting." + +Cecil was silenced for the moment, but not daunted; for was it not +the foremost duty of the lady of the manor to keep the clergyman in +order, more especially when he was her own husband's younger +brother? so she met her brother-in-law with "Julius, when I +undertook that notice, I had no notion you were going to have so +many services." + +"Is there more than you have time to paint? Then Bindon can do it, +or Jenny Bowater." + +"No! it is not time or trouble; but I do not think such a number of +services desirable." + +"Indeed!" said he, looking amused. + +"Yes. An over number of services frequented by no one only brings +the Church into contempt. I heard papa say so. We only had regular +Sunday and Saint's Day services, and I am sure Dunstone was quite as +religious a place as there is any need to be." + +"I am glad to hear it," said Julius, an odd look flickering about +his face; "but as I am afraid Compton is not as religious a place as +there is need to be, I must try, by your leave, all means of making +it so. Good night." + +He was gone, and Cecil was not sure that he had not presumed to +laugh at her. + + + +CHAPTER V +A Sunday of Excitement + + +Strangers in court do take her for the queen.--Shakespeare + +The first Sunday of Julius Charnock's ministry was spent in an +unexpected manner. In the darkness of the autumn morning there was +a knock at the door, and a low hurried call in Anne's voice at the +bedroom door: "Rosamond! Julius, pray look out! Isn't there a +great fire somewhere?" + +"Fire! Here?" cried Rosamond, springing up. + +"No, not here. A great way off. You could beat it back." + +Rosamond had by this time rushed to the window which looked out the +wrong way, found her dressing-gown, and scrambled into it in the +dark ere joining Anne in the gallery, from the end window of which +the lurid light in the sky, with an occasional flame leaping up, was +plainly visible. When Julius joined them he declared it to be at +Willansborough, and set off to call up the coachman and despatch the +fire-engine, his wife calling after him to send for the soldiers at +Backsworth. + +Frank and Charlie came rushing down in gratified excitement, +declaring that it was tremendous--the church at least--and exulting +in the attainment of their life-long ambition, the riding out on the +fire-engine. Servants bustled about, exclaiming, tramping, or +whisking on the stairs; and Raymond presently appeared to ask +whether his mother were ill, and, when reassured on that score, +hurrying to ascertain whether she were alarmed, before he started +for the scene of action. + +"Let me come and stay with her," said Rosamond, a striking figure, +in a scarlet dressing-gown, with a thick plait of black hair hanging +down to her waist on either side. + +"Thank you, it will be very kind," said Raymond, running down before +her, and meeting Susan waddling out in a fringe of curl-papers, for +some mysterious instinct or echo had conveyed to her and her +mistress that there was fire somewhere--perhaps at home. Mrs. +Poynsett was not a nervous woman, and from the time she saw her +eldest son come in, all fright was over, and she could have borne to +hear that the house over her head was burning, in the perfect trust +that he would save her from all peril; nor had he any difficulty in +committing her to Rosamond, when he hurried away to finish dressing +and repair to the spot. + +Nothing could be seen from her room, but the little ante-room +between it and the drawing-room had an excellent view, as the ground +fell away from it, and there was an opening among the trees. + +"We must get you there!" exclaimed Rosamond, in her excitement, +helping her into some garments, and then running out as she heard a +step--"Here, Julius, help me;" and without more ado, the mother was +transported between them to the broad low couch under the window, +and there bestowed in a nest of pillows, shawls, and rugs, that +seemed to grow up under Rosamond's touch. + +Then following Julius out into the hall as he met his brother, +Rosamond clung to him, entreating, "Please, please don't run into +any dangerous places." + +"Never fear, dearest; I am not likely." + +"Don't let him, pray!" she said, turning to Raymond. "Make him +remember how blind he is." + +"I'll take good care of him, Rosamond," said the elder brother +kindly; "I'm used to it." + +"And send for the ---th," she added. "There is nothing like +soldiers at a fire." + +"The glare must have given notice," said Julius, "but we'll send if +needful. Let go, you foolish girl; I'm not leading a forlorn hope." + +Did Raymond, as he mounted his horse, turning from the contact of +the white and black heads, admire the reasonableness of the Cecil +who had never shown any fears for his safety, nor any tendency to +run about the passages in her robe de chambre, though she was now +dressing with all speed? + +The women-folk had to depend on their own eyes for intelligence, for +every male, not only of the household but of the village, between +the ages of five and seventy, started for Wil'sbro', and a good many +females followed their example, including the cook and her suite. + +However, Susan remained, to find her mistress flown, and in her +fright, give Lady Rosamond as round a scolding as if she had been +Charlie, for her rashness in attempting a transit, which Dr. Hayter +had pronounced to be as much as her mistress's life was worth. +Having thus relieved her mind, and finding that Mrs. Poynsett was +really very comfortable, or else too eager and anxious to find out +if she was not, the good woman applied herself to the making of +coffee. + +Anne and Cecil had found their way to the leads, and were thence +summoned to partake of this hasty meal, after which they proposed +going to look from the brow of the hill; and Mrs. Poynsett insisted +that Rosamond should not stay behind on her account; and, glad to +appease the restlessness of anxiety, out went the ladies, to find +the best view of the town,--usually a white object in the distance, +but now blurred by smoke thick and black in the daylight, and now +and then reddened by bursts of flame. + +Anne had been reassured as to the need of beating out the fire and +trampling down a place to isolate it, as in the bush-fires of her +experience; and Rosamond related the achievements of the regiment in +quenching many a conflagration in inflammable colonial cities. + +It occurred to her that the best place whence to see it was the +tower of the church, which, placed upon a little knoll, was standing +out in full relief against the lurid light. She found the key at +the sexton's, and led the way up the broken stone stair to the trap- +door, where they emerged on the leads, and, in spite of the cold +wind and furious flapping of the flag above their heads, stood +absorbed in the interest of the sight. + +There was a black mass in the open space, whence rose fitful clouds +of smoke, the remnants of the fire, which had there done its worst; +and beyond was a smoky undefined outline, with tongues of flame +darting up, then volumes of dense white smoke, denoting a rush of +water from the engines. Black beings flitted about like ants round +a disturbed nest; Rosamond hoped she detected some scarlet among +them, and Cecil lamented over not having brought her opera-glass. +Even without this, it was possible to make out two long lines of men +between the fire and the river, and at times they fancied they heard +the shouting, but the wind generally carried it away. The cold was +bitter, and they had to hold together and keep a tight grip upon +their garments against the gusts that seemed to rock the tower; but +they could not bear to turn away, though the clock beneath pealed +out hour after hour; for still, as the flames were subdued in one +place they broke out in another; but gradually smoke became +predominant, and then grew thinner, and as some of the black specks +began to straggle into the road as if returning to Compton, the +desire to hear became more pressing than that to see, and the three +ladies began to descend--a slow and weary process, cutting them off +from the view, and lasting so long, that the road was no longer +deserted when they finally emerged into the churchyard. + +Young Mr. Bowater, grimed, dusty, hatless, and his hair on end, and +Rollo following with his feathery tail singed, hurried up at once. +"I'm not fit to touch, Lady Rosamond," as he showed a black hand, +and bowed to the others. + +"Where's Ju--where's my husband?" exclaimed Rosamond. + +"Just behind, riding home with Raymond and the rest of them. Wasn't +it a magnificent flare-up? But there was no loss of life; and this +dog was of as much use as two men--carried whatever I told him." + +"Good old man! You've suffered too!" said Rosamond. "Pah! you're +like a singed horse; but never mind, you're a hero." + +"And where is Mr. Charnock Poynsett?" said Cecil, retreating from +the dog, which her sisters-in-law were vehemently patting. + +"He was arranging with the mayor. Church, paper-mills, and town- +hall got the worst of it. It was well he came down; old Briggs, the +mayor, lost his head, and Fuller never had one. Every one gave +contrary orders till he came down, and then, didn't we work!" + +The curate stretched his stalwart limbs, as if they were becoming +sensible of the strain they had undergone. + +"Did you say the church was burnt?" asked Cecil. + +"Yes; and a very good thing too! Hideous place, where you couldn't +do right if you died for it! The fire began there--stoves no doubt-- +and there it would have stopped if any one had had any sense; but +there they would run and gape, and the more I tried to get them to +form a chain and drench the warehouses, the more they wouldn't do +it. And when the flame once got hold of the paper--did you see it?-- +it was not a thing to forget. I verily believe the whole town +would have gone if the Charnocks hadn't come and got a little +discipline into the asses. It was just life and death work, +fighting the fire to hinder it from getting across Water Lane, and +then it would have been all up with High Street. The tongues broke +out like live things ready to lick up everything; and it was like +killing dragons to go at them with the hose and buckets. I declare +my arms are fit to drop out of their sockets. And the Rector +devoted himself to carrying out bed-ridden old women. I forgot to +tell you, Lady Rosamond, he has broken his--There now, I never meant +to frighten you--broken his spectacles." + +"You did it on purpose," she said, laughing at her own start. + +"No, indeed, I did not." + +"And is it quite out now?" + +"Yes; when the Backsworth engines and the soldiers came up, it was +like the Prussians at Waterloo." + +"Oh, then it was done," said Rosamond. "Take care! my grandfather +was in the Light Division." + +"And my uncle in the Guards," said the curate. But before the +Waterloo controversy could be pursued, four or five figures on +horseback came round the knoll, and Raymond and Julius sprang off +their horses, introducing the three officers who followed their +example. + +One was Rosamond's old acquaintance, the Colonel, a friend of her +father; but she had little attention to spare for them till she had +surveyed her husband, who looked nothing worse than exceedingly +dusty, and at fault without his spectacles. + +Inquiries were made for Frank and Charlie. They were walking home. +They had worked gallantly. The flames were extinguished, but the +engines must go on playing on them for some time longer. No lives +lost, and very few casualties, but the paper-mills were entirely +destroyed, and about twenty tenements, so that great distress was to +be apprehended. + +Such intelligence was being communicated as the party stood together +in a group, when there was a light tinkling of bells, and two ladies +in a light open carriage, drawn by two spirited ponies, dashed round +the knoll; and at the moment something must have gone wrong with +them, for there was a start, a pull, a call of "Raymond! Raymond!" + +Throwing his bridle to Herbert Bowater, he sprang to the horses' +heads. + +"Mr. Poynsett! Thank you! I beg your pardon," said the lady, +recovering herself; and Rosamond instantly perceived that she must +be Lady Tyrrell, for she was young-looking, very handsome, and in +slight mourning; and her companion was Miss Vivian. Julius, holding +his surviving glass to his eye, likewise stepped forward. "Thank +you, it was so stupid," the lady ran on. "Is not there something +wrong with the traces? I don't know how they got themselves +harnessed, but there was no keeping at home." + +"I think all is right," said Raymond, gravely, making the +examination over to a servant. "Let me introduce my wife, Lady +Tyrrell." + +The lady held out her hand. "I hope we shall be excellent +neighbours.--My sister.--You remember little Lena," she added to the +brothers. "She stole a march on us, I find. I heard of your +encounter on Friday. It was too bad of you not to come in and let +us send you home; I hope you did not get very wet, Lady Rosamond.-- +Ah! Mr. Strangeways, I did not know you were there," she proceeded, +as the youngest of the officers accosted her; "come over and see us. +You're better provided now; but come to luncheon any day. I am sure +to be at home at half-past one; and I want so much to hear of your +mother and sisters." And with a universal bow and smile she +nourished her whip, her ponies jangled their bells, and the ladies +vanished. + +"Stunning pair that!" was young Strangeways' exclamation. + +"Most beautiful!" murmured Cecil, in a low voice, as if she was +quite dazzled. "You never said she was like that," she added +reproachfully to Julius. + +"Our encounter was in the dark," he answered. + +"Oh, I did not mean the young one, but Lady Tyrrell. She is just +like a gem we saw at Firenze--which was it?" + +"Where?" said Raymond, bewildered. + +"Firenze--Florence," she said, deigning to translate; and finding +her own reply. "Ah, yes, the Medusa!" then, as more than one +exclaimed in indignant dismay, she said, "No, not the Gorgon, but +the beautiful winged head, with only two serpents on the brow and +one coiled round the neck, and the pensive melancholy face." + +"I know," said Julius, shortly; while the other gentlemen entered +into an argument, some defending the beauty of the younger sister, +some of the elder; and it lasted till they entered the park, where +all were glad to partake of their well-earned meal, most of the +gentlemen having been at work since dawn without sustenance, except +a pull at the beer served out to the firemen. + +Cecil was not at all shy, and was pleased to take her place as +representative lady of the house; but somehow, though every one was +civil and attentive to her, she found herself effaced by the more +full-blown Rosamond, accustomed to the same world as the guests; and +she could not help feeling the same sense of depression as when she +had to yield the head of her father's table to her step-mother. + +Nor could she have that going to church for the first time in state +with her bridegroom she had professed to dread, but had really +anticipated with complacency; for though Julius had bidden the bells +to be rung for afternoon service, Raymond was obliged to go back to +Wil'sbro' to make arrangements for the burnt-out families, and she +had to go as lonely as Anne herself. + +Lady Tyrrell and her sister were both at Compton Church, and +overtook the three sisters-in-law as they were waiting to be joined +by the Rector. + +"We shall have to take shelter with you," said Lady Tyrrell, "poor +burnt-out beings that we are." + +"Do you belong to Wil'sbro'?" said Rosamond. + +"Yes; St. Nicholas is an immense straggling parish, going four miles +along the river. I don't know how we shall ever be able to go back +again to poor old Mr. Fuller. You'll never get rid of us from +Compton." + +"I suppose they will set about rebuilding the church at once," said +Cecil. "Of course they will form a committee, and put my husband on +it." + +"In the chair, no doubt," said Lady Tyrrell, in a tone that sounded +to Rosamond sarcastic, but which evidently gratified Cecil. "But we +will have a committee of our own, and you will have to preside, and +patronize our bazaar. Of course you know all about them." + +"Oh yes!" said Cecil, eagerly. "We have one every year for the +Infirmary, only my father did not approve of my selling at a stall." + +"Ah! quite right then, but you are a married woman now, and that is +quite a different thing. The stall of the three brides. What an +attraction! I shall come and talk about it when I make my call in +full form! Good-bye again." + +Cecil's balance was more than restored by this entire recognition to +be prime lady-patroness of everything. To add to her satisfaction, +when her husband came home to dinner, bringing with him both the +curates, she found there was to be a meeting on Tuesday in the +Assembly-room, of both sexes, to consider of the relief of the work- +people, and that he would be glad to take her to it. Moreover, as +it was to be strictly local, Rosamond was not needed there, though +Raymond was not equally clear as to the Rector, since he believed +that the St. Nicholas parishioners meant to ask the loan of Compton +Poynsett Church for one service on a Sunday. + +"Then I shall keep out of the way," said Julius. "I do not want to +have the request made to me in public." + +"You do not mean to refuse?" said Cecil, with a sort of self- +identification with her constituents. + +"The people are welcome to attend as many of our services as they +like; but there is no hour that I could give the church up to Mr. +Fuller on a Sunday." + +"Nor would the use of St. Nicholas be very edifying for our people," +added Mr. Bindon. + +His junior clenched it by saying with a laugh, "I should think not! +Fancy old Fuller's rusty black gown up in our pulpit!" + +"I rejoice to say that is burnt," rejoined Mr. Bindon. + +"What bet will you take that a new one will be the first thing +subscribed for?" said the deacon, bringing a certain grave look on +the faces of both the elder clergy, and a horror-stricken one upon +Anne's; while Cecil pronounced her inevitable dictum, that at +Dunstone Mr. Venn always preached in a gown, and "we" should never +let him think of anything nonsensical. + +Rosamond was provoked into a display of her solitary bit of +ecclesiastical knowledge--"A friar's gown, the most Popish vestment +in the church." + +Cecil, thoroughly angered, flushed up to the eyes and bit her lips, +unable to find a reply, while all the gentlemen laughed. Frank +asked if it were really so, and Mr. Bindon made the well-known +explanation that the Geneva gown was neither more nor less than the +monk's frock. + +"I shall write and ask Mr. Venn," gasped Cecil; but her husband +stifled the sound by saying, "I saw little Pettitt, Julius, this +afternoon, overwhelmed with gratitude to you for all the care you +took of his old mother, and all his waxen busts." + +"Ah! by the bye!" said Charlie, "I did meet the Rector staggering +out, with the fascinating lady with the long eyelashes in one arm, +and the moustached hero in the other." + +"There was no pacifying the old lady without," said Julius. "I had +just coaxed her to the door, when she fell to wringing her hands. +Ah! those lovely models, that were worth thirty shillings each, with +natural hair--that they should be destroyed! If the heat or the +water did but come near them, Adolphus would never get over it. I +could only pacify her by promising to go back for these idols of his +heart as soon as she was safe; and after all, I had to dash at them +through the glass, and that was the end of my spectacles." + +"Where was Pettitt himself?" + +"Well employed, poor little fellow, saving the people in those three +cottages of his. No one supposed his shop in danger, but the fire +took a sudden freak and came down Long Street; and though the house +is standing, it had to be emptied and deluged with water to save it. +I never knew Pettitt had a mother till I found her mounting guard, +like one distracted, over her son's bottles of perfumery." + +"And dyes?" murmured Raymond under his breath; but Frank caught the +sound, and said, "Ah, Julius! don't I remember his inveigling you +into coming out with scarlet hair?" + +"I don't think I've seen him since," said Julius, laughing. "I +believe he couldn't resist such an opportunity of practising his +art. And for my part, I must say for myself, that it was in our +first holidays, and Raymond and Miles had been black and blue the +whole half-year from having fought my battles whenever I was called +either 'Bunny' or 'Grandfather.' So when he assured me he could +turn my hair to as sweet a raven-black as Master Poynsett's, I +thought it would be pleasing to all, forgetting that he could not +dye my eyes, and that their effect would have been some degrees more +comical." + +"For shame, Julius!" said Rosamond. "Don't you know that one +afternoon, when Nora had cried for forty minutes over her sum, she +declared that she wanted to make her eyes as beautiful as Mr. +Charnock's. Well, what was the effect?" + +"Startling," said Raymond. "He came down in shades of every kind of +crimson and scarlet. A fearful object, with his pink-and-white face +glowing under it." + +"And what I had to undergo from Susan!" added Julius. "She washed +me, and soaped me, and rubbed me, till I felt as if all the +threshing-machines in the county were about my head, lecturing me +all the time on the profanity of flying against Scripture by trying +to alter one's hair from what Providence had made it. Nothing would +do; her soap only turned it into shades of lemon and primrose. I +was fain to let her shave my head as if I had a brain fever; and I +was so horribly ashamed for years after, that I don't think I have +set foot in Long Street since till to-day." + +"Pettitt is a queer little fellow," said Herbert. "The most +truculent little Radical to hear him talk, and yet staunch in his +votes, for he can't go against those whose hair he has cut off from +time immemorial." + +"I hope he has not lost much," said Julius. + +"His tenements are down, but they were insured; and as to his stock, +he says he owes its safety entirely to you, Julius. I think he +would present you with both his models as a testimonial, if you +could only take them," said Raymond. + +Cecil had neither spoken nor laughed through all this. She was +nursing her wrath; and after marching out of the dining-room, lay in +wait to intercept her husband, and when she had claimed his +attention, began, "Rosamond ought not to be allowed to say such +things." + +"What things?" + +"Speaking in that improper way about a gown." + +"She seems to have said what was the fact." + +"It can't be! It is preposterous! I never heard it before." + +"Nor I; but Bindon evidently is up in those matters." + +"It was only to support Rosamond; and I am quite sure she said it +out of mere opposition to me. You ought to speak to Julius." + +"About what?" said Raymond. + +"Her laughing whenever I mention Dunstone, and tell them the proper +way of doing things." + +"There may be different opinions about the proper way of doing +things." Then as she opened her eyes in wonder and rebuke, he +continued, in his elder-brotherly tone of kindness, "You know I told +you already that you had better not interfere in matters concerning +his church and parish." + +"We always managed things at Dunstone." + +Hang Dunstone! was with some difficulty suppressed; but in an extra +gentle voice Raymond said, "Your father did what he thought his +duty, but I do not think it mine, nor yours, to direct Julius in +clerical matters. It can only lead to disputes, and I will not have +them." + +"It is Rosamond. I'm sure I don't dispute." + +"Listen, Cecil!" he said. "I can see that your position may be +trying, in these close quarters with a younger brother's wife with +more age and rank than yourself." + +"That is nothing. An Irish earl, and a Charnock of Dunstone!" + +"Dunstone will be more respected if you keep it in the background," +he said, holding in stronger words with great difficulty. "Once for +all, you have your own place and duties, and Rosamond has hers. If +you meddle in them, nothing but annoyance can come of it; and +remember, I cannot be appealed to in questions between you and her. +Julius and I have gone on these nine-and-twenty years without a +cloud between us, and I'm sure you would not wish to bring one now." + +Wherewith he left her bewildered. She did not perceive that he was +too impartial for a lover, but she had a general sense that she had +come into a rebellious world, where Dunstone and Dunstone's daughter +were of no account, and her most cherished notions disputed. What +was the lady of the manor to do but to superintend the church, +parsonage, and parish generally? Not her duty? She had never heard +of such a thing, nor did she credit it. Papa would come home, make +these degenerate Charnocks hear reason, and set all to rights. + + + + +CHAPTER VI +Wedding Visits + + +Young Mrs. Charnock Poynsett had plenty of elasticity, and her +rebuffs were less present to her mind in the morning than to that of +her husband, who had been really concerned to have to inflict an +expostulation; and he was doubly kind, almost deferential, giving +the admiration and attention he felt incumbent on him to the +tasteful arrangements of her wedding presents in her own sitting- +room. + +"And this clock I am going to have in the drawing-room, and these +Salviati glasses. Then, when I have moved out the piano, I shall +put the sofa in its place, and my own little table, with my pretty +Florentine ornaments." + +Raymond again looked annoyed. "Have you spoken to my mother?" he +said. + +"No; she never goes there." + +"Not now, but if ever she can bear any move it will be her first +change, and I should not like to interfere with her arrangements." + +"She could never have been a musician, to let the piano stand +against the wall. I shall never be able to play." + +"Perhaps that might be contrived," said Raymond, kindly. "_Here_ +you know is your own domain, where you can do as you please." + +"Yes; but I am expected to play in the evening. Look at all those +things. I had kept the choicest for the drawing-room, and it is +such a pity to hide them all up here." + +Raymond felt for the mortification, and was unwilling to cross her +again, so he said, "I will ask whether my mother would object to +having the piano moved." + +"This morning?" + +"After eleven o'clock--I never disturb her sooner; but you shall +hear before I go to Backsworth." + +"An hour lost," thought Cecil; but she was too well bred to grumble, +and she had her great work to carry on of copying and illustrating +her journal. + +Mrs. Poynsett readily consented. "Oh yes, my dear, let her do +whatever she likes. Don't let me be a bugbear. A girl is never at +home till she has had her will of the furniture. I think she will +find that moving out the piano betrays the fading of the rest of the +paper, but that is her affair. She is free to do just as she likes. +I dare say the place does look antediluvian to young eyes." + +So Raymond was the bearer of his mother's full permission; and Cecil +presided with great energy over the alterations, which she carried +out by the aid of the younger servants, to the great disgust of +their seniors. She expected the acclamations of her contemporaries; +but it happened that the first of them to cross the room was Julius, +on his way to his mother's room after luncheon, and he, having on a +pair of make-shift glasses, till the right kind could be procured +from London, was unprepared for obstacles in familiar regions, +stumbled over an ottoman, and upset a table with the breakage of a +vase. + +He apologized, with much regret; but the younger brothers made an +outcry. "What has come to the place? Here's the table all over +everything!" + +"And where are the bronzes?" + +"And the humming-birds? Miles's birds, that he brought home after +his first voyage." + +"And the clock with the two jolly little Cupids? Don't you remember +Miles and Will Bowater dressing them up for men-of-war's men? +Mother could not bring herself to have them undressed for a year, +and all the time the clock struck nohow!" + +"This is an anatomical study instead of a clock," lamented Frank. +"I say, Cecil, do you like your friends to sit in their bones, like +Sydney Smith?" + +"I never saw such a stupid old set of conservatives!" broke in +Rosamond, feeling for Cecil's mortification. "In an unprejudiced +eye the room looks infinitely better, quite revivified! You ought +to be much obliged to Cecil for letting you see all her beautiful +things." + +"Why don't you favour us with yours?" said Charlie. + +"I know better! Mine aren't fit to wipe the shoes of Cecil's! When +I get into the Rectory you'll see how hideous they are!" said +Rosamond, with the merriest complacency. "Couvre-pieds to set your +teeth on edge, from the non-commissioned officers' wives; and the +awfullest banner-screen you ever saw, worked by the drum-major's own +hands, with Her Majesty's arms on one side, and the De Courcy ones +on the other, and glass eyes like stuffed birds' to the lion and +unicorn. We nearly expired from suppressed laughter under the +presentation." + +Then she went round, extorting from the lads admiration for Cecil's +really beautiful properties, and winning gratitude for her own +cordial praise, though it was not the artistic appreciation they +deserved. Indeed, Cecil yielded to the general vote for the +restoration of the humming-birds, allowing that, though she did not +like stuffed birds in a drawing-room, she would not have banished +them if she had known their history. + +This lasted till Charlie spied a carriage coming up the drive, which +could be seen a long way off, so that there was the opportunity for +a general sauve qui peut. Cecil represented that Rosamond ought to +stay and receive her bridal visits; but she was unpersuadable. "Oh +no! I leave all that for you! My time will come when I get into +the Rectory. We are going in the dog-cart to the other end of the +parish.--What's its name--Squattlesea Marsh, Julius?" + +"Squattlesford!" said Charlie. "If Julius means to drive you, look +out for your neck!" + +"No, it's the other way, I'm going to drive Julius!--Come along, or +we shall be caught!" + +Cecil stood her ground, as did Anne, who was too weary and +indifferent to retreat, and Frank, who had taken another view of the +carriage as it came nearer. + +"I must apologize for having brought nothing but my father's card," +said Lady Tyrrell, entering with her sister, and shaking hands: +"there's no such thing as dragging him out for a morning call." + +"And Mr. Charnock Poynsett is not at home," replied Cecil. "He +found so much county business waiting for him, that he had to go to +Backsworth." + +"It is the better opportunity for a little private caucus with you," +returned Lady Tyrrell, "before the meeting to-morrow. I rather +fancy the gentlemen have one of their own." + +"Some are to dine here to-night," said Cecil. + +"We ladies had better be prepared with our proposals," said Lady +Tyrrell. + +At the same time Frank drew near Miss Vivian with a large book, +saying, "These are the photographs you wished to see." + +He placed the book on the ottoman, and would thus have secured a +sort of tete-a-tete; but Eleonora did not choose to leave Mrs Miles +Charnock out, and handed her each photograph in turn, but could only +elicit a cold languid "Thank you." To Anne's untrained eye these +triumphs of architecture were only so many dull representations of +'Roman Catholic churches,' and she would much rather have listened +to the charitable plans of the other two ladies, for the houseless +factory women of Wil'sbro'. + +The bazaar, Lady Tyrrell said, must be first started by the Member's +wife; and there should be an innermost committee, of not more than +three, to dispose of stalls and make arrangements. + +"You must be one," said Cecil. "I know no one yet." + +"You will, long before it comes off. In fact, I am as great a +stranger as yourself. Ah! there's an opportunity!" as the bell +pealed. "The Bowaters, very likely; I saw their Noah's ark as I +passed the Poynsett Arms, with the horses taken out. I wonder how +many are coming--worthy folks!" + +Which evidently meant insufferable bores. + +"Is there not a daughter?" asked Cecil. + +"You need not use the singular, though, by the bye, most of them are +married." + +"Oh, pray stay!" entreated Cecil, as there were signs of leave- +taking. + +"I should do you no good. You'll soon learn that I am a sort of +Loki among the Asagotter." + +Cecil laughed, but had time to resume her somewhat prim dignity +before the lengthened disembarkation was over, and after all, +produced only four persons; but then none were small--Mrs. Bowater +was a harsh matron, Mr. Bowater a big comely squire, the daughters +both tall, one with an honest open face much like Herbert's, only +with rather less youth and more intelligence, the other a bright +dark glowing gipsy-faced young girl. + +Eleonora Vivian, hitherto gravely stiff and reserved, to poor +Frank's evident chagrin, at once flashed into animation, and met the +elder Miss Bowater with outstretched hands, receiving a warm kiss. +At the same time Mr. Bowater despatched Frank to see whether his +mother could admit a visitor; and Lady Tyrrell observed, "Ah! I was +about to make the same petition; but I will cede to older friends, +for so I suppose I must call you, Mr. Bowater--though my +acquaintance is of long standing enough!" + +And she put on a most charming smile, which Mr. Bowater received +with something inarticulate that might be regarded as a polite form +of 'fudge,' which made Cecil think him a horribly rude old man, and +evidently discomposed his wife very much. + +Frank brought back his mother's welcome to the Squire; but by this +time Eleonora and Miss Bowater had drawn together into a window, in +so close and earnest a conversation that he could not break into it, +and with almost visible reluctance began to talk to the younger +sister, who on her side was desirous of joining in the bazaar +discussion, which had been started again in full force; until there +was a fresh influx of visitors, when Lady Tyrrell decidedly took +leave with her sister, and Frank escorted them to their carriage, +and returned no more. + +In the new shuffling of partners, the elder Miss Bowater found +herself close to Anne, and at once inquired warmly for Miles, with +knowledge and interest in naval affairs derived from a sailor +brother, Miles's chief friend and messmate in his training and +earlier voyages. There was something in Joanna Bowater's manner +that always unlocked hearts, and Anne was soon speaking without her +fence of repellant stiffness and reserve. Certainly Miles was loved +by his mother and brothers more than he could be by an old +playfellow and sisterly friend, and yet there was something in +Joanna's tone that gave Anne a sense of fellow-feeling, as if she +had met a countrywoman in this land of strangers; and she even told +how Miles had thought it right to send her home, thinking that she +might be a comfort to his mother. "And not knowing all that was +going to happen!" said poor Anne, with an irrepressible sigh, both +for her own blighted hopes, and for the whirl into which her sore +heart had fallen. + +"I think you will be," said Joanna, brightly; "though it must be +strange coming on so many. Dear Mrs. Poynsett is so kind!" + +"Yes," said Anne, coldly. + +"Ah! you don't know her yet. And Lady Rosamond! She is +delightful!" + +"Have you seen her!" + +"We met them just now in the village, but my brother is enchanted. +And do you know what was Julius's first introduction to her? It was +at a great school-feast, where they had the regimental children as +well as the town ones. A poor little boy went off in an epileptic +fit, and Julius found her holding him, with her own hand in his +mouth to hinder the locking of the teeth. He said her fingers were +bitten almost to the bone, but she made quite light of it." + +"That was nice!" said Anne; but then, with a startled glance, and in +an undertone, she added, "Are they Christians?" + +Joanna Bowater paused for a moment between dismay and desire for +consideration, and in that moment her father called to her, "Jenny, +do you remember the dimensions of those cottages in Queckett's +Lane?" and she had to come and serve for his memory, while he was +indoctrinating a younger squire with the duties of a landlord. + +Meanwhile Mrs. Bowater was, for the tenth time, consulting her old +friend upon Mrs. Hornblower's capabilities of taking care of +Herbert, and betraying a little disappointment that his first sermon +had not yet been heard; and when his voice was complimented, she +hoped Julius would spare it--too much exertion could not be good for +so young a man, and though dear Herbert looked so strong, no one +would believe how much sleep he required. Then she observed, "We +found Camilla Vivian--Lady Tyrrell I mean--calling. Have you seen +her?" + +"No." + +"Well, she really seems improved!" + +"Mr. Bowater has been telling me she is handsomer than ever!" + +"Oh yes! That's all gentlemen think of; but I meant in other ways. +She seems full of the rebuilding of St. Nicholas, and to be making +great friends with your new daughter. You don't think," lowering +her voice, "that Raymond would have any objection to meeting her?" + +"Certainly not!" + +"I did not suppose he would, but I thought I would just ask you. It +would be rather marked not to invite him for the 3rd, you know; and +Jenny was always so fond of poor Emily, kept up a correspondence +with her to the last. It was the first time she had met the little +one since they came back. Not that she is little now, she is very +tall and quite handsome _even_ by the side of Edith. We just saw +Lady Rosamond--a sweet face--and Herbert perfectly raves about her!" + +"She is a most unselfish warm-hearted creature!" said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"I am so glad! And Miles's wife, I hope she will come. Poor thing, +she looks very poorly." + +"Yes, I am very anxious about her. If she is not better in a day or +two, I shall insist on her having advice." + +"Poor dear, I don't wonder! But she had better come to Strawyers; +Jenny will cheer her if any one can, and we shall have a nice lively +party, I hope! She will only mope the more if she never goes out." + +"I am afraid she is hardly equal to it; besides, poor child," added +Mrs. Poynsett, "she seems to have been strictly brought up, and to +think our ways rather shocking; and Miles wrote to me not to press +her to go into society till he comes home." + +"Ah! well, I call that a mistake!" puffed out good-humoured Mrs. +Bowater. "Very bad for the poor girl's spirits. By the bye, I hope +Julius does not object to Herbert's dancing--not at a public ball, +you know, but at home--for if he did, I would try to arrange +something else, it would be so hard for the poor boy to have to look +on." + +"I don't know, I don't think he could," said the mother, +considering. + +"You see, we thought of a dinner-party for as many as possible. +Frank and Charlie won't mind dining in the schoolroom, I know, and +having the rest for a dance in the evening; but if Julius did think +it unclerical--Jenny says he won't, and papa laughs, and says, 'Poh! +poh! Julius is no fool;' but people are so much more particular +than they used to be, and I would not get the dear boy into a scrape +for the world." + +Mrs. Poynsett undertook to ascertain his opinions on this knotty +point, and to let her know if they were adverse; and then she begged +for a visit from Jenny, whose brother had no accommodation for her +in his lodgings. She could not be spared till after the +entertainment on the 3rd, nor till a visit from her married sister +was over; but afterwards, her mother was delighted that she should +come and look after Herbert, who seemed as much on the maternal mind +as if he had not batted his way through Eton, and boated it through +Oxford. + +Mrs. Poynsett obtained her word with Julius in good time that +evening. He laughed a little. "Poor Herbs! when will people +understand that it is the spirit of the thing, the pursuit, not the +individual chance participation in any particular amusement, that is +unclerical, as they are pleased to call it?" + +"What do you think of Herbert?" + +"A boy, and a very nice boy; but if he doesn't get his healthful +play somehow, he will burst out like a closed boiler some day." + +"A muscular Christian on your hands?" + +"Not theoretically, for he has been well taught; but it's a great +animal that needs to work off its steam, and if I had known it, I +would not have undertaken the problem of letting him do that, +without setting up bad habits, or scandalizing the parish and +Bindon--who is young the other way, and has no toleration. We had +this morning's service in a state of siege from all the dogs. +Herbert thought he had shut them safely up, but they were all at his +heels in the churchyard; and though he rated them home, and shut all +the doors, we heard them whining and scratching at each in turn." + +"I thought I should have died of it," said Rosamond, entering. "His +face grew red enough to set his surplice on fire, and Mr. Bindon +glared at him, and he missed his verse in the Psalm; for there was +the bull terrier, crouching and looking abject at the vestry-door, +just restrained by his eye from coming further." + +"What shall you do about it, Julius?" asked his mother, much amused. + +"Oh, that will remedy itself. All dogs learn to understand the +bell." + +And then the others began to drop in, and were told of the +invitation that was coming. + +"I say, Rosamond," cried Charlie, "can brothers and sisters-in-law +dance together?" + +"That depends on how the brothers-in-law dance," returned Rosamond. +"Some one, for pity's sake, play a waltz!--Come along Charlie! the +hall is a sweet place for it!--Whistle, Julius!--Frank, whistle!" + +And away she whirled. Frank, holding out his hands, was to his +surprise accepted by Cecil, and disappeared with her into the hall. +Julius stood by the mantelpiece, with the first shadow on his brow +his mother had seen since his arrival. Presently he spoke in a +defensive apologetic tone: "She has always been used to this style +of thing." + +"Most naturally," said the mother. + +"Not that they ever did more than their position required, and Lady +Rathforlane is a truly careful mother. Of course some things might +startle you stay-at-home people; but in all essentials--" + +"I see what you mean." + +"And what seems like rattle is habit." + +"Simple gaiete de coeur!" + +"So it is better to acquiesce till it subsides of itself. You see +it is hard, after such a life of change and variety, to settle down +into a country parsonage." + +"What are you saying there?" said Rosamond, tripping in out of +breath. + +"That I don't know how you are to put up with a pink-eyed parson, +and a hum-drum life," said Julius, holding out a caressing hand. + +"Now that's hard," pleaded she; "only because I took a frolic with +Baby Charles! I say, Julius, shall we give it up altogether and +stay at home like good children? I believe that is what would suit +the told Rabbit much better than his kid gloves,"--and her sweet +face looked up at him with a meek candid gaze. + +"No," he said, "that would not do. The Bowaters are our oldest +friends. But, Rosie, as you _are_ a clergyman's wife, could you not +give up round dances?" + +"Oh no, no! That's too bad. I'd rather never go to a dance at all, +than sit still, or be elbowed about in the square dances. You never +told me you expected that!"--and her tones were of a child petulant +at injustice. + +"Suppose," he said, as a delightful solution, "you only gratified +Frank and Charlie by waltzing with them." + +She burst into a ringing laugh. "My brothers-in-law! How very +ridiculous! Suppose you included the curates?" + +"You know what I mean," he said gravely. + +"Oh, bother the parson's wife! Haven't I seen them figuring away by +scores? Did we ever have a regimental ball that they were not the +keenest after?" + +"So they get themselves talked of!" said Julius, as Anne's quiet +entrance broke up the dialogue. + +Mrs. Poynsett had listened, glad there was no appeal to her, +conscious that she did not understand the merits of the case, and +while she doubted whether her eldest son had love enough, somewhat +afraid lest his brother had not rather too much for the good of his +lawful supremacy. + + + + +CHAPTER VII +Unfruitful Suggestions + + +"Raymond! Can you spare me a moment before you go into your +mother's room?" + +It was Rosamond who, to his surprise, as he was about to go down- +stairs, met him and drew him into her apartment--his mother's own +dressing-room, which he had not entered since the accident. + +"Is anything the matter?" he said, thinking that Julius might have +spared him from complaints of Cecil. + +"Oh no! only one never can speak to you, and Julius told me that you +could tell me about Mrs. Poynsett. I can't help thinking she could +be moved more than she is." Then, as he was beginning to speak, "Do +you know that, the morning of the fire, I carried her with only one +of the maids to the couch under the tent-room window? Susan was +frightened out of her wits, but she was not a bit the worse for it." + +"Ah! that was excitement." + +"But if it did not hurt her then, why should it hurt her again? +There's old General M'Kinnon, my father's old friend, who runs about +everywhere in a wheeled-chair with a leg-rest; and I can't think why +she should not do the same." + +Raymond smiled kindly on her, but rather sadly; perhaps he was +recollecting his morning's talk about the occupancy of the drawing- +room. "You know it is her spine," he said. + +"So it is with him. His horse rolled over him at Sebastopol, and he +has never walked since. I wanted to write to Mary M'Kinnon; but +Julius said I had better talk to you, because he was only at home +for a fortnight, when she was at the worst, and you knew more about +it." + +"Yes," said Raymond, understanding more than the Irish tongue fully +expressed. "I never saw a woman sit better than she did, and she +looked as young and light in the saddle as you could, till that day, +when, after the rains, the bank where the bridle-path to Squattles +End was built up, gave way with the horse's feet, and down she went +twenty feet, and was under the horse when Miles and I got down to +her! We brought her on a mattress to that room, not knowing whether +she were alive; and she has never moved out of it! It was agony to +her to be touched." + +"Yes but it can't be that now. Was not that three years ago?" + +"Not so much. Two and a half. We had Hayter down to see her, and +he said perfect rest was the only chance for her." + +"And has not he seen her lately?" + +"He died last winter; and old Worth, who comes in once a week to +look at her, is not fit for more than a little watching and +attention. I dare say we all have learnt to acquiesce too much in +her present state, and that more might be done. You see she has +never had a lady's care, except now and then Jenny Bowater's." + +"I do feel sure she could bear more now," said Rosamond, eagerly. +"It would be such a thing if she could only be moved about that +down-stairs floor." + +"And be with us at meals and in the evening," said Raymond, his face +lightening up. "Thank you, Rosamond!" + +"I'll write to Mary M'Kinnon to-morrow, to ask about the chair," +cried Rosamond; and Raymond, hearing the door-bell, hurried down, to +find his wife standing alone over the drawing-room fire, not very +complacent. + +"Where have you been, Raymond?" + +"I was talking to Rosamond. She has seen a chair on which it might +be possible to move my mother about on this floor." + +"I thought--" Cecil flushed. She was on the point of saying she +thought Rosamond was not to interfere in her department any more +than she in Rosamond's; but she kept it back, and changed it into +"Surely the doctor and nurses must know best." + +"A fresh eye often makes a difference," said Raymond. "To have her +among us again--!" but he was cut short by the announcement of Mr. +and Miss Fuller. + +"Poor Mr. Fuller," as every one called him, was the incumbent of St. +Nicholas, Willansborough, a college living always passed by the +knowing old bachelor fellows, and as regularly proving a delusion to +the first junior in haste for a wife. Twenty-five years ago Mr. +Fuller had married upon this, which, as Mr. Bindon said, was rather +a reason for not marrying--a town with few gentry, and a petty +unthriving manufacture, needing an enormous amount of energy to work +it properly, and getting--Mr. Fuller, with force yearly decreasing +under the pressure of a sickly wife, ill-educated, unsatisfactory +sons, and unhealthy, aimless daughters. Of late some assistance had +been obtained, but only from Mr. Driver, the 'coach' or cramming +tutor, who was directing the studies of Frank and half a dozen more +youths, and his aid was strictly limited to a share in the Sunday +services. + +The eldest daughter accompanied the Vicar. Her mother had not +health (or perhaps clothes) for a dinner-party, and it was the first +time she had ever been in the house. Very shy and in much awe she +was! Cecil viewed her as a constituent, and was elaborately civil +and patronizing, doing the honours of all the photographs and +illustrations on which she could lay hands, and only eliciting +alternately 'Very nice,' and 'How sweet!' A little more was made of +the alarms of the fire, and the preparations for clearing the house, +and there was a further thaw about the bazaar. It would be such a +relief from plain work, and she could get some lovely patterns from +her cousin who had a missionary basket; but as to the burnt-out +families, the little knowledge or interest she seemed to have about +them was rather astounding, unless, as Rosamond suspected, she +thought it 'shop,' and uninteresting to the great ladies of Compton- +Poynsett Hall. + +Meanwhile, her father made the apprehended request for the loan of +Compton Church during the intervals of services, and when the Rector +explained how brief those intervals would be, looked astonished, and +dryly complimented him on his energy and his staff, somewhat as if +the new broom were at the bottom of these congratulations. + +The schools were to be used for services until a temporary iron +church could be obtained, for which Julius, to make up for his +churlishness in withholding his own church, made the handsomer +donation, and held out hopes of buying it afterwards for the use of +Squattles End. Then, having Mr. Fuller's ear to himself, he +ventured to say, though cautiously, as to one who had been a +clergyman before he was born, "I wish it were possible to dispense +with this bazaar." + +Mr. Fuller shrugged his shoulders. "If every one subscribed in the +style of this family." + +"They would be more likely to do so, without the appeal to secondary +motives." + +"Try them," said the elder man. + +"Exactly what I want to do. I would put up the four walls, begin +with what you get from the insurance, a weekly offertory, and add +improvements as means came in. This is not visionary. I have seen +proof of its success." + +"It may serve in new-fashioned city missions, but in an old- +established place like this it would create nothing but offence. +When you have been in Orders as long as I have, you will find that +there is nothing for it but to let people do what they will, not +what one thinks best." + +"Mr. Fuller," said Julius, eagerly, "will you try an experiment? +Drop this bazaar, and I promise you our collection every Sunday +evening for the year, giving notice of it to my people, and to such +of yours as may be present." + +"I do not despise your offer," said Mr. Fuller, laying his hand upon +his arm. "You mean it kindly, and if I were in your place, or had +only my own feelings to consider, I might attempt it. But it would +be only mischievous to interfere with the bazaar. Lady Tyrrell--all +the ladies, in fact--have set their minds on it, and if I objected +there would instantly be a party cry against me, and that is the one +thing I have always avoided." + +His tone of superior wisdom, meek and depressed as he always was, +tried the Rector's patience enough to make his forehead burn and +bring out his white eyebrows in strong relief. "How about a +blessing on the work?" he asked, suppressing so much that he hardly +knew this was spoken aloud. + +Again Mr. Fuller smiled. He had been a bit of a humorist when he +was an Oxford don. "Speak of that to Briggs," he said, "and he +would answer, 'Cash for me, and the blessing may take care of +itself.' As to the ladies--why, they deafen you about blessings on +their humble efforts, and the widow's mite." + +"Simply meaning that they want their amusement a little--" + +"Buttered over," said Mr. Fuller, supplying the word. "Though you +are hard on them, Charnock--I don't know about the fine ladies; but +there are quiet folk who will work their fingers to the bone, and +can do nothing else." + +"That's true," said Julius; "and one would gladly find a safe outlet +for their diligence." + +"You do not trust to it for bringing the blessing," said Mr. Fuller +in a tone that Julius liked even less than the mere hopeless faint- +heartedness, for in it there was sarcasm on faith in aught but +pounds s. d. + +The two brothers held another discussion on this matter later that +night, on the stairs, as they were on their way to their rooms. + +"Won't you come to this meeting to-morrow, Julius?" asked Raymond. + +"I don't see that I should be of any use, unless--" + +"Unless what?" + +"Unless you would make what seems to me the right proposal, and I +could be any support in it." + +"What's that?" + +"To use the insurance to put up the mere shells and plain +indispensable fittings of the church and town-hall, then make the +drainage of Water Lane and Hall Street the first object for the +rates, while the church is done by subscription and voluntary +effort." + +"You put the drainage first--even before the church?" said Raymond, +smiling, with an elder brother's satisfaction in such an amount of +common sense. + +"Of course I do," said Julius. "An altar and four walls and chairs +are all that ought to be sought for. Little good can be done to +people's souls while their bodies are in the feverish discomfort of +foul air and water. This is an opportunity not to be wasted, while +all the houses are down, town-hall and all." + +"The very thing I told Briggs and the others this morning," said +Raymond; "but I could not get a hearing; they said there never had +been any illness worth mentioning, and in fact scouted the whole +matter, as people always do." + +"Yes, they take it as a personal insult when you mention the +odorous--or odious, savours sweet," said Julius. "I heard a good +deal of that when we had the spell of cholera at St. Awdry's." + +"I shall work on at it, and I trust to get it done in time," said +Raymond; "but it will not be at once. The subject is too new to +them, and the irritation it produces must subside before they will +hear reason. Besides, the first thing is to employ and feed these +paper-makers." + +"Of course." + +"That will pretty well absorb this first meeting. The ladies will +manage that, I think; and when this is provided for, I will try what +I can do at the committee; but there is no good in bringing it +forward at this great public affair, when every ass can put in his +word. Everything depends on whom they choose for the new mayor. If +Whitlock comes in, there is some chance of sense and reason being +heard. Good night." + +As Raymond said, the more immediate object of the meeting fixed for +the ensuing day, was to provide for the employment of the numerous +women thrown out of employment by the destruction of the paper- +mills. A subscription was in hand, but not adequate to the need; +and moreover, it was far more expedient to let them maintain +themselves. + +How this was to be done was the question. Cecil told her husband +that at Dunstone they made the women knit stockings; and he replied +by recommending the suppression of Dunstone. How strange it was +that what she had been used to consider as the source of honour +should be here held in what seemed to her disesteem! + +Lady Tyrrell's ponies were tinkling up to the door of the hotel +where the meeting was to be held, and her gracious smile recalled +Cecil's good-humour; Raymond saw them to their seats, and then had +to go and take the chair himself on the platform--first, however, +introducing his wife to such of the ladies present as he +recollected. + +She thought he wanted her to sit between melancholy white faced Mrs. +Fuller and a bony spinster in a poke-bonnet whom he called Miss +Slater; but Cecil, concluding that this last could have no vote, and +that the Vicarage was secure, felt free to indulge herself by +getting back to Lady Tyrrell, who had scarcely welcomed her before +exclaiming, "Mrs. Duncombe, I did not know you were returned." + +"I came back on the first news of your flare-up," said the newcomer. +"I only came down this morning. I would not have missed this +meeting for anything. It is a true woman's question. A fair +muster, I see," looking round with her eye-glass, and bowing to +several on the platform, especially to Raymond, who returned the bow +rather stiffly. + +"Ah! let me introduce you," said Lady Tyrrell. "Mrs. Raymond +Charnock Poynsett." + +"I am very glad to see you embarked in the cause," said the lady, +frankly holding out her hand. "May we often meet in the same +manner, though I honestly tell you I'm not of your party; I should +go dead against your husband if we only had a chance." + +"Come, you need not be so aggressive," laughed Lady Tyrrell; "you +haven't a vote yet. You are frightening Mrs. Poynsett." It was +true. Even Cecil Charnock was born too late to be one of the young +ladies who, in the first decades of the reformed Parliament, used to +look on a Liberal as a lusus naturae, whom they hardly believed to +be a gentleman. But a lady who would openly accost the Member's +bride with a protest against his politics, was a being beyond her +experience, and the contemplation fairly distracted her from her +husband's oratory. + +She would have taken Miss Slater for the strong-minded female far +rather than this small slim person, with the complexion going with +the yellower species of red hair and chignon, not unlike a gold- +pheasant's, while the thin aquiline nose made Cecil think of Queen +Elizabeth. The dress was a tight-fitting black silk, with a +gorgeous many-coloured gold-embroidered oriental mantle thrown +loosely over it, and a Tyrolean hat, about as large as the +pheasant's comb, tipped over her forehead, with cords and tassels of +gold; and she made little restless movements and whispered remarks +during the speeches. + +There was to be a rate to renew the town-hall. The rebuilding of +the paper-mills and dwelling-houses was fairly covered by the +insurance; but the Vicar, in his diffident apologetic voice, stated +that the church had been insufficiently insured, and moreover, that +many more sittings were needed than the former building had +contained. He then read the list of subscriptions already promised, +expressed hopes of more coming in, invited ladies to take collecting +cards, and added that he was happy to announce that the ladies of +the congregation had come forward with all the beneficence of their +sex, and raised a sum to supply a new set of robes. + +Here the chairman glanced at his wife, but she was absorbed in +watching Mrs. Duncombe's restless hands; and the look was +intercepted by Lady Tyrrell's eyes, which flashed back sympathetic +amusement, with just such a glance as used to pass between them in +old times; but the effect was to make the Member's face grave and +impassive, and his eyes fix on the papers before him. + +The next moment Cecil was ardently gazing at Mr. Fuller as he +proceeded to his hopes of the bazaar to be held under the most +distinguished patronage, and of which he spoke as if it were the +subject of anticipations as sanguine as any the poor man could ever +appear to indulge in. And there was, in fact, the greatest stamping +and cheering there had yet been, perhaps in compliment to the M.P.'s +young bride--at least, so Lady Tyrrell whispered, adding that +everybody was trying to see her. + +Then Mr. Charnock Poynsett himself took up the exposition of the +third branch of the subject, the support of the poor families thrown +out of work at the beginning of winter. There could be no +employment at the paper-mills till they were repaired; and after the +heavy losses, they could not attempt to keep their people together +by any payment. It had been suggested that the readiest way of +meeting the difficulty, would be to employ the subscriptions already +promised in laying in a stock of material to be made up into +garments, and then dispose of them out to the women at their homes; +and appointing a day once a week when the work should be received, +the pay given, and fresh material supplied, by a party of volunteer +ladies. + +This was, in fact, what he had been instructed to propose by the +kindly souls who ordinarily formed the St. Nicholas bureau de +charite, who had instructed him to be their mouthpiece. There was +due applause as the mayor seconded his resolution; but in the midst +a clear, rather high-pitched voice rose up close to Cecil, saying, +"Mr. Chairman, allow me to ask what sale is anticipated for these +garments?" + +"I am told that there is a demand for them among the poor +themselves," said Raymond, judiciously concealing how much he was +taken aback by this female interference. + +"Allow me to differ. A permanent work society numbering a few women +otherwise unemployed may find a sufficient sale in the neighbourhood +under the patronage of charitable ladies; but when you throw in +ninety-five or one hundred pair of hands depending on their work for +their livelihood, the supply must necessarily soon go beyond any +demand, even fictitious. It will not do to think of these women +like fancy knitters or embroiderers whose work is skilled. Most of +them can hardly mend their own clothes, and the utmost that can be +expected of them is the roughest slop work." + +"Do you wish any expedient to be proposed?" asked the chairman, in a +sort of aside. + +"Yes, I have one. I spent yesterday in collecting information." + +"Will Captain Duncombe move it?" suggested Raymond. + +"Oh no! he is not here. No, it is no use to instruct anybody; I +will do it myself, if you please." + +And before the astonished eyes of the meeting, the gold-pheasant +hopped upon the platform, and with as much ease as if she had been +Queen Bess dragooning her parliament, she gave what even the +astounded gentlemen felt to be a sensible practical exposition of +ways and means. + +She had obtained the address of a warehouse ready to give such rough +work as the women could be expected to do; but as they were +unaccustomed to work at home, and were at present much crowded from +the loss of so many houses, and could besides be little depended on +for working well enough without superintendence, her plan was to +hire a room, collect the women, and divide the superintendence +between the ladies; who should give out the work, see that it was +properly done, keep order, and the like. She finished off in full +order, by moving a resolution to this effect. + +There was a pause, and a little consultation among the gentlemen, +ending by Raymond's absolutely telling Mr. Fuller that it was a very +sensible practical arrangement, and that it _must_ be seconded; +which the Vicar accordingly did, and it was carried without +opposition, as in truth nothing so good had been thought of; and the +next thing was to name a committee of ladies, a treasurer and +auditor of accounts. There would be no work on Saturdays, so if the +ladies would each undertake half a day once a fortnight, the +superintendence need not be a burthen. + +Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Slater undertook the first start and +preliminary arrangements, then each would take her half day in +rotation. Lady Tyrrell and her sister undertook two, Cecil two +more, and others were found to fill up the vacant space. The +chairman moved a vote of thanks to the lady for her suggestion, +which she acknowledged by a gracious bow, not without triumph; and +the meeting broke up. + +Some one asked after Captain Duncombe as she descended into private +life. "There's a wonderful filly that absorbs all his attention. +All Wil'sbro' might burn as long as Dark Hag thrives! When do I +expect him? I don't know; it depends on Dark Hag," she said in a +tone of superior good-natured irony, then gathered up the radiant +mantle and tripped off along the central street of the little old- +fashioned country town, with gravelled not paved side-walks. + +"Isn't she very superior?" said Cecil, when her husband had put her +on horseback. + +"I suppose she is very clever." + +"And she spoke capitally." + +"If she were to speak. What would your father think of her?" + +But for the first time Cecil's allegiance had experienced a certain +shock. Some sort of pedestal had hitherto been needful to her +existence; she was learning that Dunstone was an unrecognized +elevation in this new country, and she had seen a woman attain to a +pinnacle that almost dazzled her, by sheer resource and good sense. + +All the discussion she afterwards heard did not tend to shake her +opinion; Raymond recounted the adventure at his mother's kettle- +drum, telling of his own astonishment at the little lady's +assurance. + +"I do not see why she should be censured," said Cecil. "You were +all at a loss without her." + +"She should have got her husband to speak for her," said Mrs. +Poynsett. + +"He was not there." + +"Then she should have instructed some other gentleman," said Mrs. +Poynsett. "A woman spoils all the effect of her doings by putting +herself out of her proper place." + +"Perfectly disgusting!" said Julius. + +Cecil had decidedly not been disgusted, except by the present strong +language; and not being ready at repartee, she was pleased when +Rosamond exclaimed, "Ah! that's just what men like, to get +instructed in private by us poor women, and then gain all the credit +for originality." + +"It is the right way," said the mother. "The woman has much power +of working usefully and gaining information, but the one thing that +is not required of her is to come forward in public." + +"Very convenient for the man!" laughed Rosamond. + +"And scarcely fair," said Cecil. + +"Quite fair," said Rosamond, turning round, so that Cecil only now +perceived that she had been speaking in jest. "Any woman who is +worth a sixpence had rather help her husband to shine than shine +herself." + +"Besides," said Mrs. Poynsett, "the delicate edges of true womanhood +ought not to be frayed off by exposure in public." + +"Yes," said Raymond. "The gain of an inferior power of man in +public would be far from compensated by the loss in private of that +which man can never supply." + +"Granted," said Rosamond slyly though sleepily, "that it always is +an inferior power of man, which it does not seem to have been in the +actual case." + +"It was a point on which she had special knowledge and information," +said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"And you were forced to thank her," said Cecil. + +"Yes, in common civility," said Raymond; "but it was as much as I +could do to get it done, the position was a false one altogether." + +"In fact, you were all jealous," said Rosamond. + +At which everybody laughed, which was her sole intention; but Cecil, +who had said so much less, really thought what Rosamond said in mere +play. Those extorted thanks seemed to her a victory of her sex in a +field she had never thought of; and though she had no desire to +emulate the lady, and felt that a daughter of Dunstone must remember +noblesse oblige, the focus of her enthusiasm was in an odd state of +shifting. + + + + +CHAPTER VIII +Unsatisfactory + + +On the evening of the party at Strawyers, Mrs. Poynsett lay on her +sofa, thinking, with a trying recurrence, of that unfortunate and +excellent German Dauphine, who was pronounced by the Duchess of +Orleans to have died of her own stupidity. + +After a fortnight had brought no improvement, but rather the +reverse, to poor Anne's wan looks and feeble languid deportment, +Mrs. Poynsett had insisted on her seeing the doctor; and had been +assured by him that there was nothing amiss, and that if Mrs Miles +Charnock could only be roused and occupied she would be perfectly +well, but that her pining and depression might so lower her tone as +to have a serious effect on her health. + +There was no hope of her husband's return for at least a year, +likely eighteen months. What was to be done with her? What could +be a more unpropitious fate than for a Colonial girl, used to an +active life of exertion and usefulness, and trained to all domestic +arts, to be set down in a great English household where there was +really nothing for her to do, and usefulness or superintendence +would have been interfering; besides, as Miles had thoughts of +settling at the Cape, English experience would serve her little. + +She had not cultivation enough for any pursuit to interest her. She +was not musical, could not draw; and when Mrs. Poynsett had, by way +of experiment, asked her to read aloud an hour a day, and selected +the Lives of the Lindsays, as an unexceptionable and improving book, +full of Scottish history, and even with African interest, she +dutifully did her task as an attention to her invalid mother-in-law, +but in a droning husky tone, finding it apparently as severe a +penance as it was to her auditor. + +The doctor's chief prescription was horse exercise; but what would a +constitutional canter be to one accustomed to free rides through the +Bush? And she would generally be alone; for even if Charlie, her +nearest approach to an ally, had not been going away from home in a +few weeks, it could not be expected that he could often ride with +her. + +It was plain that every one of the whole family was giving continual +shocks to Mr. Pilgrim's disciple, even when they felt most innocent; +and though the mother was sometimes disposed to be angry, sometimes +to laugh at the little shudder and compression of the lips she began +to know, she perceived what an addition this must be to the +unhappiness of the poor lonely stranger. + +"She must be set to some good work," thought Mrs. Poynsett; "Julius +might let her go to his old women. She might get on with them +better than with the old women here. And there's Cecil's working +affair, it would be just the thing to give her an object. I think I +can get through this evening. I've made Susan bring my desk, with +all Miles's letters from his first voyage. Shall I suppress the +ball?" + +Therewith Cecil made her entrance, in glossy white satin and deep +lace, beautiful to behold, set off with rainbow glistening opals. +She made a quiet complacent show of herself, as one not vain of fine +clothes, but used to an affectionate family appreciation of her best +attire; and it was the most friendly childlike bit of intimacy that +had yet been attained between her and Mrs. Poynsett. + +And when she sat down to wait for the others, Mrs. Poynsett ventured +on telling her the prescription and her own perplexity, hoping for a +voluntary offer to employ Anne at Willansborough; but Cecil only +pitied her for having 'no resources'; and when Mrs. Poynsett +ventured to suggest finding a niche for her in the work-room, the +answer was--"Our days are all disposed of." + +"You have two, I think?" + +"True; but it would never do for me to give up one of my times. If +I seemed to slacken, every one else would." + +"What will you do when the Session begins?" + +"I shall make some arrangement. I do not think Anne could ever take +my place; she would have no authority." + +Anne herself here entered, took her knitting, and sat down, +apparently unaware of the little pluming gesture by which Cecil +unconsciously demanded attention to her bridal satin. One white- +gloved gentleman after another dropped in, but none presumed on a +remark; Jenkins announced the carriages; but Rosamond had not +appeared, and after an excursion up-stairs, Julius returned, +declaring that the first carriage must not wait for her, they would +come afterwards in the van, for there was something amiss in the +dress, she had not had it on since the wedding. + +"And she came in so late," said Cecil. + +"That was my fault," he said. "We came through the village to leave +a message at the doctor's;" and he then insisted that the other pair +should set off, taking Frank and Charlie, and prevent dinner from +being kept waiting; at which the boys made faces, and declared that +it was a dodge of his to join Jenny's party in the schoolroom, +instead of the solemn dinner; but they were obliged to submit; and +it was not till twenty minutes later, that in glided something +white, with blue cashmere and swan's-down over it, moving, as usual, +with languid grace. + +"Poor Julius!" smiled Rosamond with her dawdling dignity. "Every +single thing turned out a misfit! As it is, there's a monstrous +hole in my glove, which demands the benevolent fiction of my having +torn it by the way. There, one second for the effect!--Good-bye, +dear Mrs. Poynsett;--good-bye, Anne. Come, you monument of patience +and resignation!" + +For one moment she had slipped back her little mantle, then drawn it +on, as, taking her husband's arm, she left the room; but that moment +had set Anne's cheeks aflame, and left Mrs. Poynsett in a startled +state of uncertainty, hoping her glance had been mistaken, wondering +what could have been _more_ amiss, and feeling incapable of entering +on the subject with that severe young judge, of narrow experience. + +Never had her eldest son failed to come and bid her good night on +his way to his own room: it was the great break in her long +sleepless hours, and she used to call it a reversal of the relations +of those days when he used to watch for her kiss on her way to bed. +Nor did he fail her now, but came and stood over her with his +fragmentary tidings. + +"An immense party--oh yes, there was he persuading them not to wait. +Mr. Bowater took Rosamond in to dinner, Cecil went with Sir Harry +Vivian. Yes, Lady Tyrrell was there, wonderfully handsome, but her +expression strikes me as altered; there is the sort of pathetic look +that, as Cecil said, is like the melancholy Medusa--I wonder if it +is genuine. She seems greatly disposed to cultivate Cecil--I wonder +what she does it for." + +"Is Cecil attracted? I fancied she was." + +"Yes, a good deal; and I fear the Wil'sbro' business will throw them +together. It is unlucky on Frank's account likewise. I see we +shall have it all over again there." + +"I have great hope in his office taking him away. How was it with +them to-night?" + +"What I should call arrant coquetry, such as even Camilla never +indulged in. The girl kept out of his way--was absolutely chill and +repelling half the evening--throwing herself at the officers from +Backsworth, till at last Frank obtained a waltz, and after that they +were perfectly inseparable." + +"If she coquets, she will soon disgust him! Did Cecil enjoy +herself?" + +"Oh yes: Phil Bowater opened the ball with her, and she dances very +nicely--so quietly, Mrs. Bowater remarked it. As to Rosamond, she +was in her native element--_is_ indeed, for she would not hear of +coming away when we did." + +"And Julius?" + +"Standing in a doorway, with others of his kind, absently talking, +and watching Rosamond out of the tail of his eye. I say, mother," +lowering his voice, "can't you give Rosamond a hint about her dress? +Cecil says she can't go out with her again like _that_. Ah," as he +heard a sigh, "I should not have worried you at night." + +"No, you have not. Tell Cecil I will see about it. Rosamond will +take it best from an old woman like me." + +Mrs. Poynsett was quite conscious that Cecil had more high breeding +and refinement than Rosamond, who was essentially the Irish +Colonel's daughter, and that the cold temperament of the one +irritated the warm nature of the other. More than one flash had +revealed Rosamond's contempt for Cecil's assumptions and intolerance +for her precision--besides, she was five years older, and had not an +ideal in Dunstone. + +After revolving what form of remonstrance would be least offensive +during half the night and day, Mrs. Poynsett was not prepared for +the appearance, about noon, of her son Julius, when, coming to what +she termed the confidential side of her couch, he asked +hesitatingly, and colouring, "Mother, I want you to tell me, was +there anything amiss in Rose's dress last night?" + +"You did not perceive--" + +"I'm not used to the style of thing. Is it not the way with what +you call full dress?" + +"To a certain degree--" she began. + +He caught her up. "And here has Cecil been putting my poor Rose +into a perfect agony! It is only woman's censorious nonsense, isn't +it, mother? Mere folly to think otherwise! I knew you would set my +mind at rest; and if you would tell Cecil that you will not have +Rosamond insulted, it would be as well." + +"Stay, Julius," as he was walking off complacently, "I grieve, but I +must confess that I was going to speak to Rosamond myself." + +He looked very blank. + +"Mind, I am certain that it is only an innocent following of what +she has been brought up to;" and as he signed a sort of hurt +acquiescence, as if trying to swallow the offence, she added, "When +do you go out again?" + +"Not till Monday, when we dine at Colonel Ross's. He is an old +friend of Lord Rathforlane." + +"Then I am inclined to let it cool. Sometimes advice that has been +resented does its work." + +"You don't think the interference justifiable?" + +"Not from that quarter." + +"And can it be needful to attend to it?" + +"My dear Julius, it is not a style of dress I could ever have worn, +nor have let my daughters have worn, if I had had any." + +"Conclusive, that!" said Julius, getting up, more really angered +with his mother than he had been since his childhood. + +However, he conquered himself by the time he had reached the door, +and came back to say, "I beg your pardon, mother, I know you would +not say so without need." + +"Thank you, my boy!" and he saw tears in her eyes, the first time he +was conscious of having brought them. As he bent down to kiss her, +she rallied, and cheerfully said, "I have no doubt it will all come +right--Rosamond is too nice not to feel it at once." + +No such thing; Rosamond was still furious. If he disapproved, she +would submit to him; but he had seen nothing wrong, had he? + +"My dear Rose, I told you I was no judge: you forget what my eyes +are; and my mother--" + +"You have been to your mother?" + +"My dear, what could I do?" + +"And you think I am going to insult my own mother and sisters to +please any woman's finical prudish notions'? Pray what did Mrs. +Poynsett say?" + +The excuse of custom, pleaded by Mrs. Poynsett, only made Rosamond +fiercer. She wished she had never come where she was to hear that +her own mother was no judge of propriety, and her husband could not +trust her, but must needs run about asking everybody if she were fit +to be seen. Such a tempest Julius had never seen outside a back +street in the garrison town. There seemed to be nothing she would +not say, and his attempts at soothing only added to her violence. +Indeed, there was only one thing which would have satisfied her, and +that was, that she had been perfectly right, and the whole world +barbarously wrong; and she was wild with passion at perceiving that +he had a confidence in his own mother which he could not feel in +hers. + +Nor would he insist that Raymond should force Cecil to apologize. +"My dear," he said, "don't you know there are things easier to ask +than to obtain?" + +To which Rosamond replied, in another gust, that she would never +again sit down to table with Cecil until she had apologized for the +insult, not to herself, she did not care about that, but to the +mother who had seen her dresses tried on: Julius must tell Raymond +so, or take her away to any cottage at once. She would not stay +where people blamed mamma and poisoned his mind against her! She +believed he cared for them more than for her! + +Julius had sympathized far longer with her offended feeling than +another could have done; but he was driven to assert himself. +"Nonsense, Rose, you know better," he said, in a voice of +displeasure; but she pouted forth, "I don't know it. You believe +every one against me, and you won't take my part against that nasty +little spiteful prig!" + +"Cecil has behaved very ill to you," said Julius, granting her +rather over much; "but she is a foolish conceited child, who does +not deserve that Raymond should be worried about her. I foresee +plenty of grievances from her; but, Rosie, we must and will not let +her come between us and Raymond. You don't know what a brother he +has been to me--I hardly think I could have got through my first +year at school but for him; and I don't think my sweet Rose could +wish to do me such an ill turn as to stir up a feud with such a +brother because his wife is provoking." + +The luncheon-bell began to sound, and she sobbed out, "There then, +go down, leave me alone! Go to them, since you are so fond of them +all!" + +"I don't think you could come down as you are," said Julius, +gravely; "I will bring you something." + +"It would choke me--choke me!" she sobbed out. + +Julius knew enough of the De Lancy temperament to be aware that +words carried them a long way, and he thought solitude would be so +beneficial, that he summoned resolution to leave her; but he had not +the face to appear alone, nor offer fictions to excuse her absence, +so he took refuge in his dressing-room, until he had seen Cecil and +Anne ride away from the hall door together. + +For the two sisters-in-law had held a little indignation meeting, +and Rosamond's misdemeanour had so far drawn them together, that +Cecil had offered to take Anne to see the working party, and let her +assist thereat. + +The coast being clear, Julius went down, encountering nothing worse +than the old butler, who came in while he was cutting cold beef, and +to whom he said, "Lady Rosamond is rather knocked up; I am going to +take her something up-stairs." + +Jenkins received this as the result of a dance, but much wanted to +fetch a tray, which Julius refused, and set off with an ale-glass in +one hand, and in the other the plates with the beef and appliances, +Jenkins watching in jealous expectation of a catastrophe, having no +opinion of Mr. Julius's powers as a waiter. He was disappointed. +The downfall was deferred till the goal was reached, and was then +most salutary, for Rosamond sprang to pick up the knife and fork, +laughed at his awkwardness, refused to partake without him, produced +implements from her travelling-bag, and was as merry as she had been +miserable. + +Not a word on the feud was uttered; and the pair walked down to the +village, where she was exemplary, going into all those more +distasteful parts of her duties there, which she sometimes shirked. + +And on her return, finding her long-expected letter from Miss +M'Kinnon awaiting her, she forgot all offences in her ardour to +indoctrinate everybody with the hopes it gave of affording Mrs. +Poynsett a change of room, if not even greater variety. +Unfortunately, this eagerness was not met with a corresponding +fervour. There was in the household the acquiescence with long- +established invalidism, that sometimes settles down and makes a +newcomer's innovations unwelcome. Raymond had spoken to the old +doctor, who had been timid and discouraging; Susan resented the +implication that the utmost had not been done for her dear mistress; +and Mrs. Poynsett herself, though warmly grateful for Rosamond's +affection, was not only nervously unwilling to try experiments, but +had an instinctive perception that there was one daughter-in-law to +whom her increased locomotion would scarcely be welcome, and by no +means wished to make this distaste evident to Raymond. Cecil would +not have been so strong against the risk and imprudence, if her +wishes had been the other way. Moreover, she had been warned off +from interference with the Rector's wife in the village, and she did +not relish Rosamond's making suggestions as to her province, as she +considered the house--above all, when she viewed that lady as in a +state of disgrace. It was nothing less than effrontery; and Cecil +became stiffer and colder than ever. She demanded of her mother-in- +law whether there had been any promise of amendment. + +"Oh! Julius will see to all that," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"It is a woman's question," returned Cecil. + +"Not entirely." + +"Fancy a clergyman's wife! It Mrs. Venn had appeared in that way at +Dunstone!" + +"You would have left it to Mr. Venn! My dear, the less said the +sooner mended." + +Cecil was silenced, but shocked, for she was far too young and +inexperienced to understand that indecorous customs complied with as +a matter of course, do not necessarily denote lack of innate +modesty--far less, how they could be confounded with home +allegiance; and as to Anne, poor Rosamond was, in her eyes, only too +like the ladies who impeded Christiana on her outset. + +So her ladyship retreated into languid sleepy dignity towards both +her sisters-in-law; and on Monday evening showed herself, for a +moment, more decolletee, if possible, than before. Mrs. Poynsett +feared lest Julius were weak in this matter; but at night she had a +visit from him. + +"Mother," he said, "it will not happen again. Say no more." + +"I am only too thankful." + +"What do you think settled it? No less than Lady Tyrrell's +admiration." + +"What could she have said?" + +"I can't make out. Rose was far too indignant to be comprehensible, +when she told me on the way home; but there was something about +adopting the becoming, and a repetition of--of some insolent +praise." And his mother felt his quiver of suppressed wrath. "If +Rose had been what that woman took her for, she would have been +delighted," he continued; "but--" + +"It was horrible to her!" said his mother. "And to you. Yes, I +knew it would right itself, and I am glad nothing passed about it +between us." + +"So am I; she quite separates you from Cecil and Anne, and indeed +all her anger is with Lady Tyrrell. She will have it there was +malice in inciting her to shock old friends and annoy you--a sort of +attempt to sympathize her into opposition." + +"Which had a contrary effect upon a generous nature." + +"Exactly! She thinks nothing too bad for that woman, and declares +she is a serpent." + +"That's dear Rosamond's anger; but I imagine that when I occur to +Camilla's mind, it is as the obstructive old hag, who once stood in +her way; and so, without any formed designs, whatever she says of me +is coloured by that view." + +"Quite possible; and I am afraid the sister is just such another. +She seems quite to belong to Mrs. Duncombe's set. I sat next her at +dinner, and tried to talk to her, but she would only listen to that +young Strangeways." + +"Strangeways! I wonder if that is Susan Lorimer's son?" + +"Probably, for his Christian name is Lorimer." + +"I knew her rather well as a girl. She was old Lord Lorimer's +youngest daughter, and we used to walk in the Square gardens +together; but I did not see much of her after I married; and after a +good while, she married a man who had made a great fortune by +mining. I wonder what her son is like?" + +"He must be the man, for he is said to be the millionaire of the +regiment. Just the match that Lady Tyrrell would like." + +"Ah! that's well," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"From your point of view," said Julius, smiling. + +"If he will only speak out before it has had time to go deep with +Frank!" + + + + +CHAPTER IX +Cold Heart + + +At that very moment the two sisters in question were driving home in +the opposite corners of the carriage in the dark. + +"Really, Lenore," was Lady Tyrrell saying, "you are a very +impracticable girl." + +There was a little low laugh in answer. + +"What blast has come and frozen you up into ice?" the elder sister +added caressingly; but as she felt for Eleonora's hand in the dark, +she obtained nothing but the cold handle of a fan. "That's just +it!" she said, laughing; "hard ivory, instead of flesh and blood." + +"I can't help it!" was the answer. + +"But why not? I'm sure you had admiration enough to turn any girl's +head." + +No answer. + +Lady Tyrrell renewed her address still more tenderly--"Lenore, +darling, it is quite needful that you should understand your +position." + +"I am afraid I understand it only too well," came in a smothered +voice. + +"It may be very painful, but it ought to be made clear before you +how you stand. You know that my father was ruined--there's no word +for it but ruined." + +"Yes." + +"He had to give up the property to the creditors, and live on an +allowance." + +"I know that." + +"And, of course, I can't bear speaking of it; but the house is +really let to me. I have taken it as I might any other house to +let." + +"Yes," again assented Eleonora. + +"And do you know why?" + +"You said it was for the sake of the old home and my father!" said +the girl, with a bitter emphasis on the _said_. + +"So it was! It was to give you the chance of redeeming it, and +keeping it in the family. It is to be sold, you know, as soon as +you are of age, and can give your consent. I can't buy it. Mine is +only a jointure, a life income, and you know that you might as well +think of Mary buying Golconda; but you--you--with such beauty as +yours--might easily make a connection that would save it." + +There was only a choked sound. + +"I know you feel the situation painfully, after having been mistress +so long." + +"Camilla, you _know_ it is not that!" + +"Ah, my dear, I can see farther than you avow. You can't marry till +you are twenty-one, you know; but you might be very soon engaged, +and then we should see our way. It only depends on yourself. +Plenty of means, and no land to tie him down, ready to purchase and +to settle down. It would be the very thing; and I see you are a +thoroughly sensible girl, Lena." + +"Indeed! I am not even sensible enough to know who is to be this +purchaser." + +"Come, Lena, don't be affected. Why! he was the only poor creature +you were moderately gracious to." + +"I! what do you mean?" + +Lady Tyrrell laughed again. + +"Oh!" in a tone of relief, "I can explain all that to you. All the +Strangeways family were at Rockpier the winter before you came, and +I made great friends with Margaret Strangeways, the eldest sister. +I wanted very much to hear about her, for she has had a great deal +of illness and trouble, and I had not ventured to write to her." + +"Oh! was that the girl young Debenham gave up because her mother +worried him so incessantly, and who went into a Sisterhood?" + +"It was she who broke it off. She found he had been forced into it +by his family, and was really attached elsewhere. I never knew the +rights of it till I saw the brother to-night." + +"Very praiseworthy family confidence!" + +"Camilla, you know I object to that tone." + +"So do most young ladies, my dear--at least by word." + +"And once for all, you need have no fancies about Mr. Lorimer +Strangeways. I am civil to him, of course, for Margaret's sake; and +Lady Susan was very kind to me; but if there were nothing else +against him, he is entirely out of the question, for I know he runs +horses and bets on them." + +"So does everybody, more or less." + +"And you! you, Camilla, after what the turf has cost us, can wish me +to encourage a man connected with it." + +"My dear Lena, I know you had a great shock, which made the more +impression because you were such a child; but you might almost as +well forswear riding, as men who have run a few horses, or staked a +few thousands. Every young man of fortune has done so in his turn, +just by way of experiment--as a social duty as often as not." + +"Let them," said Eleonora, "as long as I have nothing to do with +them." + +"What was that pretty French novel--Sybille, was it?--where the +child wanted to ride on nothing but swans? You will be like her, +and have to condescend to ordinary mortals." + +"She did not. She died. And, Camilla, I would far rather die than +marry a betting man." + +"A betting man, who regularly went in for it! You little goose, to +think that I would ask you to do that! As you say we have had +enough of that! But to renounce every man who has set foot on a +course, or staked a pair of gloves, is to renounce nine out of ten +of the world one lives in." + +"I do renounce them. Camilla, remember that my mind is made up for +ever, and that nothing shall ever induce me to marry a man who +meddles with the evils of races." + +"Meddles with the evils? I understand, my dear Lena." + +"A man who makes a bet," repeated Eleonora. + +"We shall see," was her ladyship's light answer, in contrast to the +grave tones; "no rules are without exceptions, and I only ask for +_one_." + +"I shall make none." + +"I confess I thought you were coming to your senses; you have been +acting so wisely and sensibly ever since you came home, about that +young Frank Charnock." + +Lady Tyrrell heard a little rustle, but could not see that it was +the clasping of two hands over a throbbing heart. "I am very glad +you are reasonable enough to keep him at a distance. Poor boy, it +was all very well to be friendly with him when we met him in a place +like Rockpier, and you were both children; but you are quite right +not to let it go on. It would be mere madness." + +"For him, yes," murmured the girl. + +"And even more so for you. Why, if he had any property worth +speaking of, it would be a wretched thing to marry into that family! +I am sure I pity those three poor girls! Miles's wife looks +perfectly miserable, poor thing, and the other two can't conceal the +state of things. She is just the sort of woman who cannot endure a +daughter-in-law." + +"I thought I heard Lady Rosamond talking very affectionately of +her." + +"Very excitedly, as one who felt it her duty to stand up for her +out-of-doors, whatever she may do indoors. I saw victory in those +plump white shoulders, which must have cost a battle; but whatever +Lady Rosamond gains, will make it all the worse for the others. No, +Eleonora, I have known Mrs. Poynsett's rancour for many years, and I +would wish no one a worse lot than to be her son's fiancee, except +to be his wife." + +"She did not seem to object to these marriages." + +"The sons took her by surprise. Besides, Raymond's was the very +parti mothers seek out for their sons. Depend upon it, she sent him +off with her blessing to court the unexceptionable cousin with the +family property. Poor Raymond, he is a dutiful son, and he has done +the deed; but, if I am not much mistaken the little lady is made of +something neither mother nor son is prepared for, and he has not +love enough to tame her with." + +"That may be seen at a glance. He can't help it, poor fellow; he +would have had it if he could, like anything else that is proper." + +There was a moment's silence; then the exclamation, "Just look +there!" + +One of the hats was nodding on the box in a perilous manner. + +"It is _only_ James," said Lady Tyrrell; "as long as it is not the +coachman, it matters the less. There's no danger." + +"You will not keep him, though!" + +"I don't know. He is much the best looking and handiest of the men; +and your page, Master Joshua, is no great acquisition yet." + +"I wish you would not call him mine; I wish you would send him back +to his grandmother. I can't bear his being among those men." + +"Very complimentary to my household! They are not a bit worse than +the company he came from! You don't believe in rural simplicity, +eh?" + +"I believe that taking that boy from his home makes us responsible." + +"And do I hinder you from catechizing him to your heart's content? +or sending him to the school of design?" + +Again Eleonora was silent. Perhaps the balancing of the footman's +head occupied her mind. At any rate, no more was said till the +sisters had reached their home. Then, at the last moment, when +there was no time left for a reply, Eleonora cleared and steadied +her voice, and said, "Camilla, understand two things for truth's +sake. First, I mean what I say. Nothing shall ever induce me to +marry a man who bets. Next, I never have forgotten Frank Charnock +for one moment. If I have been cold and distant to him, it is +because I will not draw him near me to be cruelly scorned and +disappointed!" + +"I don't mind the why, if the effect is the same," were Lady +Tyrrell's last words, as the door opened. + +Eleonora's little white feet sped quickly up the steps, and with a +hasty good night, she sped across the hall, but paused at the door. +"Papa must not be disappointed," she whispered to herself, and +dashed her hand over her eyes; and at the moment the lock turned, +and a gray head appeared, with a mighty odour of smoke. "Ah! I +thought my little Lena would not pass me by! Have you had a +pleasant party, my dear? Was young Strangeways there?" + +She had nestled in his arms, and hoped to avoid notice by keeping +her head bent against him, as she hastily responded to his +questions; but he detected something. + +"Eh? Camilla been lecturing? Is that it? You've not been crying, +little one? It is all right, you know! You and I were jolly enough +at Rockpier; but it was time we were taken in hand, or you would +have grown into a regular little nun, among all those black coats." + +"I wish I were." + +"Nonsense! You don't know life! You'll tell another story one of +these days; and hark childie, when you've married, and saved the old +place, you'll keep the old room for the old man, and we'll have our +own way again." + +She could but kiss him, and hide her agitation in caresses, ere +hurrying up the stairs she reached her own rooms, a single bed- +chamber opening into a more spacious sitting-room, now partially +lighted by the candles on the toilette-table within. + +She flung herself down on a chair beyond the line of light, and +panted out half aloud, "Oh! I am in the toils! Oh for help! Oh +for advice! Oh! if I knew the right! Am I unfair? am I cold and +hard and proud? Is she telling me true? No, I know she is not--not +the whole truth, and I don't know what is left out, or what is +false! And I'm as bad--making them think I give in and discard +Frank! Oh! is that my pride--or that it is too bad to encourage him +now I know more? He'll soon scorn me, and leave off--whatever he +ever thought of me. She has taken me from all my friends--and she +will take him away! No one is left me but papa; and though she +can't hurt his love, she has got his confidence away, and made him +join against me! But that one thing I'll never, never do!" + +She started up, and opened a locked purple photograph-album, with +'In Memoriam' inscribed on it--her hands trembling so that she could +hardly turn the key. She turned to the likeness of a young man--a +painful likeness of a handsome face, where the hard verities of sun- +painting had refused to veil the haggard trace of early dissipation, +though the eyes had still the fascinating smile that had made her +brother Tom, with his flashes of fitful good-nature, the idol of his +little sister's girlhood. The deadly shock of his sudden death had +been her first sorrow; and those ghastly whispers which she had +heard from the servants in the nursery, and had never forgotten, +because of the hushed and mysterious manner, had but lately started +into full force and meaning, on the tongues of the plain-spoken +poor. + +She gazed, and thought of the wrecked life that might have been so +rich in joys; nay, her tenderness for her father could not hide from +her how unlike his old age was from that of Mr. Bowater, or of any +men who had done their service to their generation in all noble +exertion. He had always indeed been her darling, her charge; but +she had never known what it was to look up to him with the fervent +belief and enthusiasm she had seen in other girls. To have him +amused, loitering from reading-room to parade or billiard-room, had +been all that she aspired to, and only lately had she unwillingly +awakened to the sense how and why this was--and why the family were +aliens in their ancestral home. + +"And Camilla, who knew all--knew, and lived through the full force +of the blight and misery--would persuade me that it all means +nothing, and is a mere amusing trifle! Trifle, indeed, that breaks +hearts and leads to despair and self-destruction and dishonour! No, +no, no--nothing shall lead me to a gamester! though Frank may be +lost to me! He will be! he will be! We deserve that he should be! +I deserve it--if family sins fall on individuals--I deserve it! It +is better for him--better--better. And yet, can he forget--any more +than I--that sunny day--? Oh! was she luring him on false +pretences? What shall I do? How will it be? Where is my +counsellor? Emily, Emily, why did you die?" + +Emily's portrait--calm, sweet, wasted, with grave trustful eyes--was +in the next page. The lonely girl turned to it, and gazed, and +drank in the soothing influence of the countenance that had never +failed to reply with motherly aid and counsel. It rested the +throbbing heart; and presently, with hands clasped and head bent, +Eleonora Vivian knelt in the little light closet she had fitted as +an oratory, and there poured out her perplexities and sorrows. + + + + +CHAPTER X +A Truant + + +Since for your pleasure you came here, + You shall go back for mine.--COWPER + +"How like Dunstone you have made this room!" said Raymond, entering +his wife's apartment with a compliment that he knew would be +appreciated. + +Cecil turned round from her piano, to smile and say, "I wish papa +could see it." + +"I hope he will next spring; but he will hardly bring Mrs. Charnock +home this winter. I am afraid you are a good deal alone here, +Cecil. Is there no one you would like to ask?" + +"The Venns," suggested Cecil; "only we do not like them to leave +home when we are away; but perhaps they would come." + +Raymond could not look as if the proposal were a very pleasing one. +"Have you no young-lady friends?" he asked. + +"We never thought it expedient to have intimacies in the +neighbourhood," said Cecil. + +"Well, we shall have Jenny Bowater here in a week or two." + +"I thought she was your mother's friend." + +"So she is. She is quite young enough to be yours." + +"I do not see anything remarkable about her." + +"No, I suppose there is not; but she is a very sensible superior +person." + +"Indeed! In that commonplace family." + +"Poor Jenny has had an episode that removes her from the +commonplace. Did you ever hear of poor Archie Douglas?" + +"Was not he a good-for-nothing relation of your mother?" + +"Not that exactly. He was the son of a good-for-nothing, I grant, +whom a favourite cousin had unfortunately married, but he was an +excellent fellow himself; and when his father died, she had Mrs. +Douglas to live in that cottage by the Rectory, and sent the boy to +school with us; then she got him into Proudfoot's office--the +solicitor at Backsworth, agent for everybody's estates hereabouts. +Well, there arose an attachment between him and Jenny; the Bowaters +did not much like it, of course; but they are kind-hearted and good- +natured, and gave consent, provided Archie got on in his profession. +It was just at the time when poor Tom Vivian was exercising a great +deal more influence than was good among the young men in the +neighbourhood; and George Proudfoot was rather a joke for imitating +him in every respect--from the colour of his dog-cart to the curl of +his dog's tail. I remember his laying a wager, and winning it too, +that if he rode a donkey with his face to the tail, Proudfoot would +do the same; but then, Vivian did everything with a grace and +originality." + +"Like his sister." + +"And doubly dangerous. Every one liked him, and we were all more +together than was prudent. At last, two thousand pounds of my +mother's money, which was passing through the Proudfoots' hands, +disappeared; and at the same time poor Archie fled. No one who knew +him could have any reasonable doubt that he did but bear the blame +of some one else's guilt, most likely that of George Proudfoot; but +he died a year or two back without a word, and no proof has ever +been found; and alas! the week after Archie sailed, we saw his name +in the list of sufferers in a vessel that was burnt. His mother +happily had died before all this, but there were plenty to grieve +bitterly for him; and poor Jenny has been the more like one of +ourselves in consequence. He had left a note for Jenny, and she +always trusted him; and we all of us believe that he was innocent." + +"I can't think how a person can go about as usual, or ever get over +such a thing as that." + +"Perhaps she hasn't," said Raymond, with a little colour on his +brown cheek. "But I'm afraid I can't make those visits with you to- +day. I am wanted to see the plans for the new town-hall at +Wil'sbro'. Will you pick me up there?" + +"There would be sure to be a dreadful long waiting, so I will +luncheon at Sirenwood instead; Lady Tyrrell asked me to come over +any day." + +"Alone? I think you had better wait for me." + +"I can take Frank." + +"I should prefer a regular invitation to us both." + +"She did not mean to make a formal affair." + +"Forms are a protection, and I do not wish for an intimacy there, +especially on Frank's account." + +"It would be an excellent match for Frank." + +"Indeed, no; the estate is terribly involved, and there are three +daughters; besides which, the family would despise a younger son. +An attachment could only lead to unhappiness now, besides the +positive harm of unsettling him. His tutor tells me that as it is +he is very uneasy about his examination--his mind is evidently +preoccupied. No, no, Cecil, don't make the intercourse +unnecessarily close. The Vivians have not behaved well to my +mother, and it is not desirable to begin a renewal. But you shall +not lose your ride, Cecil; I'll ask one of the boys to go with you +to the Beeches, and perhaps I shall meet you there." + +"He talks of my lonely life," said Cecil, to herself, "and yet he +wants to keep me from the only person who really understands me, all +for some rancorous old prejudice of Mrs. Poynsett's. It is very +hard. There's no one in the house to make a friend of--Rosamond, a +mere garrison belle; and Anne, bornee and half a dissenter; and as +soon as I try to make a friend, I am tyrannized over, and this Miss +Bowater thrust on me." + +She was pounding these sentiments into a sonata with great energy, +when her door re-opened, and Raymond again appeared. "I am looking +for two books of Mudie's. Do you know where they can be? I can't +make up the number." + +"They are here," said Cecil; "Lanfrey's Vie de Napoleon; but I have +not finished them." + +"The box should have gone ten days ago. My mother has nothing to +read, and has been waiting all this time for the next part of +Middlemarch," said Raymond. + +"She said there was no hurry," murmured Cecil. + +"No doubt she did; but we must not take advantage of her +consideration. Reading is her one great resource, and we must so +contrive that your studies shall not interfere with it." + +He waited for some word of regret, but none came; and he was obliged +to add, "I must deprive you of the books for the present, for she +must not be kept waiting any longer; but I will see about getting +them for you in some other way. I must take the box to the station +in the dog-cart." He went without a word from her. It was an +entirely new light to her that her self-improvement could possibly +be otherwise than the first object with everyone. At home, father +and mother told one another complacently what Cecil was reading, and +never dreamt of obstructing the virtuous action. Were her studies +to be sacrificed to an old woman's taste for novels? + +Cecil had that pertinacity of nature that is stimulated to +resistance by opposition; and she thought of the Egyptian campaign, +and her desire to understand the siege of Acre. Then she +recollected that Miss Vivian had spoken of reading the book, and +this decided her. "I'll go to Sirenwood, look at it, and order it. +No one can expect me to submit to have no friends abroad nor books +at home. Besides, it is all some foolish old family feud; and what +a noble thing it will be for my resolution and independence to force +the two parties to heal the breach, and bridge it over by giving +Miss Vivian to Frank." + +In this mood she rang the bell, and ordered her horses; not however +till she had reason to believe the dog-cart on the way down the +avenue. As she came down in her habit, she was met by Frank, +returning from his tutor. + +"Have I made a mistake, Cecil! I thought we were to go out together +this afternoon!" + +"Yes; but Raymond was wanted at Willansborough, and I am going to +lunch at Sirenwood. I want to borrow a book." + +"Oh, very well, I'll come, if you don't mind. Sir Harry asked me to +drop in and look at his dogs." + +This was irresistible; and Frank decided on riding the groom's +horse, and leaving him to conduct Anne to the rendezvous in the +afternoon--for Charlie had been at Sandhurst for the last week-- +running in first to impart the change of scheme to her, as she was +performing her daily task of reading to his mother. + +He did so thus: "I say, Anne, Cecil wants to go to Sirenwood first +to get a book, so Lee will bring you to meet us at the Beeches at +2.30." + +"Are you going to luncheon at Sirenwood?" asked Mrs. Poynsett. + +"Yes; Cecil wants to go," said the dutiful younger brother. + +"I wish you would ask Cecil to come in. Raymond put himself into +such a state of mind at finding me reading Madame de Sevigne, that I +am afraid he carried off her books summarily, though I told him I +was glad of a little space for my old favourites." + +Cecil was, however, mounted by the time Frank came out, and they +cantered away together, reaching the portico of Sirenwood in about +twenty minutes. + +Cecil had never been in the house before, having only left her card, +though she had often met the sisters. She found herself in a +carpeted hall, like a supplementary sitting-room, where two +gentlemen had been leaning over the wide hearth. One, a handsome +benignant-looking old man, with a ruddy face and abundant white +whiskers, came forward with a hearty greeting. "Ah! young Mrs. +Poynsett! Delighted to see you!--Frank Charnock, you're come in +good time; we are just going down to see the puppies before +luncheon. Only I'll take Mrs. Poynsett to the ladies first. +Duncombe, you don't know Mrs. Raymond Poynsett--one must not say +senior bride, but the senior's bride. Is that right?" + +"No papa," said a bright voice from the stairs, "you haven't it at +all right; Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, if you please--isn't it?" + +"I believe so," replied Cecil. "Charnock always seems my right +name." + +"And you have all the right to retain it that Mrs. Poynsett had to +keep hers," said Lady Tyrrell, as they went up-stairs to her +bedroom. "How is she?" + +"As usual, thank you; always on the sofa." + +"But managing everything from it?" + +"Oh, yes." + +"Never was there such a set of devoted sons, models for the +neighbourhood." + +Cecil felt a sense of something chiming in with her sources of +vexation, but she only answered, "They are passionately fond of +her." + +"Talk of despotism! Commend me to an invalid! Ah! how delightfully +you contrive to keep your hair in order! I am always scolding +Lenore for coming in dishevelled, and you look so fresh and compact! +Here is my sanctum. You'll find Mrs. Duncombe there. She drove +over in the drag with her husband on their way to Backsworth. I am +so glad you came, there is so much to talk over." + +"If our gentlemen will give us time," said Mrs. Duncombe; "but I am +afraid your senator will not be as much absorbed in the dogs as my +captain." + +"I did not come with my husband," said Cecil; "he is gone to +Willansborough to meet the architect." + +"Ah, about the new buildings. I do hope and trust the opportunity +will not be wasted, and that the drainage will be provided for." + +"You are longing to have a voice there," said Lady Tyrrell, +laughing. + +"I am. It is pre-eminently a woman's question, and this is a great +opportunity. I shall talk to every one. Little Pettitt, the hair- +dresser, has some ground there, and he is the most intelligent of +the tradesmen. I gave him one of those excellent little hand-bills, +put forth by the Social Science Committee, on sanitary arrangements. +I thought of asking you to join us in ordering some down, and never +letting a woman leave our work-room without one." + +"You couldn't do better, I am sure," said Lady Tyrrell; "only, +what's the use of preaching to the poor creatures to live in good +houses, when their landlords won't build them, and they must live +somewhere?" + +"Make them coerce the landlords," said Mrs. Duncombe; "that's the +only way. Upheave the masses from beneath." + +"But that's an earthquake," said Cecil. + +"Earthquakes are sometimes wholesome." + +"But the process is not so agreeable that we had not rather avert +it," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"All ours at Dunstone are model cottages," said Cecil; "it is my +father's great hobby." + +"Squires' hobbies are generally like the silver trough the lady gave +her sow," said Mrs. Duncombe; "they come before the poor are +prepared, and with a spice of the autocrat." + +"Come, I won't have you shock Mrs. Charnock Poynsett," said Lady +Tyrrell. "You illogical woman! The poor are to demand better +houses, and the squires are not to build them!" + +"The poor are to be fitly housed, as a matter of right, and from +their own sense of self-respect," returned Mrs. Duncombe; "not a few +favourites, who will endure dictation, picked out for the model +cottage. It is the hobby system against which I protest." + +"Without quite knowing what was conveyed by it in this instance?" +said Lady Tyrrell. "I am sure there is nothing I wish more than +that we had any power of improvement of the cottages here; but +influence is our only weapon." + +"By the bye, Mrs. Poynsett," continued Mrs. Duncombe, "will you give +a hint to Mrs. Miles Charnock that it will never do to preach to the +women at the working-room? I don't mean holding forth," she added, +seeing Cecil's look of amazement; "but improving the occasion, +talking piously, giving tracts, and so forth." + +"I thought you gave sanitary tracts!" said Lady Tyrrell. + +"That is quite different." + +"I doubt whether the women would see the distinction. A little book +_is_ a tract to them." + +"I would abstain rather than let our work get a goody reputation for +indoctrinating sectarianism. It would be all up with us; we might +as well keep a charity school." + +"I don't think the women dislike it," said Cecil. + +"Most likely they think it the correct thing, the grain which they +must swallow with our benefits; but for that very reason it injures +the whole tone, and prevents them learning independence. Put it in +that light; I know you can." + +"I don't think Anne would understand," said Cecil, somewhat +flattered. + +"I doubt whether there are three women in the neighbourhood who +would," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"People always think charity--how I hate the word!--a means of +forcing their own tenets down the throats of the poor," said Mrs. +Duncombe. "And certainly this neighbourhood is as narrow as any I +ever saw. Nobody but you and--shall I say the present company?--has +any ideas. I wonder how they will receive Clio Tallboys and her +husband?" + +"Ah! you have not heard about them," said Lady Tyrrell. "Most +delightful people, whom Mrs. Duncombe met on the Righi. He is a +Cambridge professor." + +"Taillebois--I don't remember the name," said Cecil, "and we know a +great many Cambridge men. We went to a Commencement there." + +"Oh, not Cambridge on the Cam! the American Cambridge," said Mrs. +Duncombe. "He is a quiet, inoffensive man, great on political +economy; but his wife is the character. Wonderfully brilliant and +original, and such a lecturer!" + +"Ladies' lectures _would_ startle the natives," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"Besides, the town-hall is lacking," said Mrs. Duncombe; "but when +the Tallboys come we might arrange a succession of soirees, where +she might gather her audience." + +"But where?" said Lady Tyrrell. "It would be great fun, and you +might reckon on me; but where else? Mrs. Charnock Poynsett has to +think of la belle mere." + +"She has given up the management of all matters of society to me," +said Cecil with dignity; "you may reckon on me." + +"No hope of the Bowaters, of course," said Mrs. Duncombe. + +"Miss Bowater is coming to stay with us," volunteered Cecil. + +"To be near that unlucky Life Guardsman manque," said Mrs. Duncombe. + +"Come, I'll not have honest Herbert abused," said the other lady. +"He is the only one of the Bowaters who has any go in him." + +"More's the pity, if he can't use it. Is his sister coming to help +the Reverend Julius to drill him?" + +"On Mrs. Poynsett's account too, I fancy," said Lady Tyrrell; "Jenny +Bowater is her amateur companion. Indeed, I believe it was no +slight disappointment that her sons' appreciation did not quite +reach the pitch of the mother's." + +"Indeed!" asked Mrs. Duncombe; "I thought there had been a foolish +affair with poor young Douglas." + +"Cela n'empeche pas. By the bye, have you finished Fleurange?" + +"Oh, you are quite welcome to it. It is quite as goody as an +English tale in one volume." + +This opened the way to Cecil's desire to borrow Lanfrey, not +concealing the reason why; and she was gratified by the full +sympathy of both ladies, who invited her in self-defence to join in +their subscription to Rolandi, to which she eagerly agreed, and +would have paid her subscription at once if there had not been a +term to be finished off first. + +The gong summoned them to luncheon, and likewise brought down Miss +Vivian, who shook hands rather stiffly, and wore a cold, grave +manner that did not sit badly on her handsome classical features. +The countenance was very fine, but of the style to which early youth +is less favourable than a more mature development; and she was less +universally admired than was her sister. Her dress was a dark +maroon merino, hanging in simple, long, straight folds, and there +was as little distortion in her coiffure as the most moderate +compliance with fashion permitted; and this, with a high-bred, +distinguished deportment, gave an air almost of stern severity. +This deepened rather than relaxed at the greeting from Frank--who, +poor fellow! had an uncontrollably wistful eager look in his face, a +sort of shy entreaty, and was under an incapacity of keeping up a +conversation with anybody else, while trying to catch the least word +of hers. + +She, however, seemed to have more eyes and ears for her father than +for any one else, and he evidently viewed her as the darling and +treasure of his life. His first question, after performing the +duties of a host, was, "Well, my little Lenore, what have you been +doing?" + +"The old story, papa," raising her clear, sweet voice to reach his +rather deaf ears. + +"Got on with your drawing?--The child is competing with a club, you +must know." + +"Not exactly, papa: it is only a little society that was set on +foot at Rockpier to help us to improve ourselves." + +"What is your subject this month?" Frank asked. + +"A branch of blackberries," she answered briefly. + +"Ah!" said Lady Tyrrell, "I saw your pupil bringing in a delicious +festoon--all black and red fruit and crimson and purple leaves. He +is really a boy of taste; I think he will do you credit." + +"The new Joshua Reynolds," said Frank, glad of an excuse to turn +towards Eleonora. "Rosamond mentioned her discovery." + +"You might have seen him just now figuring as Buttons," said Lady +Tyrrell. "Degradation of art, is it not? But it was the only way +to save it. Lenore is teaching him; and if his talent prove worth +it we may do something with him. Any way, the produce of native +genius will be grand material for the bazaar." + +"Card-board prettinesses!" said Mrs. Duncombe; "you spoil him with +them; but that you'll do any way--make him fit for nothing but a +flunkey." + +"Unappreciated zeal!" said Lady Tyrrell, glancing at her sister, who +flushed a little, and looked the more grave. + +"Eh, Lenore," said her father, "wasn't it to please you that Camilla +made me take your pet to make havoc of my glasses?" + +"You meant it so, dear papa," said Eleonora, calling up a smile that +satisfied the old gentleman. "It was very kind in you." + +Fresh subjects were started, and on all the talk was lively and +pleasant, and fascinated Cecil, not from any reminiscence of +Dunstone--for indeed nothing could be more unlike the tone that +prevailed there: but because it was so different from that of +Compton Poynsett, drifting on so unrestrainedly, and touching so +lightly on all topics. + +By the close of the meal, rain had set in, evidently for the +afternoon. Frank offered to ride home, and send the carriage for +Cecil; but the Duncombes proposed to take her and drop her at home; +and to this she consented, rather to Frank's dismay, as he thought +of their coach appearing at his mother's door. + +Lady Tyrrell took her up to resume her hat; and on the way, moved by +distaste to her double surname, and drawn on by a fresh access of +intimacy, she begged to be called Cecil--a privilege of which she +had been chary even in her maiden days; but the caressing manner had +won her heart, and spirit of opposition to the discouragement at +home did the rest. + +The request was reciprocated with that pensive look which was so +touching. "I used to be Camilla to all the neighbourhood, and here +I find myself--miles'--no, leagues further off--banished to +Siberia." + +"How unjust and unkind!" cried Cecil. + +"My dear, you have yet to learn the gentle uncharitableness of +prejudice. It is the prevailing notion that my married life was a +career of dissipation. Ah! if they only knew!" + +"The drag is round," said Mrs. Duncombe's voice at the door, in all +its decisive abruptness, making both start. + +"Just ready," called Lady Tyrrell; adding, in a lower tone, "Ah! she +is startling, but she is genuine! And one must take new friends +when the old are chilly. She is the only one--" + +Cecil's kiss was more hearty than any she had given at Compton, and +she descended; but just as she came to the door, and was only +delaying while Frank and Captain Duncombe were discussing the merits +of the four horses, the Compton carriage appeared in the approach, +and Raymond's head within. Lady Tyrrell looked at Cecil, and saw it +was safe to make a little gesture with the white skin of her fair +brow, expressing unutterable things. + +Mrs. Duncombe lost no time in asking if any steps were being taken +for improving the drainage; to which Raymond replied, "No, that was +not the business in hand. This was the architecture of the town- +hall." + +"Splendour of municipality above, and fever festering below," said +Mrs. Duncombe. + +"Wilsborough is not unhealthy," said Raymond. + +She laughed ironically. + +"The corporation have been told that they have an opportunity," said +Raymond; "but it takes long to prepare people's minds to believe in +the expedience of such measures. If Whitlock could be elected mayor +there would be some chance, but I am afraid they are sure to take +Truelove; and as things are at Wilsborough, we must move all at once +or not at all. Individual attempts would do more harm than good." + +"Ah! you fear for your seat!" said the plain-spoken lady. + +Raymond only chose to answer by a laugh, and would not pursue the +subject so treated. He was politeness itself to all; but he +withstood Lady Tyrrell's earnest entreaties to come in and see some +Florentine photographs, growing stiffer and graver each moment, +while his wife waxed more wrathful at the treatment which she knew +was wounding her friend, and began almost to glory in having +incurred his displeasure herself. Indeed, this feeling caused the +exchange of another kiss between the ladies before Sir Harry handed +Cecil into the carriage, and Raymond took the yellow paper books +that were held out to her. + +Looking at the title as they drove off, he said quietly, "I did not +mean to deprive you, Cecil; I had ordered Lanfrey from Bennet for +you." + +She was somewhat abashed, but was excited enough to answer, "Thank +you. I am going to join Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. Duncombe in a +subscription to Rolandi's." + +He started, and after a pause of a few moments said gently, "Are you +sure that Mr. and Mrs. Charnock would like to trust your choice of +foreign books to Mrs. Duncombe?" + +Taking no notice of the point of this question, she replied, "If it +is an object to exchange books at home faster than I can read them +properly, I must look for a supply elsewhere." + +"You had better subscribe alone," he replied, still without manifest +provocation. + +"That would be uncivil now." + +"I take that upon myself." + +Wherewith there came a silence; while Cecil swelled as she thought +of the prejudice against her friend, and Raymond revolved all he had +ever heard about creatures he knew so little as women, to enable him +to guess how to deal with this one. How reprove so as not to make +it worse? Ought not his silent displeasure to suffice? And in such +musings the carriage reached home. + +It had been an untoward day. He had been striving hard against the +stream at Willansborough. The drainage was not only scouted as an +absurd, unreasonable, and expensive fancy, but the architect whom he +had recommended, in the hope that he would insist on ground-work +which might bring on the improvement, had been rejected in favour of +a kinsman of Mr. Briggs, the out-going mayor, a youth of the lower +walk of the profession--not the scholar and gentleman he had +desired, for the tradesman intellect fancied such a person would be +expensive and unmanageable. + +Twin plans for church and town-hall had been produced, which to +Raymond's taste savoured of the gimcrack style, but which infinitely +delighted all the corporation; and where he was the only cultivated +gentleman, except the timid Vicar, his reasonings were all in vain. +The plan was accepted for the town-hall, and the specifications were +ordered to be made out for competition, and a rate decided on. The +church was to wait for subscription and bazaar; the drains, for +reason in Wil'sbro', or for the hope of the mayoralty of Mr. +Whitlock, a very intelligent and superior linendraper. + + + + +CHAPTER XI +Rosamond's Apologue + + +Pray, sir, do you laugh at me?--Title of Old Caricature + +Was Cecil's allegiance to Dunstone, or was it to the heiress of +Dunstone? Tests of allegiance consist in very small matters, and it +is not always easy to see the turning-point. Now Cecil had always +stood on a pinnacle at Dunstone, and she had found neither its +claims nor her own recognized at Compton. One kind of allegiance +would have remained on the level, and retained the same standard, +whether accepted or not. Another would climb on any pinnacle that +any one would erect for the purpose, and become alienated from +whatever interfered with such eminence. + +So as nobody seemed so willing to own Cecil's claims to county +supremacy as Lady Tyrrell, her bias was all towards Sirenwood; and +whereas such practices as prevailed at Dunstone evidently were +viewed as obsolete and narrow by these new friends, Cecil was +willing to prove herself superior to them, and was far more +irritated than convinced when her husband appealed to her former +habits. + +The separation of the welfare of body and soul had never occurred to +the beneficence of Dunstone, and it cost Cecil a qualm to accept it; +but she could not be a goody in the eyes of Sirenwood; and besides, +she was reading some contemporary literature, which made it plain +that any religious instruction was a most unjustifiable interference +with the great law, "Am I my brother's keeper?" and so, when she met +Anne with a handful of texts neatly written out in printing letters, +she administered her warning. + +Cecil and Anne had become allies to a certain extent, chiefly +through their joint disapproval of Rosamond, not to say of Julius; +and the order was so amazing that Anne did not at first take it in; +and when she understood that all mention of religion was forbidden, +she said, "I do not think I ought to yield in this." + +"Surely," said Cecil, "there is no connection between piety and +cutting out." + +"I don't know," said Anne; "but it does not seem to me to be right +to go on with a work where my Master's Name is forbidden." + +"Religion ought never to be obtruded," said Cecil. + +"The Word ought to flavour everything, in season or out of season," +said Anne, thoughtfully. + +"Oh! that's impossible. It's your narrow view. If you thrust +preaching into everything, we can never work together." + +"Oh, then," said Anne, quickly, "I must give it up!" And she turned +away with a rapid step, to carry her texts back to her room. + +"Anne!" called Cecil, "I did not mean _that_!" + +Anne paused for a moment, looked over the baluster, and repeated +firmly, "No, Cecil; it would be denying Christ to work where His +Name is forbidden." + +Perhaps there was something in the elevation and the carved rail +that gave the idea of a pulpit, for Cecil felt as if she was being +preached at, and turned her back, indignant and vexed at what she +had by no means intended to incur--the loss of such a useful +assistant as she found in Anne. + +"Such nonsense!" she said to herself, as she crossed the hall alone, +there meeting with Rosamond, equipped for the village. "Is not Anne +going to-day?" she said, as she saw the pony-carriage at the door. + +"No. It is so vexatious. She is so determined upon preaching to +the women, that I have been obliged to put a stop to it." + +"Indeed! I should not have thought it of poor Anne; but no one can +tell what those semi-dissenters think right." + +"When she declared she ought to do it in season or out of season, +what was one to do?" said Cecil. + +"I thought that was for clergymen," said Rosamond, hitting the right +nail on the head in her ignorance, as so often happened. + +"She sees no difference," said Cecil. "Shall I drive you down?" she +added graciously, according to the fashion of uniting with one +sister-in-law against the other; and Rosamond not only accepted, but +asked to be taken on to Willansborough, to buy a birthday present +for her brother Terry, get stamps for an Indian letter, and perform +a dozen more commissions that seemed to arise in her mind with the +opportunity. Her two brothers were to spend the Christmas holidays +with her, and she was in high spirits, and so communicative about +them that she hardly observed how little interest Cecil took in +Terry's achievements. + +"Who is that," she presently asked, "with those red-haired children? +It looked like Miss Vivian's figure." + +"I believe it was. Julius and I often see her walking about the +lanes; but she passes like--like a fire-flaught, whatever that is-- +just bows, and hardly ever speaks." + +"She is a strange girl," said Cecil. "Lady Tyrrell says she cannot +draw her into any of her interests, but she will go her own way." + +"Like poor Anne?" + +"No, not out of mere moping and want of intellect, like Anne. But +Lady Tyrrell says she feels for her; she was brought a great deal +too forward, and was made quite mistress of the house at Rockpier, +being her father's darling and all, and now it is trying to her, +though it is quite wholesome, to be in her proper place. It is a +pity she is so bitter over it, and flies off her own way." + +"That boy!" said Rosamond; "I hope she does something for his good." + +"She teaches him, I believe; but there's another instance of her +strange ways. She was absolutely vexed when Lady Tyrrell took him +into the house, though he was her protege, only because it was not +done in _her_ way. It is a great trial to Camilla." + +"I could fancy a reason for that," said Rosamond. "Julius does not +like the tone of the household at all." But she added hastily, "Who +could those children be? They did not look _quite_ like poor +children." + +"Ah! she is always taking up with some odd person in her own away," +said Cecil. "But here we are. Will you drive on to the hotel, or +get out here?" + +When, at the end of two hours, the sisters-in-law met at the work- +room, and Rosamond had taken a survey of the row of needle-women, +coming up one by one to give their work, be paid and dismissed, +there was a look of weariness and vexation on Cecil's face. She had +found it less easy to keep order and hinder gossip, and had hardly +known how to answer when that kind lady, Mrs. Miles Charnock, had +been asked after; but she would have scorned to allow that she had +missed her assistant, and only politely asked how Rosamond had sped. + +"Oh! excellently. People were so well advised as to be out, so I +paid off all my calls." + +"You did not return your calls without Julius?" + +"There's nothing he hates so much. I would not have dragged him +with me on any account." + +"I think it is due to one's self." + +"Ah! but then I don't care what is due to myself. I saw a friend of +yours, Cecil." + +"Who?" + +"Mrs. Duncombe," said Rosamond. "I went to Pettitt's--the little +perfumer, you know, that Julius did so much for at the fire; and +there she was, leaning on the counter, haranguing him confidentially +upon setting an example with sanatory measures." + +"Sanitary," corrected Cecil; "sanitas is health, sano to cure. +People never know the difference." + +"Certainly I don't," said Rosamond. "It must be microscopic!" + +"Only it shows the difference between culture and the reverse," said +Cecil. + +"Well, you know, I'm the reverse," said Rosamond, leaning sleepily +back, and becoming silent; but Cecil was too anxious for +intelligence to let her rest, and asked on what Mrs. Duncombe was +saying. + +"I am not quite sure--she was stirring up his public spirit, I +think, about the drainage; and they were both of them deploring the +slackness and insensibility of the corporation, and canvassing for +Mr. Whitlock, as I believe. It struck me as a funny subject for a +lady, but I believe she does not stick at trifles." + +"No real work can be carried out by those who do," said Cecil. + +"Oh!" added Rosamond, "I met Mrs. and Miss Bowater, and they desired +me to say that Jenny can't come till the dinner-party on the 20th, +and then they will leave her." + +"How cool to send a message instead of writing!" + +"Oh! she has always been like one of themselves, like a sister to +them all." + +"I can't bear that sort of people." + +"What sort?" + +"Who worm themselves in." + +"Miss Bowater could have no occasion for worming. They must be +quite on equal terms." + +"At any rate, she was only engaged to their poor relation." + +"What poor relation? Tell me! Who told you?" + +"Raymond. It was a young attorney--a kind of cousin of the Poynsett +side, named Douglas." + +"What? There's a cross in the churchyard to Elizabeth Douglas, +daughter of Francis Poynsett, and wife of James Douglas, and at the +bottom another inscription to Archibald Douglas, her son, lost in +the Hippolyta." + +"Yes, that must be the man. He was flying from England, having been +suspected of some embezzlement." + +"Indeed! And was Jenny engaged to him? Julius told me that Mrs. +Douglas had been his mother's dearest friend, and that this Archie +had been brought up with them, but he did not say any more." + +"Perhaps he did not like having had a cousin in an attorney's +office. I am sure I had no notion of such a thing." + +Rosamond laughed till she was exhausted at the notion of Julius's +sharing the fastidious objections she heard in Cecil's voice; and +then, struck by the sadness of the story, she cried, "And that makes +them all so fond of Miss Bowater. Poor girl, what must she not have +gone through! And yet how cheerful she does look!" + +"People say," proceeded Cecil, unable to resist the impulse to +acquire a partaker in her half-jealous aversion, "that it was a +great disappointment that Mrs. Poynsett could not make her sons like +her as much as she did herself." + +"Oh!" cried Rosamond, "how little peace we should have if we always +heeded what people say!" + +"People that know," persisted Cecil. + +"Not very wise or very kind people to say so," quoth Rosamond; +"though, by the bye, the intended sting is happily lost, considering +that it lies among five." + +"Why should you assume a sting?" + +"Because I see you are stung, and want to sting me," said Rosamond, +in so merry a tone that the earnestness was disguised. + +"I! I'm not stung! What Mrs. Poynsett or Miss Bowater may have +schemed is nothing to me," said Cecil, with all her childish +dignity. + +"People talk of Irish imagination," said Rosamond in her lazy +meditative tone. + +"Well?" demanded Cecil, sharply. + +"Only it is not _my_ Irish imagination that has devised this +dreadful picture of the artful Jenny and Mrs. Poynsett spinning +their toils to entrap the whole five brothers. Come, Cecil, take my +advice and put it out of your head. Suppose it were true, small +blame to Mrs. Poynsett." + +"What do you mean?" said Cecil, in a voice of hurt dignity. + +"I may mean myself." And Rosamond's peal of merry laughter was most +amazing and inexplicable to her companion, who was not sure that she +was not presuming to laugh at her. + +There was a silence, broken at last by Rosamond. "Cecil, I have +been tumbled about the world a good deal more than you have, and I +never found that one got any good by disregarding the warnings of +the natives. There's an immense deal in the cat and the cock." + +"I do not understand, said Cecil. + +Whereupon Rosamond, in a voice as if she were telling the story to a +small child, began: "Once upon a time there was a wee bit +mousiekie, that lived in Giberatie O--that trotted out of her hole +upon an exploring expedition. By and by she came scuttling back in +a state of great trepidation--in fact, horribly nervous. 'Mother, +mother!' said the little mouse, 'I've seen a hideous monster, with a +red face, and a voice like a trumpet, and a pair of spurs.'" + +"Of course, I know that," broke in Cecil. + +"Ah, you haven't heard all. 'I should have died of terror,' said +the little mouse, 'only that I saw a dear sweet graceful creature, +with a lovely soft voice, and a smooth coat, and the most beautiful +eyes, and the most exquisite pathetic expression in her smile; and +she held out her velvet paw to me, and said, 'Dear little mousiekie- +pousie, you're the loveliest creature I ever met, quite +unappreciated in these parts. That horrid old cock is terribly +vulgar and commonplace; and never you believe your mother if she +tells you he is better worth cultivating than one who has such a +deep genuine love and appreciation of all the excellences of all +mice, and of you in particular with your dun fur.'" + +Rosamond could not for her very life help putting in that word dun; +and Cecil, who had been driving straight on with her eyes fixed on +her pony's ears, and rather a sullen expression of forced endurance, +faced about. "What you mean by all this I don't know; but if you +think it applies to me or my friends, you are much mistaken." + +"I told you," said Rosamond, with the same languor, looking out +under her half-shut eyes, "that I apply things to myself. I've met +both sorts in my time." + +And silence reigned for the rest of the way. Cecil had read many +more books, knew much more, and was altogether a far more cultivated +personage than the Lady Rosamond; but she was not half so ready in +catching the import of spoken words; and all this time she was by no +means certain whether all this meant warning or meant mockery, +though either was equally impertinent, and must be met with the same +lady-like indifference, which Cecil trusted that she had never +transgressed. + +Neither of them, nor indeed any other living creature, knew of a +little episode which had occurred about eighteen months previously, +when Joanna Bowater had been taking care of Mrs Poynsett during +Raymond's first absence from home after her accident. Of course he +took her back to Strawyers as soon as he arrived; and about half- +way, after a prolonged and unusual silence, he said, "Jenny, I +believe we know one another's histories pretty well. It would be a +great happiness and blessing if you could bring yourself to sink the +past so far as to take me, and become indeed my mother's daughter. +Do not answer me in haste. Think it over, and tell me if it is +possible." + +Jenny let him drive on more than a mile before she spoke; and when +she did, the tears stood on her cheek, and it was quite an effort +that her voice was made steady. "No, Raymond, I am very sorry, but +it will not do. Two griefs will not make one joy." + +"Yes, they would, to my mother." + +"Ah! there it lies! Indeed, Raymond, I do feel for you all so much, +especially your dear mother, that I would bring myself to it, if I +could; but the very thought brings Archie up so vividly before me +that I cannot! He has almost seemed to be sitting by me all this +time. It seems as though beginning again would kill my right to +think of him foremost of all." + +"I could bear with that and trust to time," said Raymond. "Think it +over, Jenny. I will be candid with you. The old delusion was too +strong for any repetition of that kind, as you may see by the lame +performance I am making now." + +Jenny gave a little agitated laugh, and ejaculated, "Dear Raymond!" +then added, "It is not on your account, but mine." + +"But," he added, "my marriage is becoming a necessity, if only for +my mother's sake; and you stand far before any other woman with me, +if that would but satisfy you. I verily believe that in a short +time we should be just as comfortable together as if we could start +with more romance." + +"I dare say we should, dear Raymond," said Jenny; "but I cannot feel +that it is the right thing, while I have not _that_ feeling for you +which overpowers everything else; it seems to me that I ought not to +give up my place at home. Papa depends on me a good deal, and they +both will want me more and more." + +"Less than my mother." + +"I don't know; and they are my first duty. I can always come to +your mother when I am wanted, and I know in your secret soul you +prefer me on those terms." + +He made no answer, only when passing the lodge he said, "Will you +consider it a little longer, Jenny?" + +But this only resulted in a note:-- + +"DEAR RAYMOND,--Considering only shows me that I must be Archie +Douglas's now and for ever. I can't help it. It is better for +you; for you can find some young girl who can wake your heart +again, as never could be done by your still affectionate J. B." + +Raymond and Jenny had met so often since, that the matter was +entirely past, and no one ever guessed it. + +At any rate, Rosamond, the most ready to plunge into counsel to +Cecil, was the least likely to have it accepted; Rosamond had +foibles of her own that Cecil knew of, and censured freely enough +within herself. + +That never-ending question, whether what became the Colonel's +daughter became the clergyman's wife, would crop up under endless +forms. Rosamond, in all opinions, was good-natured and easy, and +always for pardon and toleration to an extent that the Compton code +could not understand. She could not bear that anybody should be +punished or shut out of anything; while there was no denying that, +now the first novelty was passing, she was very lazy as to her +parochial work, and that where her feelings were not stirred she was +of little use. + +Julius seemed shamefully tolerant of her omissions, and likewise of +her eagerness for all gaieties. He would not go himself, would not +accept a dinner invitation for any of the three busy nights of the +week, and refused all those to dances and balls for himself, though +he never hindered Rosamond's going. + +She used absolutely to cry with passionate entreaties that he would +relent and come with her, declaring that he was very unkind, he knew +it took away all her pleasure--he was a tyrant, and wanted her not +to go. And then he smiled, and owned that he hoped some day she +would be tired of it; whereat she raged, and begged him to forbid +her, if he really thought her whole life had been so shocking, +declaring in the same breath that she would never disown her family, +or cast a slur on her mother and sisters. + +It always ended in her going, and though never again offending as by +her bridal gown, she seldom failed to scandalize Cecil by an excess +of talking and of waltzing, such as even Raymond regretted, and +which disabled her for a whole day after from all but sofa, sleep, +novels, and yawns. + +Was this the person whose advice the discreet heiress of Dunstone +was likely to follow? + +It may be mentioned here, among other elements of difficulty, that +Cecil's maid Grindstone was a thorough Dunstonite, who 'kept herself +to herself,' was perfectly irreproachable, lived on terms of distant +civility with the rest of the household, never complained, but +constantly led her young mistress to understand that she was +enduring much for her sake. + +Cecil was too well trained, and so was she, for a word of gossip or +censure to pass between them; but the influence was not the less +strong. + + + + +CHAPTER XII +Pastoral Visiting + + +A finger's breadth at hand may mar +A world of light in heaven afar; +A mote eclipse a glorious star, + An eyelid hide the sky.--KEBLE. + +The dinner was over, and Cecil was favouring the audience with a +severely classical piece of music, when, under cover thereof, a low +voice said to Julius, "Now, really and truly, tell me how he is +getting on?" + +"Really and truly, Jenny?" + +"Well, not as you would tell mamma, for instance; but as you think +in your secret soul." + +"I am sorry you think me so duplex." + +"Come, you understand how anxious I am about the boy." + +"Exactly." And they both laughed. + +"Is that all?" said Joanna Bowater. + +"_Really and truly_ it is! Rose can manage him much better than I +can." + +"He is very fond of her; but does he--is he--is his heart in his +work?" asked the sister, looking with her honest eyes earnestly at +Julius, her contemporary and playfellow as a child, and afterwards +the companion with whom she had worked out many a deep problem, +rendering mutual assistance that made each enter in no common degree +into the inner thoughts of the other. + +Julius smiled. "I doubt whether he has come to his heart yet." + +"Why should he be so young? Think what you were at twenty-three." + +"I never had Herbert's physique; and that makes an immense +difference. I had no taste or capacity for what is a great +privation to a fine young fellow like him. Don't look startled! He +attempts nothing unfitting; he is too good and dutiful, but--" + +"Yes, I know what that _but_ means." + +"Nothing to be unhappy about. You know how blameless he has always +been at Eton and Oxford; and though he may view his work rather in a +school-boy aspect, and me as a taskmaster, as long as he is doing +right the growth is going on. Don't be unhappy, Jenny! His great +clear young voice is delightful to hear; he is capital at choral +practices, and is a hero to all the old women and boys, the more so +for the qualities that earnestness cannot give, but rather detracts +from." + +"You mean that he is not in earnest?" + +"Don't pervert all I say! He is not past the time of life when all +appointed work seems a task, and any sort of excuse a valid cause +against it; but he is conscientious, and always good-humoured under +a scolding,--and Rosamond does not spare him," he added, laughing. + +"Then you don't think there has been a mistake about him?" said +Jenny, in a low voice of alarm. + +"I have little doubt that when anything develops his inner life, so +as to overcome the great strong animal that demands play and +exercise, he will be a most useful clergyman." + +"Perhaps he is too young, though I don't see how it could be helped. +Papa always intended it, because of the living; and Herbert never +wished anything else. I thought he really desired it, but now I +don't know whether he did not only take it as a matter of course." + +"Obedience is no unwholesome motive. As things stood, to delay his +ordination would have been a stigma he did not deserve; and though +he might have spent a year with advantage in a theological college, +pupilage might only have prolonged his boyhood. It must be +experience, not simply years of study, that deepens him." + +"Ah, those studies!" + +"To tell the truth, that's what I am most uneasy about. I take care +he should have two hours every forenoon, and three evenings every +week, free; but when a man is in his own neighbourhood, and so +popular, I am afraid he does not get many evenings at home; and I +can't hinder Bindon from admonishing him." + +"No," said the sister; "nothing will stir him till the examination +is imminent; but I will try what I can do with him for the present. +Here he comes, the dear old idle fellow!" + +"Joanie, here you are at last, in conclave with the Rector. Lady +Rose wants me to sing, and you must accompany me. No one is so +jolly for picking one up." + +'Picking one up' was apt to be needed by Herbert, who had a good ear +and voice, but had always regarded it as 'bosh' to cultivate them, +except for the immediately practical purposes that had of late been +forced on him. The choral society had improved him; but Jenny was +taken aback by being called on to accompany him in Mrs. Brown's +Luggage; and his father made his way up to him, saying, "Eh, +Herbert! is that the last clerical fashion?" + +"'Tis my Rectoress who sets me on, sir," was Herbert's merry answer, +looking at her. "Now, Lady Rose, you'll keep me in countenance! My +father has never heard you sing Coming through the Rye." + +"No, no, Herbert, my singing is only to amuse little boys. Here's +the higher order of art!" + +For Cecil was leading a young lady to the piano, and looking as if +she by no means approved of such folly, though everybody had +listened to the Poor Old Cockatoo, laughed and applauded heartily; +and the ensuing performance seemed to be unappreciated by any one +except Raymond and Cecil themselves. + +Anne was sitting in a corner of the sofa, with a straight back and +weary face, having been driven out into the throng by the old +friends who came to sit with Mrs. Poynsett; but she brightened as +Miss Bowater took a seat beside her, and accepted her inquiries for +Captain Charnock far more graciously than the many which had +preceded them. Was not her likeness in his album? And had he not +spoken of her as one whom Anne would like? + +Soon Joanna had led her to tell not only of Miles's last letter, but +of those from Glen Fraser, of which she had spoken to no one, under +the impression that nobody cared. She even spoke of the excellent +farm and homestead which Mr. Van Dorp wanted to sell before going to +the Free State, and which her father thought would exactly suit +Miles. + +"Does he mean to settle there?" + +"Oh, yes; he promised me to leave the navy and take me home as soon +as this voyage is over," said Anne, eagerly. "If the Salamanca only +puts in for long enough, he might run up to Glen Fraser, and see +Bocksfeld Stoop, and settle it all at once. I am sure he would be +delighted with it, and it is only two miles from Mr. Pilgrim's." + +"I'm afraid you can never feel this like home," said Jenny. + +"Miles wanted me to know his family, and thought I should be useful +to his mother," said Anne; "but she does not want anything I could +do for her. If she has Raymond, she seems to need nobody else." + +"And have you nothing to do?" + +"I have letters to write to Miles and to them all at home; and I am +making a whole set of shirts and stockings for papa and the boys--it +will spare mamma and Jeanie, and I have plenty of time." + +"Too much, I am afraid! But Herbert said you were very useful at +the Work Society at Wil'sbro'." + +"Not now." + +"Indeed!" + +"No," in the old cold dry tone. But while Jenny was doubting +whether to inquire further, innate sympathy conquered, and Anne +added, "I wonder whether I did wrong!" + +"As how?" asked Joanna, kindly. + +"They said"--she lowered her voice--"I must never speak on religious +subjects." + +"How do you mean? What had you done?" + +"One day I found a woman crying because her husband had gone away to +seek work, so I told her my husband was further away and repeated +the texts I like. She was so much comforted that I printed them on +a card for her." + +"Was that all?" + +"No; there was another poor dear that was unhappy about her baby; +and when I bade her pray for it, she did not know how, so I had to +tell her a little. There is one who does know her Saviour, and I +did love to have a few words of peace with her." + +"And was that what was objected to?" + +"Yes; they said it would change the whole character of the +institution." + +"Who did?" + +"Cecil--Mrs. Charnock Poynsett. I think Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. +Duncombe desired her. I thought it was no place for me where I +might not speak one word for Christ, and I said so; but since I have +wondered whether the old Adam did not speak in me, and I ought to +have gone on." + +"My wonder," said Jenny, indignantly, "would be what right they had +to stop you. This was private interference, not from the Vicar or +the committee." + +"But I am not a real visiting lady. I only go to help Cecil." + +"I see; but why didn't you ask Julius what was right? He would have +told you." + +"Oh, no, I could not." + +"Why not?" + +"It would seem like a complaint of Cecil. Besides--" + +"Besides?" + +"I don't think Julius is a Christian." + +The startling announcement was made in so humble and mournful a +voice as almost to disarm Jenny's resentment; and before she had +recovered enough for a reply, she was called to take leave of her +parents. + +Her brother was the professed object of her visit, and she was only +at the Hall because there was no accommodation at his lodgings, so +that she had no scruple in joining the early breakfast spread for +the Rector and his wife, so as to have the morning free for him; but +she found Julius alone, saying that his wife was tired after the +party; and to Jenny's offer to take her class, he replied, "Thank +you, it will be a great kindness if you will teach; but Rose has no +regular class. Teaching is not much in her line; and it is a pity +she should have to do it, but we have to make the most of the single +hour they allow us for godliness." + +"Don't you utilize Mrs. Charnock? or is she not strong enough for +early hours?" + +"Poor Anne! The truth is, I am afraid of her. I fancy all her +doctrine comes out of the Westminster Catechism." + +"Could Calvinism be put in at seven years old? Would not it be a +pouring of stiff glue into a narrow-necked phial?" + +"Result--nil." + +"A few pure drops might got in--and you could give her books." + +"It had struck me that it might be wholesome work for her; but the +children's good must stand first. And, timid and reserved as she +seems, she insisted on preaching at the work-room, so that Cecil had +to put a stop to it." + +"Are you certain about that preaching?" + +"Rose heard of it from Cecil herself." + +"Did she ask what it amounted to?" + +"I don't know; perhaps I had better find out. I remember it came +after that ride to Sirenwood. By the bye, Jenny, I wish Cecil could +be hindered from throwing herself into that oak of Broceliande!" + +"Are not you so suspicious that you see the waving arms and magic +circles everywhere?" + +"A friendship with any one here is so unnatural, that I can't but +think it a waving of hands boding no good. And there is worse than +friendship in that quarter too." + +"Oh, but Lenore is quite different!" + +"A Vivienne still!" said Julius, bitterly. "If she costs poor Frank +nothing more than his appointment, it will be well." + +"I don't understand!" + +"She caught him in her toils two years ago at Rockpier; and now she +is playing fast and loose with him--withdrawing, as I believe; and +at any rate keeping the poor foolish boy in such an agitation, that +he can't or won't settle to his reading; and Driver thinks he will +break down." + +"I can't think it of Lenore.--Oh! good morning, Raymond!" + +"Good morning! May I come to breakfast number one? I have to go to +Backsworth." + +"Yes," said Jenny; "we told papa it was too bad to put you on the +Prison Committee. What does your wife say?" + +"My wife has so many occupations, that she is very sufficient for +herself," said Raymond. "I hope you will get on with her, Jenny. +If she could only be got to think you intellectual!" + +"Me? O, Raymond! you've not been telling her so?" exclaimed Jenny, +laughing heartily. + +"A very superior coach in divinity, &c.," said Julius, in a tone +half banter, half earnest. + +But Jenny exclaimed in distress, "No, no, no; say nothing about +that! It would never do for Herbert to have it known. Don't let +him guess that you know." + +"Quite right, Jenny; never fear," said Julius; "though it is +tempting to ask you to take Frank in hand at the same time." + +"Have you seen anything of the Vivians?" asked Raymond. + +"Very little. I hoped to see something of Eleonora from hence." + +"I can't understand that young lady," said Julius. "She was very +friendly when first we met her; but now she seems absolutely +repellant." + +"Tant mieux," Raymond + +"They seem inclined to take up all the good works in hand," said +Jenny. "By the bye, what is all this story about Raymond affronting +Wil'sbro' by stirring up their gutters? Papa has been quite in a +state of mind for fear they should take offence and bring in Mr. +Moy." + +"Julius only thinks I have not stirred the gutters enough," said +Raymond. "And after all, it is not I, but Whitlock. I was in hopes +that matters might have been properly looked after if Whitlock had +been chosen mayor this year; but, somehow, a cry was got up that he +was going to bring down a sanitary commission, and put the town to +great expense; and actually, this town-council have been elected +_because_ they are opposed to drainage." + +"And Truelove, the grocer, is mayor?" + +"Yes; one of the most impracticable men I ever encountered. One +can't get him so much as to understand anything. Now Briggs does +understand, only he goes by pounds s. d." + +"Posterity has done nothing for me, and I will do nothing for +posterity, is his principle," said Julius. "Moreover, he is a +Baptist." + +"No chance for the Church in his time," said Jenny. + +"There's the less harm in that," said Raymond, "that the plan is +intolerable. Briggs's nephew took the plan of what he calls a +German Rat-house, for the town-hall, made in gilt gingerbread; and +then adapted the church to a beautiful similarity. If that could be +staved off by waiting for the bazaar, or by any other means, there +might be a chance of something better. So poor Fuller thinks, +though he is not man enough to speak out at once." + +"Then the bazaar is really fixed?" + +"So far as the resolution goes of the lady population, though Julius +is sanguine, and hopes to avert it. After all, I believe the +greatest obstructive to improvement is Moy." + +"Old Mr. Proudfoot's son-in-law?" said Jenny. "I know he has +blossomed out in great splendour on our side of the county, and his +daughter is the general wonder. Papa is always declaring he will +set up in opposition to you." + +"Not much fear of that," said Raymond. "But the man provokes me, he +has so much apparent seriousness." + +"Even to the persecution of Dr. Easterby," put in Julius. "And yet +he is the great supporter of that abominable public-house in Water +Lane, the Three Pigeons--which, unluckily, escaped the fire. He +owns it, and all those miserable tenements beyond it, and nothing +will move him an inch towards doing any good there!" + +"I remember," said Jenny, "papa came home very angry on the +licensing day; the police had complained of the Three Pigeons, and +the magistrates would have taken away the license, but that Mr. Moy +made such a personal matter of it." + +"You don't mean that he is a magistrate!" exclaimed Julius. + +"Yes," said Raymond. "He got the ear of the Lord-Lieutenant." + +"And since he has lived at the Lawn, they have all quite set up for +county people or anything you please," said Jenny, a little +bitterly. "Mrs. Moy drives about with the most stylish pair of +ponies; and as to Miss Gussie, she is making herself into a proverb! +I can't bear them." + +"Well done, Jenny!" exclaimed Julius. + +"Perhaps it is wrong," said Jenny, in a low voice. "I dare say I am +not just. You know I always did think Mr. Moy could have cleared +Archie if he would," she added, with a slightly trembling tone. + +"So did I," said Raymond. "I gave him the opportunity after George +Proudfoot's death; but when the choice lay between two memories, one +could hardly wonder if he preferred to shield his brother-in-law." + +"Or himself!" said Jenny, under her breath. + +"Come, Jenny," said Julius, feeling that the moment for interruption +had come, "it is time we should be off. Methinks there are sounds +as if the whole canine establishment at Mrs. Hornblower's were +prancing up to meet us." + +So it proved; and Jenny had to run the gauntlet through the +ecstasies of all the dogs, whose ecclesiastical propriety was quite +overthrown, for they danced about her to the very threshold of the +church, and had to have the door shut on their very noses. That +drop of bitterness, which her sad brief story could not fail to have +left in poor Joanna's heart, either passed out of mind in what +followed, or was turned into the prayer, "And to turn their hearts;" +and she was her bright self again for her promised assistance at the +school. + +Then Herbert's address was, "Come, Joan, I promised to take you to +see the Reeves's pheasant at the Outwood Lodge. Such a jolly old +woman!" + +"The pheasant?" + +"No; the keeper's mother. Tail a yard long! I don't see why we +shouldn't turn them out at home. If father won't take it up, I +shall write to Phil." + +"Thank you, Herbs. Hadn't you better secure a little reading first? +I could wait; I've got to write to Will." + +"The post doesn't go till five." + +"But I want to get it done. The mail goes to-morrow." + +"You'll do it much better after a walk. I can't understand anything +after the fumes of the school, unless I do a bit of visiting first; +and that pheasant is a real stunner. It really is parish work, +Jenny. Look here, this is what I'm reading her." + +"_Learn to die_!" said Jenny, laughing heartily. "Nothing could be +more appropriate, only you should have begun before October." + +"You choose to make fun of everything!" answered Herbert, gruffly; +and Jenny, deciding that she would see a specimen day, made her +peace by consenting to share in the pastoral visit, whether to +pheasant or peasant. Indeed, a walk with Herbert was one of the +prime pleasures of her life--and this was delightful, along broad +gravelled drives through the autumnal woods with tinted beech-leaves +above, and brackens of all shades of brown, green, and yellow +beneath. And it was charming to see Herbert's ways with the old +woman--a dainty old dame, such as is grown in the upper ranks of +service, whom he treated with a hearty, bantering, coaxing manner, +which she evidently enjoyed extremely. His reading, for he _did_ +come to more serious matters, was very good--in a voice that without +effort reached deaf ears, and with feeling about it that did a great +deal to reassure his sister that there was something behind the big +bright boy. + +But by the time he had done the honours of all the pheasants, and +all the dogs, and all the ferrets, and all the stuffed birds, and +all the eggs (for the keeper was a bit of a naturalist), and had +discussed Mr. Frank's last day's shooting, it was so late, that +Jenny had only just time to walk back to the Hall at her best pace, +to see Mrs. Poynsett for a few minutes before luncheon; and her +reception was, "Is that Herbert's step? Call him in, my dear!--You +must make the most of your sister, Herbert. Come in to all meals +while she is here." + +He heard with gratitude--his sister with consternation. If forenoon +pastoral visits were to be on that scale, and he dined out whenever +he was not at school or at church, how would his books fare? and yet +she could not grudge his pleasure. She could not help looking half +foolish, half sad, when she met the Rector's eye. + +Julius thought so much of her advice, as to knock at Cecil's +sitting-room door, and beg to ask her a question; and as she liked +to be consulted, she welcomed him hospitably into that temple, +sacred to culture and to Dunstone--full of drawings, books, and +china. + +"I was thinking," he said, "of offering Anne some parish work. I +wanted to know if you saw any objection?" + +"Certainly not; I have not been able to make acquaintance yet with +all our tenants, but they seem quite to understand the difference in +our positions," said Cecil, with due deliberation. + +Julius choked his amusement, and waived that point. "But did you +not feel obliged to decline her services at the Wil'sbro' work- +room?" + +"That was quite another thing. What was most undesirable in such an +institution would be all very well for your old women." + +"What kind of thing?" + +"Talking piously, giving away texts, and so on; just the way to make +the women think we intended to impose religious instruction and give +a sectarian character, defeating our own object." + +"Was there any flaw in what she said?" + +"I can't tell what she said. It was just a little murmur over the +work." + +"Not preaching?" + +"Not in that sense," said Cecil, with a little compunction. + +"I am glad to hear it; it makes a great difference." + +"You see," said the lady, "our institution is merely intended to +support these women in the time of want; and if we were to couple +our assistance with religion we should just sink into a mothers' +meeting, and make the women think--" + +"Think that you prize the soul more than the body," said Julius, as +she halted in search of a word. "I understand, Cecil; you would not +be in the prevailing fashion. I don't want to argue that point, +only to understand about Anne." + +So saying, he went at once to Anne's abode, the old schoolroom, +which, like everything else belonging to Mrs. Miles Charnock, had a +sad-coloured aspect, although it had been fitted up very prettily. +The light was sombre, and all the brighter pictures and ornaments +seemed to have been effaced by a whole gallery of amateur +photographs, in which the glories of the African bush were +represented by brown masses of shade variegated by blotches of +white. Even in Miles's own portrait on the table, the gold seemed +overwhelmed by the dark blue; and even as Julius entered, she shut +it up in its brown case, as too sacred for even his brother's eyes. + +However, a flush of pleasure came to her pale face at the invitation +to take a class, and to read to a good old woman, whom in his secret +soul he thought so nearly a dissenter, that she could not be made +more so. She promised her help with some eagerness for as long as +she should remain in England, and accepted the books he gave her +without protest. Nay, that same evening she took Jenny off into her +gray abode, to consult her whether, since she must now join the +early breakfast, she could go to daily service without becoming +formal. + +She even recurred to her question, whether Julius was a Christian, +without nearly as much negation in her tones as before; and Jenny, +taking it as it was meant, vouched for his piety, so as might render +it a little more comprehensible to one matured on Scottish Calvinism +and English Methodism, diluted in devout undogmatic minds, with no +principle more developed than horror of Popery and of worldliness. +Turned loose in solitude, reserve, and sadness, on her husband's +family, who did nothing but shock her with manifestations of the +latter, she could hardly turn even to the clerical portion of it, +while Julius, as well as his curates, bore all the tokens by which +she had been taught to know a Papist. Daily intercourse was perhaps +drawing her a little towards her brother-in-law; but Herbert Bowater +united these obnoxious externals to a careless tongue, and joyous +easy-going manner, and taste for amusement, which so horrified Anne, +that she once condoled with his sister, and proposed to unite in +prayer for his conversion; but this was more than Joanna could bear, +and she cried, "I only wish I were as good a Christian as dear +Herbert!" + +For indeed, the sister's heart intensely esteemed his sweetness, +honesty, and simplicity, even while she found it an uphill task to +coax him to steady work. After that first morning he was indeed +ashamed to let her see the proportion between his pastoral visits +and his theological reading; but the newspapers (he had two or three +weekly ones) had a curious facility of expansion, and there was a +perilous sound in "I'll just see where the meet is,"--not that he +had the most distant idea of repairing thither; it was pure filial +interest in learning where his father and Edith would be. + +Jenny could not tell whether her presence conduced to diligence or +to chatter, but he minded her more than any one else, and always +stuck close to her, insisting on her admiring all his proteges. +There was one with whom he was certainly doing a work, which, as +Julius truly said, no one more clerical could have done so well-- +namely, the son of his landlady, a youth who held a small clerkship +in an office at Willansborough, and who had fallen this year under +the attraction of the Backsworth races, so as to get into serious +difficulties with his master, and narrowly escape dismissal for the +sake of his mother. + +The exceeding good-nature and muscular Christian side of the +lodger's character was having a most happy effect on the lad. He +had set up a regular hero-worship, which Herbert encouraged by +always calling for him when going to the choral practices, getting +him into the choir, lending him books, and inviting him to read in +his room in the evening. How much they played with the dogs was not +known; but at any rate, Harry Hornblower was out of mischief, and +his mother was so grateful to Mr. Bowater, that she even went the +length of preferring his sermons to those of both his seniors. + +The discovery that most vexed Jenny was that Sirenwood had so much +of his time. He seemed to be asked to come to dinner whenever Sir +Harry saw him, or a chair was left vacant at a party; and though his +Rector was inexorable as to releasing him on casual notice from the +parish avocations of three nights in the week, the effect was +grumbling as savage as was possible from so good-humoured a being; +and now and then a regular absence without leave, and a double growl +at the consequent displeasure. It was true that in ten minutes he +was as hearty and friendly as ever to his colleagues, but that might +be only a proof of his disregard of their reproofs, and their small +effect. + +Eleonora Vivian was not the attraction. No; Herbert thought her a +proud, silent, disagreeable girl, and could see no beauty in her; +but he had a boy's passion for the matured splendour of her sister's +beauty; and she was so kind to him! + +What could Jenny mean by looking glum about it? She was stunningly +good, and all that. She had done no end of good with clubs and +mothers' meetings at her married home; and it was no end of a pity +she was not in Compton parish, instead of under poor wretched old +Fuller, whom you could not stir--no, not if you tied a firebrand to +his tail. + + + + +CHAPTER XIII +Withered Leaves and Fresh Buds + + +Lady Rosamond and Joanna Bowater could not fail to be good friends; +Herbert was a great bond of union, and so was Mrs. Poynsett. +Rosamond found it hard to recover from the rejection of her scheme +of the wheeled-chair, and begged Jenny to become its advocate; but +Mrs. Poynsett listened with a smile of the unpromising kind--"You +too, Jenny?" + +"Why not, dear Mrs. Poynsett? How nice it would be to see you in +your own corner again!" + +"I don't think my own corner remains." + +"Oh! but it could be restored at once." + +"Do you think so? No, no, Jenny my dear; cracked china is better +left on the shelf out of the way, even if it could bear the move, +which it can't." + +Then Jenny understood, and advised Rosamond to bide her time, and +wait till the session of parliament, when the house would be +quieter; and Rosamond nodded and held her peace. + +The only person who held aloof was Cecil, who would not rise to the +bait when Raymond tried to exhibit Miss Bowater as a superior +intellectual woman. + +Unluckily, too, Jenny observed one evening at the five o'clock tea, +"I hear that Mrs. Duncombe has picked up some very funny people--a +lady lecturer, who is coming to set us all to rights." + +"A wonderful pair, I hear!" said Frank. "Mrs. Clio Tallboys, she +calls herself, and a poor little husband, whom she carries about to +show the superiority of her sex." + +"A Cambridge professor and a great political economist!" observed +Cecil, in a low but indignant voice. + +"The Yankee Cambridge!" quoth Frank. + +"The American Cambridge is a distinguished university," returned +Cecil. + +"Cecil is right, Master Frank," laughed his mother; "Cam and Isis +are not the only streams of learning in the world." + +"I never heard of him," said Jenny; "he is a mere satellite to the +great luminary." + +"They are worth seeing," added Frank; "she is one of those regular +American beauties one would pay to get a sight of." + +"Where did you get all this information?" asked Cecil. + +"From Duncombe himself. They met on the Righi; and nothing is more +comical than to near him describe the ladies' fraternization over +female doctors and lawyers, till they rushed into each other's arms, +and the Clio promised to come down on a crusade and convert you +all." + +"There are two ways of telling a story," said Cecil. + +"No wonder the gentlemen quake!" said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"I don't," said Frank, boyishly. + +"Because you've no wife to take you in hand," retorted Jenny. + +"For my part," said Mrs. Poynsett, "I can't see what women want. I +have always had as many rights as I could exercise." + +"Ah! but we are not all ladies of the manor," said Jenny, "nor do we +all drive coaches." + +"I observe," said Cecil, with dignity, "that there is supposed to be +a license to laugh at Mrs. Duncombe and whatever she does." + +"She would do better to mind her children," said Frank. + +"Children! Has she children?" broke in Anne and Rosamond, both at +once. + +"Didn't you know it?" said Jenny. + +"No, indeed! I didn't think her the sort of woman," said Rosamond. +"What does she do with them?" + +"Drops them in the gutter," said Frank. "Literally, as I came home, +I heard a squeak, and found a child flat in a little watercourse. I +picked it out, and the elder one told me it was Ducky Duncombe, or +some such word. Its little boots had holes in them, mother; its +legs were purple, and there was a fine smart foreign woman flirting +round the corner with young Hornblower." + +"Boys with long red hair, and Highland dresses?" exclaimed Rosamond. +"Yes, the same we saw with Miss Vivian!" + +"Exactly!" said Frank, eagerly. "She is quite a mother to those +poor little wretches; they watch for her at the Sirenwood gate, and +she walks with them. The boy's cry was not for mother or nurse, but +for Lena!" + +"Pray, did she come at his call?" + +"No; but when I carried the brat home, poor Duncombe told me almost +with tears, how good she is to them. I fancy he feels their +mother's neglect of them." + +"I'm sure I gave her credit for having none," said Rosamond. + +"Ah!" said Jenny, "you should have heard her condolences with my +sister Mary on her last infliction. Fancy Mary's face!" + +"No doubt it was to stem a torrent of nursery discussions," said +Cecil. "Such bad taste!" + +"Which?" murmured Rosamond under her breath, with an arched eyebrow. + +"Plain enough," said Frank: "if a woman is a woman, the bad taste +is to be ashamed of it." + +"Yes," said Cecil, "that is the way with men; they would fain keep +us down to the level of the nursery." + +"I thought nurseries were usually at the top of the house." + +"Perhaps," said Mrs. Poynsett, disregarding this mischievous +suggestion, "they mean that organization, like charity, should begin +at home." + +"You say that meaningly," said Rosamond. "I have heard very odd +stories of domestic affairs at Aucuba Villa, and that she can't get +a servant to stay there." + +"That man, Alexander, has always been there," said Frank. + +"Yes; but he has occasionally to do all the work of the house. Yes, +I can't help it, Cecil, Susan will regale me with cook-stories +sometimes; and I have heard of the whole establishment turning out +on being required to eat funguses." + +"I shall beware of dining there!" said Rosamond. + +"Don't they dine here to-morrow?" asked Frank. + +"No, they are engaged to the Moys," said Cecil. + +"But the Vivians come?" + +"Oh yes." + +Every one knew that already; but Frank could not help having it +repeated. It was a mere formal necessity to ask them, and had been +accepted as such; but there was some amazement when Cecil brought +home Lady Tyrrell and Miss Vivian to lunch and spend the afternoon. +It might be intended as one of her demonstrations; for though it was +understood that any of the inmates were free to bring home friends +to luncheon, it was not done--except with a casual gentleman-- +without notice to the mistress of the house. Cecil, however, +comported herself entirely as in that position, explaining that Lady +Tyrrell was come to give her advice upon an intended fernery, and +would perform her toilette here, so as to have plenty of time. +Frank, little knowing what was passing, was working the whole day at +his tutor's for the closely imminent examination; Julius and Raymond +were gravely polite; Eleonora very silent; and as soon as the meal +was over, Rosamond declared that she should not come out to stand +planning in the cold; and though Herbert would have liked nothing +better in that company, his Rector carried him off to arrange an +Advent service in a distant hamlet; Anne's horse came to the door; +and only Joanna remained to accompany the gardening party, except +that Raymond came out with them to mark the limits of permissible +alteration. + +"How unchanged!" exclaimed Lady Tyrrell. "Time stands still here; +only where is the grand old magnolia? How sweet it used to be!" + +"Killed by the frost," said Raymond, shortly, not choosing to +undergo a course of reminiscences, and chafing his wife by his +repressive manner towards her guest. When he had pointed out the +bed of Americans that were to be her boundary, he excused himself as +having letters to finish; and as he went away Cecil gave vent to her +distaste to the old shrubs and borders, now, of course, at their +worst--the azaleas mere dead branches, the roses with a few yellow +night-capped buds still lingering, and fuchsias with a scanty bell +or two. + +Jenny fought for their spring beauty, all the more because Lady +Tyrrell was encouraging the wife to criticize the very things she +had tried to sentimentalize over with the husband; but seeing that +she was only doing harm, she proposed a brisk walk to Eleonora, who +gladly assented, though her sister made a protest about damp, and +her being a bad walker. The last things they heard was Cecil's +sigh, "It is all so shut in, wherever there is level ground, that +the bazaar would be impossible." + +"I should hope so!" muttered Jenny. + +"What do you mean to do about this bazaar?" asked Eleonora, as they +sped away. + +"I don't know. Those things so often go off in smoke, that I don't +make up my mind till they become imminent." + +"I am afraid this will go on," said Eleonora. "Camilla means it and +she always carries out her plans; I wish I saw the right line." + +"About that?" + +"About everything. It seems to me that there never was any one so +cut off from help and advice as I am;" then, as Joanna made some +mute sign of sympathy, "I knew you would understand; I have been +longing to be with you, for there has been no one to whom I could +speak freely since I left Rockpier." + +"And I have been longing to have you. Mamma would have asked you to +stay with us before, only we had the house full. Can't you come +now?" + +"You will see that I shall not be allowed. It is of no use to think +about it!" said the girl, with a sigh. "Here, let us get out of +this broad path, or she may yet come after us--persuade Mrs. +Charnock Poynsett it is too cold to stand about--anything to break +up a tete-a-tete." + +Jenny saw she really was in absolute fear of pursuit; but hardly yet +understood the nervous haste to turn into a not very inviting side- +path, veiled by the trees, whose wet leaves were falling. + +"Do you mind the damp?" asked the girl, anxiously. + +"No, not at all; but--" + +"You don't know what it is never to feel free, but be like a French +girl, always watched--at least whenever I am with any one I care to +speak to." + +"Are you quite sure it is not imagination?" + +"O, Joanna, don't be like all the rest, blinded by her! You knew +her always!" + +"Only from below. I am four years younger; you know dear Emily was +my contemporary." + +"Dear Emily! I miss her more now than even at Rockpier. But you, +who were her friend, and knew Camilla of old, I know you can help me +as no one else can." + +Jenny returned a caress; and Eleonora spoke on. "You know I was +only eight years old when Camilla married, and I had scarcely seen +her till she came to us at Rockpier, on Lord Tyrrell's death, and +then she was most delightful. I thought her like mother and sister +both in one, even more tender than dear Emily. How could I have +thought so for a moment? But she enchanted everybody. Clergy, +ladies, and all came under the spell; and I can't get advice from +any of them--even from Miss Coles--you remember her?" + +"Your governess? How nice she was!" + +"Emily and I owed everything to her! She was as near being a mother +to us as any one could be; and Camilla could not say enough of +gratitude, or show esteem enough, and fascinated her like all the +rest of us; but she never rested till she had got her off to a +situation in Russia. I did not perceive the game at the time, but I +see now how all the proposals for situations within reach of me were +quashed." + +"But you write to her?" + +"Yes; but as soon as I showed any of my troubles she reproved me for +self-will and wanting to judge for myself, and not submit to my +sister. That's the way with all at Rockpier. Camilla has gone +about pitying me to them for having to give way to my married +sister, but saying it was quite time that she took charge of us; and +on that notion they all wrote to me. Then she persuaded papa to go +abroad; and I was delighted, little thinking she never meant me to +go back again." + +"Did she not?" + +"Listen! I've heard her praise Rockpier and its church to the skies +to one person--say Mr. Bindon. To another, such as our own Vicar, +she says it was much too ultra, and she likes moderation; she tells +your father that she wants to see papa among his old friends; and to +Mrs. Duncombe, I've heard her go as near the truth as is possible to +her, and call it a wearisome place, with an atmosphere of incense, +curates, and old maids, from whom she had carried me off before I +grew fit for nothing else!" + +"I dare say all these are true in turn, or seem so to her, or she +would not say them before you." + +"She has left off trying to gloss it over with me, except so far as +it is part of her nature. She did at first, but she knows it is of +no use now." + +"Really, Lenore, you must be going too far." + +"I have shocked you; but you can't conceive what it is to live with +perpetual falsity. No, I can't use any other word. I am always +mistrusting and being angered, and my senses of right and wrong get +so confused, that it is like groping in a maze." Her eyes were full +of tears, but she exclaimed, "Tell me, Joanna, was there ever +anything between Camilla and Mr. Poynsett?" + +"Why bring that up again now?" + +"Why did it go off?" insisted Lenore. + +"Because Mrs. Poynsett could not give up and turn into a dowager, as +if she were not the mistress herself." + +"Was that all?" + +"So it was said." + +"I want to get to the bottom of it. It was not because Lord Tyrrell +came in the way." + +"I am afraid they thought so here." + +"Then," said Eleonora, in a hard, dry way, "I know the reason of our +being brought back here, and of a good deal besides." + +"My dear Lena, I am very sorry for you; but I think you had better +keep this out of your mind, or you will fall into a hard, bitter, +suspicious mood." + +"That is the very thing. I am in a hard, bitter, suspicious mood, +and I can't see how to keep out of it; I don't know when opposition +is right and firm, and when it is only my own self-will." + +"Would it not be a good thing to talk to Julius Charnock? You would +not be betraying anything." + +"No! I can't seem to make up to the good clergyman! Certainly not. +Besides, I've heard Camilla talking to his wife!" + +"Talking?" + +"Admiring that dress, which she had been sneering at to your mother, +don't you remember? It was one of her honey-cups with venom below-- +only happily, Lady Rosamond saw through the flattery. I'm ashamed +whenever I see her!" + +"I don't think that need cut you off from Julius." + +"Tell me _truly_," again broke in Lenore, "what Mrs. Poynsett really +is. She is a standing proverb with us for tyranny over her sons; +not with Camilla alone, but with papa." + +"See how they love her!" cried Jenny, hotly. + +"Camilla thinks that abject; but I can't forget how Frank talked of +her in those happy Rockpier days." + +"When you first knew him?" said Jenny. + +They must have come at length to the real point, for Eleonora began +at once--"Yes; he was with his sick friend, and we were so happy; +and now he is being shamefully used, and I don't know what to do!" + +"Indeed, Lenore," said Jenny, in her downright way, "I do not +understand. You do not seem to care for him." + +"Of course I am wrong," said the poor girl; "but I hoped I was doing +the best thing for him." Then, as Jenny made an indignant sound, +"See, Jenny, when he came to Rockpier, Camilla had been a widow +about three months. She never had been very sad, for Lord Tyrrell +had been quite imbecile for a year, poor man! And when Frank came, +she could not make enough of him; and he and I both thought the two +families had been devotedly fond of each other, and that she was +only too glad to meet one of them." + +"I suppose that was true." + +"So do I, as things stood then. She meant Frank to be a sort of +connecting link, against the time when she could come back here; but +we, poor children, never thought of that, and went on together, not +exactly saying anything, but quite understanding how much we cared. +Indeed, I know Camilla impressed on him that, for his mother's sake, +it must go no farther then, while he was still so young; and next +came our journey on the Continent, ending in our coming back here +last July." + +Jenny remembered that Raymond's engagement had not been made known +till August, and Frank had only returned from a grouse-shooting +holiday a week or two before the arrival of the brides. + +"Now," added Eleonora, "Camilla has made me understand that nothing +will induce her to let papa consent; and though I know he would, if +he were left to himself, I also see how all this family must hate +and loathe the connection." + +"May I ask, has Frank ever spoken?" + +"Oh no! I think he implied it all to Camilla when she bade him wait +till our return, fancying, I suppose, that one could forget the +other." + +"But why does she seem so friendly with him?" + +"It is her way; she can't be other than smooth and caressing, and +likes to have young men about; and I try to be grave and distant, +because--the sooner he is cured of me the better for him," she +uttered, with a sob; "but when he is there, and I see those grieved +eyes of his, I can't keep it up! And papa does like him! Oh! if +Camilla would but leave us alone! See here, Jenny!" and she showed, +on her watch-chain, a bit of ruddy polished pebble. "Is it wrong to +keep this? He and I found the stone in two halves, on the beach, +the last day we were together, and had them set, pretending to one +another it was only play. Sometimes I think I ought to send mine +back; I know he has his, he let me see it one day. Do you think I +ought to give it up?" + +"Why should you?" + +"Because then he would know that it must be all over." + +"But _is_ it all over? Within, I mean?" + +"Jenny, you know better!" + +"Then, Lenore, if so, and it is only your sister who objects, not +your father himself, ought you to torment poor Frank by acting +indifference when you do not feel it?" + +"Am I untrue? I never thought of that. I thought I should be +sacrificing myself for his good!" + +"His good? O, Lenore, I believe it is the worst wrong a woman can +do a man, to let him think he has wasted his heart upon her, and +that she is trifling with him. You don't know what a bad effect +this is having, even on his prospects. He cannot get his brain or +spirits free to work for his examination." + +"How hard it is to know what is right! Here have I been thinking +that what made me so miserable must be the best for him, and would +it not make it all the worse to relax, and let him see?" + +"I do not think so," returned Jenny. "His spirits would not be worn +by doubt of _you_--the worst doubt of all: and he would feel that +he had something to strive for." + +Eleonora walked on for some steps in silence, then exclaimed, "Yes, +but there's his family. It would only stir up trouble for them +there. They can't approve of me." + +"They don't know you. When they do, they will. Now they only see +what looks like--forgive me, Lena--caprice and coquetry; they will +know you in earnest, if you will let them." + +"You don't mean that they know anything about it!" exclaimed +Eleonora. + +Jenny almost laughed. "Not know where poor Frank's heart is? You +don't guess how those sons live with their mother!" + +"I suppose I have forgotten what sincerity and openness are," said +Eleonora, sadly. "But is not she very much vexed?" + +"She was vexed to find it had gone so deep with him," said Jenny; +"but I know that you can earn her affection and trust by being +staunch and true yourself--and it is worth having, Lena!" + +For Jenny knew Eleonora of old, through Emily's letters, and had no +doubt of her rectitude, constancy, and deep principle, though she +was at the present time petrified by constant antagonism to such +untruthfulness as, where it cannot corrupt, almost always hardens +those who come in contact with it. And this cruel idea of self- +sacrifice was, no doubt, completing the indurating process. + +Jenny knew the terrible responsibility of giving such advice. She +had not done it lightly. She had been feeling for years past that +"'Tis better to have loved and lost, than never to have loved at +all;" and she knew that uncertainty of the right to love and trust +would have been a pang beyond all she had suffered. To give poor +Eleonora, situated as she now was, admission to the free wholesome +atmosphere of the Charnock family, was to her kind heart +irresistible; and it was pleasant to feel the poor girl clinging to +her, as people do to those who have given the very counsel the heart +craved for. + +It was twilight when the walk was over, and the drawing-room was +empty; but Anne came to invite them to Mrs. Poynsett's tea, saying +that Cecil had Lady Tyrrell in her own sitting-room. Perhaps Mrs. +Poynsett had not realized who was Jenny's companion, for she seemed +startled at their entrance; and Jenny said, "You remember Lenore +Vivian?" + +"I must have seen you as a child," said Mrs. Poynsett, courteously. +"You are very like your sister." + +This, though usually a great compliment, disappointed Eleonora, as +she answered, rather frigidly, "So people say." + +"Have you walked far?" + +"To the Outwood Lodge." + +"To-day? Was it not very damp in the woods?" + +"Oh no, delightful!" + +"Lena and I are old friends," said Jenny; "too glad to meet to heed +the damp." + +Here Raymond entered, with the air of a man who had just locked up a +heavy post-bag at the last possible moment; and he too was amazed, +though he covered it by asking why the party was so small. + +"Rosamond has gone to meet her husband, and Cecil has her guest in +her own domains." + +Then Jenny asked after his day's work--a county matter, interesting +to all the magistracy, and their womankind in their degree; and +Eleonora listened in silence, watching with quiet heedfulness +Frank's mother and brother. + +When Frank himself came in, his face was a perfect study; and the +colour mantled in her cheeks, so that Jenny trusted that both were +touched by the wonderful beauty that a little softness and timidity +brought out on the features, usually so resolutely on guard. But +when, in the later evening, Jenny crept in to her old friend, hoping +to find that the impression had been favourable, she only heard, +"Exactly like her sister, who always had the making of a fine +countenance." + +"The mask--yes, but Lena has the spirit behind the mask. Poor girl! +she is not at all happy in the atmosphere her sister has brought +home." + +"Then I wish they would marry her!" + +"Won't you believe how truly nice and good she is?" + +"That will not make up for the connection. My heart sank, Jenny, +from the time I heard that those Vivians were coming back. I kept +Frank away as long as I could--but there's no help for it. It seems +the fate of my boys to be the prey of those sirens." + +"Well, then, dear Mrs. Poynsett, do pray believe, on my word, that +Eleonora is a different creature!" + +"Is there no hope of averting it? I thought Camilla would--poor +Frank is such insignificant game!" + +"And when it does come, don't be set against her, please, dear Mrs. +Poynsett. Be as kind to her--as you were to me," whispered Jenny, +nestling up, and hiding her face. + +"My dear, but I knew you! You were no such case." + +"Except that you all were horribly vexed with us, because we +couldn't help liking each other," said Jenny. + +"Ah! my poor child! I only wish you could have liked any one else!" + +"Do you?" said Jenny, looking up. "Oh no, you don't! You would not +have me for your supplementary child, if I had," she added +playfully; then very low--"It is because the thought of dear Archie, +even ending as it did, is my very heart's joy, that I want you to +let them have theirs!" + +And then came a break, which ended the pleading; and Jenny was +obliged to leave Compton without much notion as to the effect of her +advice, audacious as she knew it to have been. + + + + +CHAPTER XIV +Neither Land Nor Water + + +A light that never was on sea or land.--WORDSWORTH + +Nothing could be prettier than Rosamond's happiness in welcoming her +school-boy brothers, and her gratitude to Mrs. Poynsett for inviting +them, declaring that she liked boys. Her sons, however, dreaded the +inroad of two wild Irish lads, and held council what covers and what +horses could most safely be victimized to them, disregarding all +testimony in their favour from interested parties. When, therefore, +Terence and Thomas de Lancey made their appearance, and were walked +in for exhibition by their proud and happy sister, there was some +surprise at the sight of two peculiarly refined, quiet boys, with +colourless complexions, soft, sleepy, long-lashed, liquid brown +eyes, the lowest of full voices, and the gentlest of manners, as if +nothing short of an explosion could rouse them. + +And it was presently manifest that their sister had said rather too +little than too much of Terry's abilities. Not only had he brought +home a huge pile of prizes, but no sooner was the seance after +dinner broken up, than he detained Julius, saying, in a very meek +and modest tone, "Rose says you know all the books in the library." + +"Rose undertakes a great deal for me. What is this the prelude to?" + +"I wanted to ask if I might just look at any book about the physical +geography of Italy, or the History of Venice, or the Phoenicians." + +"Why, Terry?" + +"It is for the Prize Essay," explained the boy; "the subject is the +effect of the physical configuration of a country upon the character +of a nation." + +Julius drew a long breath, astounded at the march of intellect since +his time. "They don't expect such things of fellows like you!" he +said. + +"Only of the sixth, but the fifth may go in for it, and I want to +get up to the Doctor himself; I thought, as I was coming to such a +jolly library, I might try; and if I do pretty well, I shall be put +up, if any more fellows leave. Do you think I may use the books? +I'm librarian, so I know how to take care of them." + +"You can be trusted for that, you book-worm," said Julius; "here's +the library, but I fear I don't know much about those modern +histories. My mother is a great reader, and will direct us. Let us +come to her." + +Quiet as Terry was, he was neither awkward nor shy; and when Julius +had explained his wishes, and Mrs. Poynsett had asked a few good- +natured questions, she was charmed as well as surprised at the +gentle yet eager modesty with which the low-pitched tones detailed +the ideas already garnered up, and inquired for authorities, in +which to trace them out, without the least notion of the remarkable +powers he was evincing. She was delighted with the boy; Julius +guided his researches; and he went off to bed as happy as a king, +with his hands full of little dark tarnished French duodecimos, and +with a ravenous appetite for the pasture ground he saw before him. +Lower Canada had taught him French, and the stores he found were +revelry to him. + +Cecil's feelings may be better guessed than described when the +return of Mudie's box was hastened that he might have Motley's Dutch +Republic. She thought this studiousness mere affectation; but it +was indisputable that Terry's soul was in books, and that he never +was so happy as when turned loose into the library, dipping here and +there, or with an elbow planted on either side of a folio. + +Offers of gun or horse merely tormented him, and only his sister +could drag him out by specious pleas of need, to help in those +Christmas works, where she had much better assistance in Anne and +the curates--the one for clubs and coals, the other for decorations. + +Mrs. Poynsett was Terry's best friend. He used to come to her in +the evening and discuss what he had been reading till she was almost +as keen about his success as Frank's. He talked over his ambition, +of getting a scholarship, becoming a fellow, and living for ever +among the books, for which the scanty supply in his wandering +boyhood had but whetted his fervour. He even confided to her what +no one else knew but his sister Aileen, his epic in twenty-four +books on Brian Boromhe and the Battle of Clontarf; and she was +mother enough not to predict its inevitable fate, nor audibly to +detect the unconscious plagiarisms, but to be a better listener than +even Aileen, who never could be withheld from unfeeling laughter at +the touching fate of the wounded warriors who were tied to stakes +that they might die fighting. + +Tom was a more ordinary youth, even more lazy and quiet in the +house, though out of it he amazed Frank and Charlie by his dash, +fire, and daring, and witched all the stable-world with noble +horsemanship. Hunting was prevented, however, by a frost, which +filled every one with excitement as to the practicability of +skating. + +The most available water was a lake between Sirenwood and Compton; +and here, like eagles to the slaughter, gathered, by a sort of +instinct, the entire skating population of the neighbourhood on the +first day that the ice was hard enough. Rosamond was there, of +course, with both her brothers, whom she averred, by a bold figure +of speech, to have skated in Canada before they could walk. Anne +was there, studying the new phenomena of ice and snow under good- +natured Charlie's protection, learning the art with unexpected +courage and dexterity. Cecil was there but not shining so much, for +her father had been always so nervous about his darling venturing on +the ice, that she had no skill in the art; and as Raymond had been +summoned to some political meeting, she had no special squire, as +her young brother-in-law eluded the being enlisted in her service; +and she began to decide that skating was irrational and unwomanly; +although Lady Tyrrell had just arrived, and was having her skates +put on; and Eleonora was only holding back because she was taking +care of the two purple-legged, purple-faced, and purple-haired +little Duncombes, whom she kept sliding in a corner, where they +could hardly damage themselves or the ice. + +Cecil had just thanked Colonel Ross for pushing her in a chair, and +on his leaving her was deliberating whether to walk home with her +dignity, or watch for some other cavalier, when the drag drew up on +the road close by, and from it came Captain and Mrs. Duncombe, with +two strangers, who were introduced to her as 'Mrs. Tallboys and the +Professor, just fetched from the station.' + +The former was exquisitely dressed in blue velvet and sealskin, and +had the transparent complexion and delicate features of an American, +with brilliant eyes, and a look of much cleverness; her husband, +small, sallow, and dark, and apparently out of health. "Are you +leaving off skating, Cecil?" asked Mrs. Duncombe; "goodness me, I +could go on into next year! But if you are wasting your privileges, +bestow them on Mrs. Tallboys, for pity's sake. We came in hopes +some good creature had a spare pair of skates. Gussie Moy offered, +but hers were yards too long." + +"I hope mine are not too small," said Cecil, not quite crediting +that an American foot could be as small as that of a Charnock; but +she found herself mistaken, they were a perfect fit; and as they +were tried, there came a loud laugh, and she saw a tall girl +standing by her, whom, in her round felt hat and thick rough coat +with metal buttons, she had really taken for one of the Captain's +male friends. + +"I wouldn't have such small feet," she said; "I shouldn't feel +secure of my understanding." + +"Mrs. Tallboys would not change with you, Gussie," said Captain +Duncombe. "I'd back her any day--" + +"What odds will you take, Captain--" + +But Mrs. Duncombe broke in. "Bless me, if there aren't those little +dogs of mine! Lena Vivian does spoil them. Send them home, for +pity's sake, Bob." + +"Poor little kids, they are doing no harm." + +"We shall have them tumbling in, and no end of a row! I can't stand +a swarm of children after me, and they are making a perfect victim +of Lena. Send them home, Bob, or I shall have to do it." + +The Captain obeyed somewhat ruefully. "Come, my lads, Bessie says +you must go home, and leave Miss Vivian in peace." + +"O, Bob, please let us stay; Lena is taking care of us--" + +"Indeed I like nothing so well," protested Lenore; but the Captain +murmured something about higher powers, and cheerfully saying he +would give the boys a run, took each by an unwilling hand, and raced +them into a state of frightened jollity by a short cut, by which he +was able to dispose of them in the drag. + +The Professor, meanwhile, devoted himself to Mrs. Charnock Poynsett, +took her chair for a whirl on the ice; described American sleighing +parties; talked of his tour in Europe. He was really a clever, +observant man, and Cecil had not had any one to talk Italy to her +for a long time past, and responded with all her full precision. +The Professor might speak a little through his nose, but she had +seldom met any one more polite and accomplished. + +Meantime, a quadrille was being got up. Such a performance and such +partners had never been seen in light that shone on water or on +land, being coupled by their dexterity in the art. They were led +off by Mrs. Duncombe and the Reverend James Bindon. Mrs. Tallboys +paired with Terry De Lancey, Lady Tyrrell with Herbert Bowater, Lady +Rosamond with one of the officers. Tom was pounced on by the great +'Gussy Moy,' who declared, to his bitter wrath, that she preferred +little boys, turning her back on Mr. Strangeways and two or three +more officers, as she saw them first solicitous to engage Eleonora +Vivian--who, however, was to skate with Charlie. + +A few wistful glances were cast towards the Wil'sbro' road, for +Frank had been obliged by the cruel exigencies of the office to +devote this magnificent frosty day to the last agonies of cram. +This, however, had gone on better for the last fortnight--owing, +perhaps, to some relaxation of Eleonora's stern guard over her +countenance in their few meetings since Jenny's departure. + +"And after all," as Charlie said, with the cheeriness of one who has +passed his own ordeal, "a man who had taken such a degree as Frank +could not depend on a few weeks of mere cramming." + +Frank did come speedily up the road just as the quadrille was in +full force; and perhaps the hindrance had stood him in good stead; +for when the performance ceased in the twilight, and voices were +eagerly talking of renewing it as a fackel-tanz in the later +evening, and only yielding at the recollection of dinner +engagements, it was not Charlie who was taking off Eleonora's +skates; and when, after fixing grand plans for the morrow, Lady +Tyrrell mounted her pony-carriage and looked for her sister, she +heard that Miss Vivian was walking home. + +Yes, Miss Vivian was walking home; and there was a companion by her +side feeling as if that dark, hard gravelled road were the pebbly +beach of Rockpier. + +"When do you go to London?" she asked. + +"To-morrow afternoon. Wish me well through, Lenore." + +"Indeed I do." + +"Say it again, Lenore! Give me the elixir that will give me power +to conquer everything." + +"Don't say such exaggerated things." + +"Do you think it is possible to me to exaggerate what a word from +you is to me?" said Frank, in a low voice of intense feeling. + +"O Frank! it is wiser not to say such things." + +"Wise! what is that to me? It is true, and you have known it--and +why will you not allow that you do, as in those happy old days--" + +"That's what makes me fear. It would be so much better for you if +all this had never begun." + +"It has begun, then!" murmured Frank, with joy and triumph in the +sound. "As long as you allow that, it is enough for me." + +"I must! It is true; and truth must be somewhere!" was whispered in +a strange, low, resolute whisper. + +"True! true that you can feel one particle of the intensity--Oh! +what words can I find to make you understand the glow and tenderness +the very thought of you has been!" + +"Hush, hush!--pray, Frank. Now, if I do own it--" + +"It--what? Let me hear! I'm very stupid, you know!" said Frank, in +a voice of exulting comprehension, belying his alleged stupidity. + +"What you have been to me--" + +"Have been--eh?" said this cruel cross-examiner. + +"Do not let us waste time," said Eleonora, in a trembling voice; +"you know very well." + +"Do I?" + +"Now, Frank!" + +"If you only knew what it would be worth to me to hear you say it!" + +"I'm afraid it would be only worth pain and grief to you, and anger +from every one," said she, in a low dejected voice, "far more than I +am worth." + +"You? Trust me to judge of that, Lenore. Would not you be worth +all, and more than all, that flesh or spirit could feel! I could +face it all for one look from you!" said Frank, with fervour from +his heart of hearts. + +"You make me more and more afraid. It is all too wretched to lead +any one into. Since I knew the whole truth, I have tried to spare +you from it." + +"That is why you have been so cold, and held so cruelly aloof all +this time, so that if I had not caught one ray now and then, you +would have broken my heart, Lenore; as it is, I've been wretched +beyond description, hardly able to sleep by night or speak +rationally by day. How had you the heart to serve me so, like a +stony Greek statue?" + +"I thought it must be right. It seemed to break my own heart too." + +"That's the woman's way of showing a thing is right; but why I can't +see. If you did hate me, it might be all very well to throw me +over; but if not, why torture two as well as one? Are you afraid of +my people? I'll manage them." + +"You little know--" + +"Know what?" + +"All that made it cruel in Camilla to throw us together." + +"Cruel! when it was the crowning joy of my past life, and is to be +the crowning joy of the future?" + +"How can it? Frank, you must know the causes your mother has for +abhorring any connection with our unhappy family." + +"My mother has too much sense to think a little extravagance among +the men of a family can affect the daughters. I know the outer +world is afraid of her, but she is the tenderest and most indulgent +of mothers to us. No fear of her!" + +"Ah! but that's not all." + +"You mean that she has not taken much to your sister. I know; and +I'm very sorry; but bring them together, and it would soon be got +over. Besides, it is not your sister, but you. What do you mean?" +rather disconcerted. + +"Then you really did not know of the old engagement between Camilla +and your eldest brother?" + +"Oh, oh! So she consented once! Then she will do so again." + +"Listen! Camilla broke it off because your mother could not resign +her position to her." + +He gave a whistle of dismay, then recovering himself with a laugh, +said, "Fourth sons don't have such expectations founded on them. +Don't fear, dearest; that can't be all the story, though no doubt it +was part of it. My mother would rather go into a hermitage than +stand in the way of Raymond's happiness. Some one must have made +mischief." + +"It was not all," said the girl; "it was Lord Tyrrell's coming in +the way. Yes, my father told me so; he held it up to me as an +example of what one ought to do for one's family." + +"Then she was coerced?" + +"I don't know; but such a marriage for me, with some one who would +redeem the property, is their scheme for me. Even if your mother +and brother could tolerate the thought of one of us, my poor dear +father will never dare to consent as long as she is with him." + +"Nay, Lenore; have I not often heard her say she prefers happiness +to ambition? Whatever she may have done, she has come to think +differently. She has well-nigh told me so." + +"Yes, at Rockpier," sighed Eleonora. "Hark!" The sound of the +ponies' bells and hoofs was heard; Lenore put her hand on his arm, +and drew him aside on the grass, behind a clump of trees, hushing +him by a silent pressure as he tried to remonstrate. He clasped her +hand, and felt her trembling till the tinkling and tramp were gone +by. + +"You frightened darling!" were his first words, when she let him +speak. "Who would have thought you would be so shy? But we'll have +it out, and--" + +"It is not that," interrupted Lenore, "not maidenly shyness. That's +for girls who are happy and secure. No; but I don't want to have it +all overthrown at once--the first sweetness--" + +"It can't be overthrown!" he said, holding arm and hand in the +intense grasp. + +"Not really, never; but there is no use in attempting anything till +I am of age--next autumn, the 7th of November." + +"Say nothing till then!" exclaimed Frank, in some consternation. + +"We are only where we were before! We are sure of each other now. +It will be only vexation and harass," said she, with the instinct of +a persecuted creature. + +"I couldn't," said Frank. "I could not keep it in with mother! It +would not be right if I could, nor should I feel as if I were acting +fairly by your father." + +"You are right, Frank. Forgive me! You don't know what it is to +have to be always saving one's truth only by silence. Speak when +you think right." + +"And I believe we shall find it far easier than you think. I'm not +quite a beggar--except for you, my Lena. I should like to go home +this minute, and tell mother and Charlie and Rose, that I'm--I'm +treading on air; but I should only be fallen upon for thinking of +anything but my task-work. So I'll take a leaf out of your book, +you cautious Lenore, and wait till I come down victorious, happy and +glorious--and I shall now. I feel as if you had given me power to +scale Olympus, now I know I may carry your heart with me. Do you +remember this, Lena?" He guided her hand to the smooth pebble on +his chain. She responded by putting her own into his. + +"My talisman!" he said. "It has been my talisman of success many a +time. I have laid my hand on it, and thought I was working for you. +Mine! mine! mine! Waters cannot quench love--never fear." + +"Hush!" as the light of the opening hall door was seen, and Lady +Tyrrell's voice was heard, saying, "I thought we passed her; I am +sure she was near." + +Eleonora withdrew her arm, patted Frank back, waved him into +silence, and went forward, saying, "Here I am, Camilla; I walked +home." + +Her voice was calm and self-contained as ever--the unassailable +dignity just as usual. The hall was full of officers, standing +about the fire and drinking tea, and Eleonora's well-worn armour was +instantly on, as her sister asked where she had been, since others +had walked home and had not overtaken her. + +"I came by the lower road," said she. + +"Indeed! I never saw you." + +"I saw you pass--or rather heard you." + +"And did not let me pick you up! Did you hide yourself?" + +"It was much warmer to walk." + +"So you seem to have found it, to judge by your cheeks," said Lady +Tyrrell. + +And Mr. Strangeways and one or two others could not restrain a +murmured exclamation on the exceeding loveliness of that deepened +colour and brightened eye; but Lenore only knew that an equally +bright and keen eye was watching her heedfully, and knew that she +was suspected, if not read through and through. + +She mingled in the discussion of the skating, with those outward +society-senses that she learnt to put on, and escaped as soon as +possible to her own room. + +Again she almost fell on the ground in her own little oratory +chamber, in a tumult of gladness that was almost agony, and fear +that was almost joy. + +She wanted to give thanks that Frank had become so wholly and +avowedly hers, and for that deep intense affection that had gone on, +unfed, uncherished, for years; but the overflow of delight was +checked with foreboding--there was the instinctive terror of a +basilisk eye gazing into her paradise of joy--the thanksgiving ran +into a half-despairing deprecation. + +And she knew that Frank was under Camilla's spell, and admired and +trusted her still; nor had she been able to utter a word of caution +to undeceive him. Should she have the power on the morrow? Camilla +really loved skating, and surrounded as she was sure to be, there +was hope of escaping her vigilant eye once more. To-morrow there +would be another meeting with Frank! perhaps another walk with him! + +That anticipation was soothing enough to bring back the power of +joyful gratitude, and therewith of hopeful prayer. + + + + +CHAPTER XV +Plot and Counterplot + + +A lady a party of pleasure made, + And she planned her scheme full well, +And day and night the party filled + The head of the demoiselle.--FABER + +Though Frank had no reason to expect that the tidings of his success +would be hailed with much satisfaction at home, yet his habit of +turning to his mother for sympathy would have been too much for his +prudence, but for the fact that Terry De Lancey had dragged into her +room a massive volume of prints from the Uffizi Gallery, and was +looking it over with her, with a zest she had not seen since the +days when her father gloried in his collection. + +His victory could only be confided to Charlie, who might laugh, but +fully appreciated the repose of mind with which he could now +encounter the examiners, and promised to do his part to cover the +meetings of the lovers the next day. But even then the chances of +another performance on the lake, or of a walk among the icicles +afterwards, were departing. Thaw was setting in and by breakfast- +time there was a down-pouring rain. Frank lingered about Cecil in +hopes of a message to serve as an excuse for a rush to Sirenwood; +but she proved to be going to drive to the working-room, and then to +lunch at Mrs. Duncombe's, to meet the Americans and the ladies from +Sirenwood, according to a note sent over in early morning at first +sight of the wet. + +Thereupon Frank found he had a last reference to make to his tutor, +and begged for a lift. A touch of warmth in Cecil would have opened +the flood-gates of his confidence, but she was exercised about a +mistake in the accounts, and claimed his aid in tracking a defective +seven-pence. When she heard him utter the monstrous statement that +a hundred and five farthings were almost nine shillings, she looked +at him with withering compassion, as sure to fail, and a small loss +to Her Majesty; nor would she listen to any of his hints that he was +very curious to see her working-room. + +His question to the tutor judiciously lasted till twelve, when he +dropped in to consult Captain Duncombe about horse-hire in London; +and that gentleman, who had been undergoing a course of political +economy all the morning, eagerly pounced on him for a tour of his +stables, which lasted till luncheon was due, and he could casually +enter the dining-room, where Lady Tyrrell held out her hand good- +naturedly to him, laughing at the blankness he could not entirely +conceal. "Only me!" she said. "It can't be helped! Poor Lenore +caught such a dreadful sore throat last night, that I have shut her +up in her room with a mustard poultice." + +"Indeed! I am very sorry." + +"You may well look horrified! You were the guilty party, I suspect. +Taking her all across the park under those dank trees!" + +He coloured up to the eyes, little expecting to be thus convicted; +but Mrs. Duncombe came to his aid. "My impartiality would impute +the damage to her standing about with those wretched little dogs of +mine." + +"It is your climate," said Mrs. Tallboys. "In our dry atmosphere +there would be no risk with a far lower temperature." + +"I hope it is nothing serious," said Frank, anxiously. + +"I hope so too," said Lady Tyrrell, looking archly into his face, +which had not learnt such impenetrability as poor Lenore's. + +"No; but really?" he said, in anxiety that would not be rallied +away. + +"This is the way," said Lady Tyrrell. "Young gentlemen persuade +young ladies to do the most imprudent things--saunter about in the +cold after skating, and dawdle under trees, and then wonder when +they catch cold.--Do they do such things in your country, Mrs. +Tallboys, and expect the mammas and elder sisters to be gratified?" + +"Mammas and elder sisters are at a discount with you, are not they?" +said Mrs. Duncombe. + +"Our young women are sufficient to protect themselves without our +showing tacit distrust, and encumbering them with guardianship," +returned the Professor. + +"Mr. Charnock wishes we had reached that point," said Lady Tyrrell. + +She had put him completely out of countenance. He had not supposed +her aware of his having been Lenore's companion, and was not certain +whether her sister had not after all confided in her, or if he +himself had not been an unconscious victim. The public banter +jarred upon him; and while Cecil was making inquiries into the +extent of the young ladies' privileges in America, he was mentally +calculating the possibilities of rushing up to Sirenwood, trying to +see Lenore in spite of her throat, and ascertaining her position, +before his train was due; but he was forced to resign the notion, +for Raymond had made an appointment for him in London which must not +be missed; and before luncheon was over the dog-cart, according to +agreement with Charlie, called for him. + +"Good-bye, Mr. Frank," said Mrs. Duncombe; "will you have an old +shoe thrown after you for luck?" + +"The time is not come for that yet," said Cecil, gravely. + +"Tending in that direction. Eh, Charnock?" said the Captain. +"Here's to your success--now, and in what's to come!" + +"Thank you, Captain," said Frank, shaking his hand, liking the +hearty voice. "Lady Tyrrell, won't you give me your good wishes?" +he asked, half diffidently. + +"For the examination--yes, certainly," she replied. "It is safer +not to look too far into your wishing-well." + +"And--and will you give my--my best regards to Le--to Miss Vivian, +and say I grieve for her cold, and trust to her--to her good wishes-- +" he uttered, quick and fast, holding her hand all the time. + +"Yes, yes," she said quickly; "but last messages won't do when +trains are due." + +"Not due yet," said Frank; "but I must go home. I've not seen my +mother to-day, and I shall not have a moment.--Good-bye, Cecil; have +you any commands for Raymond?" + +"No, thank you," said Cecil, gravely; and with a bow to the +Americans, he was gone. + +"That is one of your products of the highest English refinement?" +said Mrs. Tallboys, whom in his preoccupation he had scarcely +noticed. + +"How does he strike you?" said Cecil. "He is my brother-in-law, but +never mind that." + +"He looks fitted for the hero of a vapid English novel. I long to +force him to rough it, and to rub off that exquisite do-nothing air. +It irritates me!" + +"Frank Charnock has done a good deal of hard work, and is not to +lead the life of an idle man," said Captain Duncombe. "I know I +should not like to be in his shoes if he succeeds--grinding away in +an office ten months out of the twelve." + +"In an office! I should like to set him to work with an axe!" + +"Well, those dainty-looking curled darlings don't do badly in the +backwoods," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"Ah! I understand! You stand up for him because there's a little +tendresse for your sister," said the plain-spoken American. + +"Poor fellow! I am afraid he is far gone. It is an impossible +thing, though, and the sooner he can be cured of it the better," +said Lady Tyrrell. "I am sorry that walk took place yesterday.--Did +he mention it at home, Cecil?" + +"You are a very inconsistent woman, Lady Tyrrell," broke in Mrs. +Duncombe in her abrupt way. "Here you are come to uphold the +emancipation of woman, and yet, when we come to your own sister +taking one poor walk--" + +"I beg your pardon, Bessie," said Lady Tyrrell, with her most +courteous manner. "I never said I was come to uphold the +emancipation of woman; only to subject myself to Mrs. Tallboys' +influence--she has to make a convert of me." + +For, of course, Lady Tyrrell was only drawn into the controversy as +a matter of amusement, and possibly as something specially +distasteful to the house of Charnock Poynsett; and Cecil was a good +deal influenced by the fascination of her example, as well as by the +eagerness of Mrs. Duncombe and the charms of the Americans; and +above all, they conspired in making her feel herself important, and +assuming that she must be foremost in all that was done. She did +not controvert the doctrines of Dunstone so entirely as to embrace +the doctrines of emancipation, but she thought that free ventilation +was due to every subject, most especially when the Member's wife was +the leading lady in bringing about such discussion. The opposition +made in the town to Mrs. Duncombe's sanitary plans, and the contempt +with which they had been treated as ladies' fancies, had given a +positive field of battle, with that admixture of right and wrong on +either side which is essential to championship. And in truth Cecil +was so much more under the influence of Camilla Tyrrell and Bessie +Duncombe than under that of any other person, that she was ready to +espouse any cause that they did. + +How to arrange for the intended instruction was the difficulty, +since Wil'sbro' was without a town-hall, and, moreover, the +inhabitants were averse to all varieties of change, either as to the +claims of women, the inequality of social laws, the improvement of +education, or the comprehension of social science--the regular +course which Mrs. Clio W. Tallboys was wont to lecture. + +The matter could only be managed by arranging a series of soirees at +different houses. Mrs. Duncombe's rooms were far too small; but if +some person of more note--'some swell' as she said--would make the +beginning, there would be no difficulty in bringing others to follow +suit. + +"You must do it, Lady Tyrrell," said Mrs. Duncombe. + +"I! If there's nobody else; but it would come much better from +another quarter," nodding at Cecil. + +"Don't you wish you may get it?" muttered the slang-loving Bessie. + +"That's one point in which we leave you far behind," said Mrs. +Tallboys. "We issue our invitations quite independently of the +other members of the household. Each has a separate visiting list." + +"There need be no difficulty," said Cecil; "all matters of visiting +are in my hands. It is necessary in our position; and if Lady +Tyrrell thinks it proper that I should give the first party, I will +do so." + +"Bravo, what fun!" cried Mrs. Duncombe, clapping her hands. "You +won't get into a jolly row, though?" she added, anxiously. + +"I am perfectly sure of my ground," said Cecil, with the dignity of +one to whom a 'row' was unheard of. "It is the simple duty of a +Member to come forward in promoting free discussion of opinions." + +"You are a public-spirited woman, Cecil," said Lady Tyrrell. "When +you have made the first move, I'll follow. Then whom shall we ask +next?" + +"Mrs. Moy," said Bessie. "She is a nonentity herself, but if Gussie +were to be strongly bitten she could do more than any one else, and +make her father reform that nest of horrors in Water Lane!" + +"I'm afraid the freedom side will bite her more than the sanitary +side," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"She is capital fun, though, and a great ally of ours," said Mrs. +Duncombe; "and the rooms at Proudfoot Lawn are worth anything!" + +Other details were fixed, even to the day of Cecil's opening party, +which must take place on the first practicable day; but there was +none to be found till the Wednesday week, the day before Raymond +would return home. Cecil did not recollect this till the day had +been unanimously agreed on, and it was with a little alarm; but +after what she had asserted about her freedom of action, she could +not retract before the eyes of the American lady; and, as she said +to herself, she could receive her own ladies' party, without +interfering with any one else, in the library, so that no one had a +right to object. However, she had a certain anticipation of +opposition, which caused her to act before announcing her intention; +and thus it was that Rosamond found her dropping a number of notes +through the slit in the lid of the post-box. "Another dinner?" was +the question. + +"No, this is a soiree in the library, entirely for ladies; Mrs. +Tallboys is to explain her views in the evenings at the Principal +houses in the neighbourhood. She will begin here on Wednesday +week." + +"Why, that's before Raymond comes back!" + +"This is entirely for women." + +"Women! women's rights! How have you got Mrs. Poynsett to consent?" + +"I have carte blanche in these matters." + +"Do you mean that you have not consulted her? Does Raymond know? +Oh! Yes, I see I have no right to ask; but, Cecil, for your own +sake, I entreat you to consider what you are about, before running +into such a frightful scrape!" and Rosamond impulsively caught the +hand that was still putting in a letter; but Cecil stood still, not +withdrawing or moving a muscle, perfectly impassive. Rosamond went +on more eagerly, "Oh yes, I know you don't like me--I'm only a poor +battered soldier's daughter, quite an unworthy associate for a +Charnock of the Charnocks; but I can't help begging you to consider +the consequences of sending out invitations to hear this strange +woman hold forth in Mrs. Poynsett's own house, in your husband's +absence." + +"Thank you for your solicitude," said Cecil, dropping in her +envelope the instant the obstructive hand was removed, and going on +her way with dignified self-possession; while Rosamond, in a tumult +of indignation, which made her scarcely comprehensible, rushed up to +her husband at his writing, and poured out her story. + +Clio advocating female supremacy in Mrs. Poynsett's own house, +without notice to her! Should she be warned in time to stop the +letters? Should Raymond be written to? Rosamond was for both, +Julius for neither. He said that either way would begin a system +that could never be forgiven; and that they had better consider +themselves as practically at the Rectory, and not interfere. + +"How can you be so cold-blooded?" cried she. + +"I do not want to do worse harm. My mother will learn what is to +happen sooner or later; and then she can put a stop to it in any way +she chooses." + +"I wish she would send in Mrs. Crabtree with her tawse!" said +Rosamond. "But is it right by Raymond to let his wife bring this +Yankee muse to talk her nonsense in his very rooms?" + +"You have argued with her?" + +"Or with a block--a stock--a stone!" raved Rosamond. + +"Then depend upon it, to inform against her would be far worse than +letting any amount of absurdity be talked. I should like to know +how you would get over being so served!" + +"Don't make comparisons, sir! Poor things! they would not be the +worse for a little of our foolishness!" + +Things settled themselves according to Julius's prediction; for Mr. +Bowater, coming up with his son Herbert to see his old friend, said, +"What grand doings are you having here? What is Raymond's wife up +to? Ladies' conversazione--that's a new thing in these parts!" + +"I gave such matters up to her," said Mrs. Poynsett. "Young people +like a little freedom of action; and there are changes in the +neighbourhood since I was laid up." It was a temporizing speech, to +avoid showing her total ignorance. + +Mr. Bowater cleared his throat. "Young folk may like freedom of +action, but it don't always follow that it is good for them. I hope +she won't get Raymond into a scrape, that's all--committing him and +herself to a course of lectures by that Yankee woman on woman's +rights." + +"It does not commit him; it is before he comes home, on Wednesday," +said Herbert. + +"Never mind that; what a woman does her husband does. Look here, +Mrs. Poynsett, I brought over Jenny's note in my pocket; see, here +are two--one to accept, and one to refuse, just as you choose." + +"Oh! accept, by all means," cried Mrs. Poynsett; "don't leave the +wrong one!" + +Then she changed the conversation, so decidedly, that Mr. Bowater +could not resume his warning; but after taking leave of her, he met +Rosamond in the avenue, and could not help saying, "Pray, was my old +friend aware of Mrs. Raymond's doings?" + +"Have you told her? Oh! I am so glad!" + +"Then it is as you said, Herbert. Mrs. Raymond had left her in +ignorance! The impudent baggage! That's what the world is coming +to!" + +"But what regular game Mrs. Poynsett was!" said Herbert. "You could +not make out in the least that she had been left in the lurch; and +I'm sure she has a plan, by the way in which she desired Jenny and +Edie to come." + +"Only make her understand that the Wil'sbro' folks are in a ticklish +state," said Mr. Bowater; "they are sulking already, because they +say the ladies have been stirring him up to put them to expense +about the drains." + +"Wil'sbro' isn't sweet," said Herbert. + +"There's been nothing amiss in my time," returned his father. +"Perfectly healthy in all reason! Ay! you may laugh, young folks, +but I never heard of any receipt to hinder people from dying; and +let well alone is a safe maxim." + +"If it be well," said Rosamond. "However, Raymond says whatever is +done must be by general consent, and that small private attempts do +more harm than good." + +"He had better take care what he says. If they fancy he is in +league with that ridiculous Duncombe woman against their pockets, +Moy is on the watch to take advantage of it; and all the old family +interest will not save his seat." + +When Rosamond reached home she found Anne beside her mother-in-law, +provided with a quire of note-paper and pile of envelopes. "My +dear, I want your help," she said. "Till my accident I always had a +children's party at Christmas; and now I have so many young people +to manage it for me, I think we might try again, and combine it with +Cecil's ladies' party, on Wednesday." + +"Hurrah!" cried Rosamond. "You mean that we should have plenty of +fun--and, in fact, drum out the rights of woman." + +"At any rate, present a counter attraction. You and Charlie and +your brothers, with the Bowaters, might do something?" + +"Trust me!" cried Rosamond. "Oh! I am so thankful to Mr. Bowater. +Julius and I had our blood boiling; and I said as much or more to +Cecil than woman could, but she minded me no more than the old white +cockatoo; and Julius said our telling would only make more +mischief." + +"He was quite right," said his mother. "Let there not be one word +of opposition, you know; only swamp it. You could get up some +charades, and have something going on all the evening." + +"Trust me for that! Oh! if my darling Aileen were but here! But +Tom is the very model of an actor, and Terry is grand, if only we +can keep him out of the high tragedy line. King Lear is the mildest +thing he condescends to!" + +"Could you manage a Christmas-tree? The taking up a room beforehand +is inconvenient; but I should like to offer some little substantial +bait, even to the grown-up;" and her eyes twinkled merrily. + +"I know a better thing," said Rosamond; "an enchanted grove with a +beneficent witch. We did it at St. Awdry's, with bon-bons and +trumpery, in a little conservatory, hardly large enough to turn +round in. If I may have the key of the conservatory, I'll manage." + +"You shall have what you please; and perhaps you would kindly go and +choose the things at Backsworth. There is a very good fancy shop +there." + +"Thank you, thank you! How sweet!--Now, Anne, you will see what you +shall see!" + +"Is there to be dancing?" asked Anne, humbly yet resolutely. + +"There shall not be, my dear, if it will spoil the evening for you," +said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"I promised," said Anne. + +At that moment the servants came in with the preparations for the +afternoon tea, closely followed by the ever punctual Cecil. + +Mrs. Poynsett asked her whether she would require the barouche on +the morrow, since Rosamond and Anne would want it to go to +Backsworth, to obtain requisites for a children's entertainment to +take place on Wednesday. + +"Some friends of mine are coming on Wednesday," said Cecil + +"Indeed! In Raymond's absence?" + +"This is not a dinner, but a ladies' party." + +"Then it will combine the better." + +"Certainly not," replied Cecil. "Mine is simply intellectual--only +a few intelligent women to meet Mrs. Tallboys in the library. It +will be quite apart from any amusements Rosamond may like to have +for the children in the drawing-room." + +"Pray, will they require nothing but this feast of reason and flow +of soul?--for the housekeeper will need warning." + +"They will have dined. Nothing but coffee will be wanted." + +"For how many?" + +"About twelve or fourteen, thank you. Excuse me--I have something +to finish in my own room." + +They were very glad to excuse her, and the following note was +concocted to serve both for those she might have invited and those +she might not; and it was copied by the two daughters for all the +acquaintance who had young folks in their houses. An appearance of +want of unanimity was carefully avoided, and it stood thus:-- + +"I am desired by Mrs. Poynsett to say that the ladies' party already +proposed for the 3rd is to undergo a little expansion, and that she +much hopes to see you and ---, at 7 p.m., disposed for a few +Christmas amusements." + + + + +CHAPTER XVI +The Drive To Backsworth + + +She was betrothed to one now dead, +Or worse, who had dishonoured fled.--SCOTT + +The party set out for Backsworth early in the day. It included +Julius, who had asked for a seat in the carriage in order to be able +to go on to Rood House, where lived Dr. Easterby, whom he had not +seen since he had been at Compton. + +"The great light of the English Church," said Rosamond, gaily; while +Anne shuddered a little, for Miss Slater had told her that he was +the great fountain-head of all that distressed her in Julius and his +curates. But Julius merely said, "I am very glad of the +opportunity;" and the subject dropped in the eager discussion of the +intended pastimes, which lasted beyond the well-known Wil'sbro' +bounds, when again Julius startled a Anne by observing, "No dancing? +That is a pity." + +"There, Anne!" exclaimed Rosamond. + +"It was out of kindness to me," said Anne: and then, with a +wonderful advance of confidence, she added, "Please tell me how you, +a minister, can regret it?" + +"Because I think it would be easier to prevent mischief than when +there has to be a continual invention of something original. There +is more danger of offence and uncharitableness, to speak plainly." + +"And you think that worse than dancing?" said Anne, thoughtfully. + +"Why is dancing bad at all, Anne?" asked Rosamond. + +Anne answered at once, "It is worldly." + +"Not half so worldly as driving in a carriage with fine horses, and +liveries, and arms, and servants, and all," said Rosamond from her +comfortable corner, nestling under Miles's racoon-skin rug; "I +wonder you can do that!" + +"The carriage is not mine," said Anne. + +"The worldliness would be in sacrificing a duty to the luxury and +ostentation of keeping one," said Julius. "For instance, if I +considered it due to my lady in the corner there to come out in this +style, and put down a curate and a few such trifles with that +object. To my mind, balls stand on the same ground; they are +innocent as long as nothing right is given up for them." + +"You would not dance?" said Anne. + +"Wouldn't he?" said Rosamond. "I've seen him. It was at St. +Awdry's at a Christmas party, in our courting days. No, it wasn't +with me. Oh no! That was the cruel cut! It was with little Miss +Marks, whose father had just risen from the ranks. Such a figure +she was, enough to set your teeth on edge; when, behold! this +reverend minister extracts her from the wall-flowers, and goes +through the Lancers with her in first-rate style, I assure you. It +had such an effect, do you know, that what does my father do but go +and ask her next; and I heard an old lady remarking that there were +only two gentlemen in the room, Mr. Charnock and Lord Rathforlane. +So you see it was all worldliness after all, Anne." + +"I suppose it was good-nature," said Anne. + +"Indignation, I fancy," said Julius. + +"Now, was he very wicked for it, Anne?" + +"N--no, if dancing be not wrong." + +"But why should it?" + +"All the bad people danced in the Bible." + +"Miriam--King David, eh?" + +"That was part of their religious service." + +"The welcome to the prodigal son?" further suggested Julius. "Does +not this prove that the exercise is not sinful in itself?" + +"But you would not do it again?" repeated Anne. + +"I certainly should not make a practice of it, nor go to balls any +more than I would be a sportsman or a cricketer, because I am bound +to apply my whole self to the more direct service; but this does not +show that there is evil necessarily connected with these amusements, +or that they may not safely be enjoyed by those who have time, and +who need an outlet for their spirits, or by those who wish to guard +these pleasures by presiding over them." + +"Don't persuade me!" exclaimed Anne. "I gave my word to Mr. Pilgrim +that nothing should induce me to dance or play at cards." + +"Mr. Pilgrim had no right--" began Rosamond; but Julius hushed her, +saying, "No one wishes to persuade you, Anne. Your retirement +during Miles's absence is very suitable and becoming." + +"Till we live in the Bush, out of the way of it all," said Anne. + +"I wish you could have seen one of our real old Christmas parties; +but those can never be again, without mother herself or Mrs. +Douglas." + +"Do tell me about those Douglases," said Rosamond. "Cecil hinted at +some romance, but seemed to think you had suppressed the connection +because he was an attorney." + +"Not exactly," said Julius, smiling; "but it is a sad story, though +we have no doubt he bore the guilt of others." + +"Something about two thousand pounds!" + +"Yes. It was the year that my mother and Raymond were abroad. She +had been buying some property near, and sent home an order from +Vevay. It did not come, and was inquired for; but as it was an +order, not a draft, it was not stopped at the bank; and in about a +fortnight more it was presented by a stranger, and paid without +hesitation, as it was endorsed "Proudfoot and Moy." Old Proudfoot +was away at Harrogate, and came home to investigate; young Proudfoot +denied all knowledge of it, and so did his brother-in-law Moy; but +Raymond, working at the other end, found that the waiter at the +hotel at Vevay had forgotten to post the letter for more than a +week, and it was traced through the post to Wil'sbro', where the +postman remembered delivering a foreign-looking letter to Archie +Douglas at the door of the office. It came alone by the afternoon +post. His account was this: They were all taking it rather easy in +old Proudfoot's absence; and when a sudden summons came to take the +old farmer's instructions for his will, Archie, as the junior, was +told off to do it. He left George Proudfoot and Moy in a private +room at the office, with Tom Vivian leaning over the fire talking, +as he had a habit of doing in old Proudfoot's absence. As he opened +the office door the postman put the letter into his hand; and +recognizing the writing, he ran back, and gave it in triumph to +George Proudfoot, exclaiming that there it was at last, but he was +in danger of being late for the train, and did not wait to see it +opened; and when he came back he was told that it had been merely a +letter of inquiry, with nothing in it, and destroyed at once. That +was his account; but Proudfoot, Moy, and Vivian all denied any +knowledge of this return of his, or of the letter. The night of +this inquiry he was missing. Jenny Bowater, who was with an aunt in +London, heard that a gentleman had called to see her while she was +out for a couple of days; and a week later we saw his name among the +passengers lost in the Hippolyta off Falmouth." + +"Poor Jenny! Was she engaged to him?" + +"On sufferance. On her death-bed Mrs. Douglas had wrung from Mr. +Bowater a promise that if Archie did well, and ever had means +enough, he would not refuse consent; but he always distrusted poor +Archie, because of his father, and I believe he sent Jenny away to +be out of his reach. If any of us had only been near, I think we +could have persuaded him to face it out, and trust to his innocence; +but Raymond was abroad, Miles at sea, I at Oxford, and nothing like +a counsellor was near. If Jenny had but seen him!" + +"And has nothing happened to clear him?" + +"No. Raymond hurried home, and did his best, but all in vain. +George Proudfoot was indeed known to have been in debt to Vivian; +but Moy, his brother-in-law, an older man, was viewed as a person +whose word was above all question, and they both declared the +signature at the back of the order not to be genuine. Archie's +flight, you see, made further investigation impossible; and there +was no putting on oath, no cross-examination." + +"Then you think those three had it?" + +"We can think nothing else, knowing Archie as we did. Raymond +showed his suspicions so strongly, that old Proudfoot threw up all +agencies for our property, and there has been a kind of hostility +ever since. Poor Vivian, as you know, came to his sad end the next +year, but he had destroyed all his papers; and George Proudfoot has +been dead four or five years, but without making any sign. Moy has +almost risen above the business, and--see, there's Proudfoot Lawn, +where he lives with the old man. He claims to compete with the +county families, and would like to contest Wils'bro' with Raymond." + +"And Jenny?" asked Anne. "Did she bear it as a Christian? I know +she would." + +"She did indeed--most nobly, most patiently. Poor girl! at her own +home she knew she stood alone in her faith in Archie's innocence; +but they were kind and forbearing, and kept silence, and the +knowledge of our trust in him has bound her very close to us." + +"Was that call, when she did not see him, all she ever heard of +him?" + +"All! except that he left a fragment of paper with the servant, with +the one pencil scrawl, 'A Dieu!'--a capital D to mark the full +meaning. She once showed it to me--folded so as to fit into the +back of a locket with his photograph." + +"Dear Jenny! And had you traced him on board this ship?" + +"No, but his name was in the list; and we knew he had strong fancy +for South Africa, whither the Hippolyta was bound. In fact he ought +to have been a sailor, and only yielded to his mother's wishes." + +"We knew a Mr. Archibald Douglas once," said Anne; "he came and +outspanned by us when he was going north after elephants. He stayed +a fortnight, because his wagon had to be mended." + +"O, Julius! if we could but find him for her again!" cried Rosamond. + +"I am afraid Archibald Douglas is not much more individual a name +than John Smith," said Julius, sadly. + +"That tells as much against the Hippolyta man," said Rosamond. + +"Poor Archie would not be difficult to identify," said Julius; "for +his hair was like mine, though his eyes were blue, and not short- +sighted." + +"That is all right, then," cried Anne; "for we had a dispute whether +he were young or old, and I remember mamma saying he had a look +about him as if his hair might have turned white in a single night." + +"Julius! Now won't you believe?" cried Rosamond. + +"Had he a Scotch accent?" said Julius. + +"No; I recollect papa's telling him he never should have guessed him +to be a Scot by his tongue; and he said he must confess that he had +never seen Scotland." + +"Now, Julius!" pleaded Rosamond, with clasped hands, as if Jenny's +fate hung on his opinion. + +"How long ago was this?" asked he. + +"Four years," said Anne, with a little consideration. "He came both +in going and returning, and Alick was wild to join him if he ever +passed our way again. My father liked him so much that he was +almost ready to consent; but he never came again. Ivory hunters go +more from Natal now." + +"You will trace him! There's a dear Anne!" exclaimed Rosamond. + +"I will write to them at home; Alick knows a good many hunters, and +could put Miles into the way of making inquiries, if he touches at +Natal on his way home." + +"Miles will do all he can," said Julius; "he was almost broken- +hearted when he found how Archie had gone. I think he was even more +his hero than Raymond when we were boys, because he was more +enterprising; and my mother always thought Archie's baffled passion +for the sea reacted upon Miles." + +"He will do it! He will find him, if he is the Miles I take him +for! How old was he--Archie, I mean?" + +"A year older than Raymond; but he always seemed much younger, he +was so full of life and animation--so unguarded, poor fellow! He +used to play tricks with imitating hand-writing; and these, of +course, were brought up against him." + +"Thirty-four! Not a bit too old for the other end of the romance!" + +"Take care, Rosie. Don't say a word to Jenny till we know more. +She must not be unsettled only to be disappointed." + +"Do you think she would thank you for that, you cold-blooded +animal?" + +"I don't know; but I think the suspense would be far more trying +than the quiet resigned calm that has settled down on her. Besides, +you must remember that even if Archie were found, the mystery has +never been cleared up." + +"You don't think that would make any difference to Jenny?" + +"It makes all the difference to her father; and Jenny will never be +a disobedient daughter." + +"Oh! but it will--it must be cleared! I know it will! It is +faithless to think that injustice is not always set right!" + +"Not always here," said Julius, sadly. "See, there's the Backsworth +race-ground, the great focus of the evil." + +"Were racing debts thought to have any part in the disaster?" + +"That I can't tell; but it was those races that brought George +Proudfoot under the Vivian influence; and in the absence of all of +us, poor Archie, when left to himself after his mother's death, had +become enough mixed up in their amusements to give a handle to those +who thought him unsteady." + +"As if any one must be unsteady who goes to the races!" cried +Rosamond. "You were so liberal about balls, I did expect one little +good word for races; instead of which, you are declaring a poor +wretch who goes to them capable of embezzling two thousand pounds, +and I dare say Anne agrees with you!" + +"Now, did I ever say so, Anne?" + +"You looked at the course with pious horror, and said it justified +the suspicion!" persisted Rosamond. + +"That's better," said Julius; "though I never even said it justified +the suspicion, any more than I said that balls might not easily be +overdone, especially by _some_ people." + +"But you don't defend races?" said Anne. + +"No; I think the mischief they do is more extensive, and has less +mitigation than is the case with any other public amusement." + +"H'm!" said Rosamond. "Many a merry day have I had on the top of +the regimental drag; so perhaps there's nothing of which you would +not suspect me." + +"I'll tell you what I more than suspect you of," said Julius, "of +wearing a gay bonnet to be a bait and a sanction to crowds of young +girls, to whom the place was one of temptation, though not to you." + +"Oh, there would be no end to it if one thought of such things." + +"Or the young men who--" + +"Well," broke in Rosamond, "it was always said that our young +officers got into much less mischief than where there was a +straight-laced colonel, who didn't go along with them to give them a +tone." + +"That I quite believe. I remember, too, the intense and breathless +sense of excitement in the hush and suspense of the multitude, and +the sweeping by of the animals--" + +"Then you've been!" cried his wife. + +"As a boy, yes." + +"Not since you were old enough to think it over?" said Anne eagerly. + +"No. It seemed to me that the amount of genuine interest in the +sport and the animals was infinitesimal compared with the fictitious +excitement worked up by betting." + +"And what's the harm of betting when you've got the money?" + +"And when you haven't?" + +"That's another question." + +"Do you approve it at the best?" + +"It's a man's own concern." + +"That's arguing against your better sense." + +"Can't be helped, with two such solemn companions! There would be +no bearing you if I didn't take you down sometimes, when you get so +didactic, and talk of fictitious excitement, indeed! And now you +are going to Rood House, what will you be coming back?" + +Rood House stood about two miles on the further side of Backsworth. +It was an ancient almshouse, of which the mastership had been wisely +given to Dr. Easterby, one of the deepest theological scholars, +holiest men, and bravest champions of the Church, although he was +too frail in health to do much, save with his pen, and in council +with the numerous individuals who resorted to him from far and wide, +and felt the beautiful old fragment of a monastic building where he +dwelt a true court of peace and refreshment, whence they came forth, +aided by prayer and counsel, for their own share of the combat. + +Julius Charnock had, happily for himself, found his way thither when +his character and opinions were in process of formation, and had +ever since looked to Rood House for guidance and sympathy. To be +only fourteen miles distant had seemed to him one great perfection +of Compton Poynsett; but of course he had found visits there a far +more possible thing to an unoccupied holiday son of the great house +than to a busy parish priest, so that this opportunity was very +valuable to him. + +And so it proved; not so much for the details as for the spirit in +which he was aided in looking at everything, from the mighty +questions which prove the life of the Church by the vehement emotion +they occasion, down to the difficulties of theory and practice that +harassed himself--not named, perhaps, but still greatly unravelled. + +Those perpetual questions, that have to be worked out again and +again by each generation, were before him in dealing with his +parish; and among them stood in his case the deeper aspects of the +question that had come forward on the drive, namely, the lawfulness +and expedience of amusement. + +Granting the necessity of pastimes and recreation for most persons, +specially the young, there opened the doubtful, because ever- +varying, question of the kind and the quantity to be promoted or +sanctioned, lest restraint should lead to reaction, and lest +abstinence should change from purity and spirituality to moroseness +or hypocrisy. And if Julius found one end of the scale represented +by his wife and his junior curate, his sister-in-law and his senior +curate were at the other. Yet the old recluse was far more inclined +to toleration than he had been in principle himself, though the spur +of the occasion had led him to relaxations towards others in the +individual cases brought before him, when he had thought opposition +would do more harm than the indulgence. His conscience had been +uneasy at this divergence, till he could discuss the subject. + +The higher the aspiration of the soul, the less, of course, would be +the craving for diversion, the greater the shrinking from those evil +accompaniments that soon mar the most innocent delights. Some +spirits are austere in their purity, like Anne; some so fervent in +zeal, as to heed nothing by the way, like Mr. Bindon; but most are +in an advanced stage of childhood, and need play and pleasure almost +as much as air or food; and these instincts require wholesome +gratification, under such approval as may make the enjoyment bright +and innocent; and yet there should be such subduing of their excess, +such training in discipline, as shall save them from frivolity and +from passing the line of evil, prevent the craving from growing to a +passion, and where it has so grown, tone it back to the limits of +obedience and safety. + +Alas! perhaps there lay the domestic difficulty of which Julius +could not speak; yet, as if answering the thought, Dr. Easterby +said, "After all, charity is the true self-acting balance to many a +sweet untaught nature. Self-denials which spring out of love are a +great safeguard, because they are almost sure to be both humble and +unconscious." + +And Julius went away cheered as he thought of his Rosamond's wells +of unselfish affection, confident that all the cravings for variety +and excitement, which early habit had rendered second nature, would +be absorbed by the deeper and keener feelings within, and that these +would mount higher as time went on, under life's great training. + +Pleasant it was to see the triumphant delight of the two sisters +over their purchases. Such a day's English shopping was quite a new +experience to Anne; and she had not been cautioned against it, so +her enjoyment was as fresh and vivid as a child's; and they both +chattered all the way home with a merriment in which Julius fully +shared, almost surprised to see Anne so eager and lively, and--as +her cheeks glowed and her eyes brightened--beginning to understand +what had attracted Miles. + +Mrs. Poynsett had not had quite so pleasant a day, for Cecil knocked +at her door soon after luncheon with an announcement that Lady +Tyrrell wished for admission. Expecting an exposition of the Clio +scheme, she resigned herself, looking with some curiosity at the +beautiful contour of face and drooping pensive loveliness, that had +rather gained than lost in grace since the days when she had deemed +them so formidable. + +"This is kind, dear Mrs. Poynsett," said the soft voice, while the +hand insisted on a pressure. "I have often wished to come and see +you, but I could not venture without an excuse." + +"Thank you," was the cold reply. + +"I have more than an excuse--a reason, and I think we shall be fully +agreed; but first you must let me have the pleasure of one look to +recall old times. It is such a treat to see you so unchanged. I +hope you do not still suffer." + +"No, thank you." + +"And are you always a prisoner here? Ah! I know your patience." + +"What was the matter on which you wanted to speak to me?" said Mrs. +Poynsett, fretted beyond endurance by the soft, caressing tone. + +"As I said, I should hardly venture if I did not know we agreed-- +though perhaps not for the same reasons. We do agree in our love +and high opinion of your dear Frank!" + +"Well!" repressing a shudder at the 'dear.' + +"I am afraid we likewise agree that, under all circumstances, our +two young people are very unfortunately attached, and that we must +be hard-hearted, and let it go no further." + +"You mean your sister?" + +"My dear Lena! I cannot wonder! I blame myself excessively, for it +was all through my own imprudence. You see, when dear Frank came to +Rockpier, it was so delightful to renew old times, and they both +seemed such children, that I candidly confess I was off my guard; +but as soon as I had any suspicion, I took care to separate them, +knowing that, in the state of my poor father's affairs, it would be +most unjustifiable to let so mere a youth be drawn into an +attachment." + +"Frank is no prize," said his mother with some irony. + +"I knew you would say that, dear Mrs. Poynsett. Pecuniarily +speaking, of course, he is not; though as to all qualities of the +heart and head, he is a prize in the true sense of the word. But, +alas! it is a sort of necessity that poor Lena, if she marry at all, +should marry to liberal means. I tell you candidly that she has not +been brought up as she ought to have been, considering her +expectations or no expectations. What could you expect of my poor +father, with his habits, and two mere girls? I don't know whether +the governess could have done anything; but I know that it was quite +time I appeared. I tell you in confidence, dear Mrs. Poynsett, +there was a heavy pull on my own purse before I could take them away +from Rockpier; and, without blaming a mere child like poor dear Lena +you can see what sort of preparation she has had for a small +income." + +It is hard to say which tried Mrs. Poynsett's patience most, the +'dears' or the candour; and the spirit of opposition probably +prompted her to say, "Frank has his share, like his brothers." + +"I understand, and for many girls the provision would be ample; but +poor Lena has no notion of economizing--how should she? I am afraid +there is no blinking it, that, dear children as they both are, +nothing but wretchedness could result from their corning together; +and thus I have been extremely sorry to find that the affair has +been renewed." + +"It was not an unnatural result of their meeting again." + +"Ah! there I was to blame again; but no one can judge whether an +attachment be real between such children. I thought, too, that +Frank would be gone out into the world, and I confess I did not +expect to find that he had absolutely addressed her, and kept it +secret. That is what my poor father feels so much. Eleonora is his +special darling, and he says he could have overlooked anything but +the concealment." + +Maternal affection assumed the defensive; and, though the idea of +concealment on the part of one of her sons was a shock, Mrs. +Poynsett made no betrayal of herself, merely asking, "How did it +come to light?" + +"I extorted the confession. I think I was justified, standing in a +mother's position, as I do. I knew my vigilance had been eluded, +and that your son had walked home with her after the skating; and +you know very well how transparent young things are." + +The skating! The mother at once understood that Frank was only +postponing the explanation till after his examination; and besides, +she had never been ignorant of his attachment, and could not regard +any display thereof more or less as deception towards herself. The +very fact that Lady Tyrrell was trying to prejudice her beforehand, +so as to deprive him of the grace of taking the initiative towards +his own mother, enlisted her feelings in his defence, so she coldly +answered, "I am sorry if Sir Harry Vivian thinks himself unfairly +treated; but I should have thought my son's feelings had been as +well known in the one family as in the other." + +"But, _dear_ Mrs. Poynsett," exclaimed Lady Tyrrell, "I am sure you +never encouraged them. I am quite enough aware--whatever I may once +have been--of the unfortunate contrast between our respective +families." + +Certainly there was no connection Mrs. Poynsett less wished to +encourage; yet she could not endure to play into Camilla' hands, and +made reply, "There are many matters in which young men must judge +for themselves. I have only once see Miss Vivian, and have no means +of estimating my son's chance of happiness with her." + +Her impenetrability ruffled Lady Tyrrell; but the answer was softer +than ever. "Dear Mrs. Poynsett, what a happy mother you are, to be +able so freely to allow your sons to follow their inclinations! +Well! since you do not object, my conscience is easy on that score; +but it was more than I durst hope." + +To have one's approval thus stolen was out of the question and Mrs. +Poynsett said, "Regret is one thing, opposition another. Sir Harry +Vivian need not doubt that, when my son's position is once fixed, he +will speak openly and formally, and it will then be time to judge." + +"Only," said Lady Tyrrell, rising, "let this be impressed on your +son. Eleonora cannot marry till she is of age, and my father cannot +sanction any previous entanglement. Indeed it is most unfortunate, +if her affections have been tampered with, for me, who have outgrown +romance, and know that, in her position, a wealthy match is a +necessity. I have spoken candidly," she repeated; "for I like Frank +too well to bear that he should be trifled with and disappointed." + +"Thank you!" + +The ladies parted, liking one another, if possible, less than +before. + +Mrs. Poynsett's instinct of defence had made her profess much less +distaste to the marriage than she really felt; she was much +concerned that another son should be undergoing Raymond's sad +experiences, but she had no fear that Lady Tyrrell would ever allow +it to come to a marriage, and she did not think Frank's poetical +enthusiasm and admiration for beauty betokened a nature that would +suffer such an enduring wound as Raymond's had done. + +So she awaited his return, without too much uneasiness for amusement +in Rosamond's preparations. One opening into the conservatory was +through her room, so that every skilful device, or gay ornament, +could be exhibited to her; and she much enjoyed the mirth that went +on between the queen of the revels and her fellow-workers. + +Cecil did not interfere, being indeed generally with her friends at +Sirenwood, Aucuba Villa, or the working-room, in all of which she +had the pleasure of being treated as a person of great +consideration, far superior to all her natural surroundings, and on +whom hinged all the plans for the amelioration of Willansborough. + +Sometimes, however, it happens that the other side of a question is +presented; and thus it was on the day before the entertainment, when +Rosamond had taken her brother Tom to have his hair cut, and to +choose some false moustaches, and the like requisites for their +charades. + +They went first to Pettitt's, the little hair-dresser, where Tom was +marvellously taken with the two Penates, and could hardly be dragged +into the innermost recesses, where in the middle of a sheet, with a +peignoir on his shoulders, he submitted to the clipping of his +raven-black locks, as Mr. Pettitt called them, on the condition of +his sister looking on. + +Presently they heard some feet enter the outer shop, and Mrs. +Duncombe's voice asking for Mr. Pettitt; while his mother replied +that he would wait on her immediately, but that he was just now +engaged with the Honourable Mr. De Lancey. "Could she show them +anything?" + +"Oh no, thank you, we'll wait! Don't let us keep you, Mrs. Pettitt, +it is only on business." + +"Ay!" said the other voice--female, and entirely untamed. "He's +your great ally about your gutters and drains, isn't he?" + +"The only landowner in Wil'sbro' who has a particle of public +spirit!" said Mrs. Duncombe. + +Whereat good-natured Lady Rosamond could not but smile +congratulation to the hair-cutter, who looked meekly elevated, while +Tom whispered, "Proverb contradicted." + +But the other voice replied, "Of course--he's a perfumer, learned in +smells! You'd better drop it, Bessie! you'll never make anything of +it." + +"I'll never drop what the health and life of hundreds of my fellow- +creatures depend on! I wish I could make you understand, Gussie!" + +"You'll never do anything with my governor, if that's your hope--you +should hear him and the mum talking! 'It's all nonsense,' he says; +'I'm not going to annoy my tenants, and make myself unpopular, just +to gratify a fashionable cry.' 'Well,' says mumsey, 'it is not what +was thought the thing for ladies in my time; but you see, if Gussie +goes along with it, she will have the key to all the best county +society.' 'Bother the county society!' says I. 'Bessie Duncombe's +jolly enough--but such a stuck-up set as they all are at Compton, +I'll not run after, behaving so ill to the governor, too!' However--" + +"There's a proverb about listeners!" said Rosamond, emerging when +she felt as if she ought to hearken no longer, and finding Mrs. +Duncombe leaning with her back to the counter, and a tall girl, a +few degrees from beauty, in a riding-habit, sitting upon it. + +They both laughed; and the girl added, "If you had waited a moment, +Lady Rosamond, you would have heard that you were the only jolly one +of all the b'iling!" + +"Ah! we shall see where you are at the end of Mrs. Tallboys' +lectures!" said Mrs. Duncombe. + +"On what?" asked Rosamond. "Woman's rights, or sanitary measures? +for I can't in the least understand why they should be coupled up +together." + +"Nor I!" said Miss Moy. "I don't see why we shouldn't have our own +way, just as well as the men; but what that has to do with drains +and gutters, I can't guess." + +"I'm the other way," said Rosamond. "I think houses and streets +ought to be made clean and healthy; but as for woman's rule, I fancy +we get more of it now than we should the other way." + +"As an instance," said Mrs. Duncombe, "woman is set on cleansing +Wil'sbro'. Man will not stir. Will it ever be done till woman has +her way?" + +"Perhaps, if woman would be patient, man would do it in the right +way, instead of the wrong!" quoth Rosamond. + +"Patient! No, indeed! Nothing is to be done by that! Let every +woman strive her utmost to get the work done as far as her powers +go, and the crusade will be accomplished for very shame!" + +Just then Tom, looking highly amused, emerged, followed by Mr. +Pettitt, the only enlightened landlord on whom Mrs. Duncombe had +been able to produce the slightest impression. He had owned a few +small tenements in Water Lane, which he was about to rebuild, and +which were evidently the pivot of operations. + +At the door they met Cecil, and Rosamond detained her a moment in +the street to say, "My dear Cecil, is _that_ Miss Moy coming on +Wednesday?" + +"Of course she is. We greatly want to move her father. He has the +chief house property there." + +"It is too late now," said Rosamond; "but do you think it can be +pleasant to Jenny Bowater to meet her?" + +"I know nothing of the old countrified animosities and gossipings, +which you have so heartily adopted," replied Cecil, proudly. +"Firstly, I ignore them as beneath me; secondly, I sacrifice them +all to a great cause. If Miss Bowater does not like my guests, let +her stay away." + +Here Mrs. Duncombe stood on the step, crying out, "Well, Cecil, how +have you sped with Mrs. Bungay?" + +"Horrid woman!" and no more was heard, as Cecil entered Mr. +Pettitt's establishment. + +"That might be echoed," said Tom, who was boiling over at the speech +to his sister. "I knew that ape was an intolerable little prig of a +peacock, but I didn't think she could be such a brute to you, Rosie! +Is she often like that, and does your parson stand such treatment of +you?" + +"Nonsense, Tom!" said Rosamond; "it doesn't often happen, and breaks +no bones when it does. It's only the ignorance of the woman, and +small blame to her--as Mrs. M'Kinnon said when Corporal Sims's wife +threw the red herring's tail at her!" + +"But does Julius stand it?" repeated Tom, fiercely, as if hesitating +whether to call out Julius or Mrs. Charnock Poynsett. + +"Don't be so ridiculous, Tom! I'd rather stand a whole shower of +red herrings' tails at once than bother Julius about his brother's +wife. How would you and Terry like it, if your wives took to +squabbling, and setting you together by the ears? I was demented +enough to try it once, but I soon saw it was worse than anything." + +"What? He took her part?" + +"No such thing! Hold your tongue, Tommy, and don't talk of married +folk till you're one yourself!" + +"Papa never meant it," repeated the indignant Tom. "I've a great +mind to write and tell him how you are served!" + +"Now, Tom," cried Rosamond, stopping short, "if you do that, I +solemnly declare I'll never have you here again! What could papa +do? Do you think he could cure Raymond's wife of being a ridiculous +little prig? And if he could--why, before your letter got to +Meerut, she will be gone up to London; and by the time she comes +back we'll be safe in our own Rectory. Here, come in, and get our +string and basket at Mrs. Bungay's." + +"I'll pay her out!" muttered Tom, as he followed his sister into +Mrs. Bungay's shop, one of much smaller pretensions, for the sale of +baskets, brushes, mats, &c. + +The mistress, a stout, red-faced woman, looked as if she had been +'speaking a bit of her mind,' and was at first very gruff and +ungracious, until she found they were real customers; and moreover, +Tom's bland Irish courtesy perfectly disarmed her, when Rosamond, +having fixed her mind on a box in the very topmost pigeon-hole, they +not only apologized for the trouble they were giving, but Tom +offered to climb up and bring it down, when she was calling for the +errand-boy in vain. + +"It's no trouble, sir, thank you; I'd think nothing of that for you, +my lady, nor for Mr. Charnock--which I'm sure I'll never forget all +he did for us at the fire, leading my little Alferd out like a lamb! +I beg your ladyship's pardon, ma'am, if I seemed a bit hasty; but +I've been so put about--and I thought at first you'd come in on the +same matter, which I'm sure a lady like you wouldn't ever do--about +the drains, and such like, which isn't fit for no lady to speak of! +As if Water Lane weren't as sweet and clean as it has any call to +be, and as if we didn't know what was right by our tenants, which +are a bad lot, and don't merit no money to be laid out on them!" + +"So you have houses in Water Lane, Mrs. Bungay? I didn't even know +it!" + +"Yes, Lady Rosamond! My husband and I thought there was no better +investment than to buy a bit of land, when the waste was inclosed, +and run 'em up cheap. Houses always lets here, you see, and the +fire did no damage to that side. But of course you didn't know, +Lady Rosamond; a real lady like you wouldn't go prying into what +she's no call to, like that fine decked-out body Duncombe's wife, +which had best mind her own children, which it is a shame to see +stravaging about the place! I know it's her doing, which I told +young Mrs. Charnock Poynsett just now, which I'm right sorry to see +led along by the like of her, and so are more of us; and we all wish +some friend would give her a hint, which she is but young--and 'tis +doing harm to Mr. Charnock Poynsett, Lady Rosamond, which all of us +have a regard for, as is but right, having been a good customer, and +friend to the town, and all before him; but we can't have ladies +coming in with their fads and calling us names for not laying out on +what's no good to nobody, just to satisfy them! As if Wil'sbro' +hadn't been always healthy!" + +Tom was wicked enough to put in a good many notes of sympathy, at +the intervals of the conjunctive whiches, and to end by declaring, +"Quite right, Mrs. Bungay! You see how much better we've brought up +my sister! I say--what's the price of that little doll's broom?" + +"What do you want of it, Tom?" + +"Never you mind!" + +"No mischief, I hope?" + + + + +CHAPTER XVII +The Enchantments + + +"It seems a shame," the Walrus said, + "To play them such a trick, +After we've brought them out so far, + And made them trot so quick." +The carpenter said nothing, but + "The butter's spread too thick."--LEWIS CARROLL + +A telegram arrived from Frank, in the midst of the preparations on +Wednesday, announcing that 'he was all right, and should be at +Hazlitt's Gate at 8.10 p.m.' + +At 6.30 children of all sizes, with manes of all colours, were +arriving, and were regaled in the dining-room by Anne, assisted by +Jenny and Charlie. Anne had a pretty pink colour in her cheeks, her +flaxen locks were bound with green ribbons, and green adorned her +white dress, in which she had a gracious, lily-like look of +unworldly purity. She thoroughly loved children, was quite equal to +the occasion, and indeed enjoyed it as much as the recent Christmas- +tree in the village school. + +Such of Cecil's guests as were mothers for the most part came with +their children; but Lady Tyrrell, her sister, and others, who were +unattached, arrived later, and were shown to the library, where she +entertained them on the specified refreshment, biscuits and coffee, +and enthroned Mrs Tallboys in the large arm-chair, where she looked +most beautiful and gorgeous, in a robe of some astonishing sheeny +sky-blue, edged with paly gold, while on her head was a coronal of +sapphire and gold, with a marvellous little plume. The cost must +have been enormous, and her delicate and spirituelle beauty was +shown to the greatest advantage; but as the audience was far too +scanty to be worth beginning upon, Cecil, with a sigh at the folly +of maternal idolatry, went to hunt up her ladies from gazing at the +babyish amusements of their offspring; and Miss Moy, in spite of her +remonstrance, jumped up to follow her; while Mrs. Duncombe, the only +_good_ mother in this new sense, remained, keeping guard lest +curiosity, and the echo of piano music, which now began to be heard, +should attract away any more of the ladies. + +Cecil was by no means prepared for the scene. The drawing-room was +crowded--chiefly indeed with ladies and children, but there was a +fair sprinkling of gentlemen--and all had their faces turned towards +the great glass doors opening into the conservatory, which was +brilliantly lighted and echoing with music and laughter. Cecil +tried to summon some of the ladies of her own inviting, announcing +that Mrs. Tallboys was arrived; but this appeared to have no effect. +"Yes, thank you," was all she heard. Penetrating a little farther, +"Mrs. Tallboys is ready." "Thank you, I'll come; but my little +people are so anxious to have me with them."--"Mrs. Tallboys is +waiting!" to the next; who really did not hear, but only responded, +"Did you ever see anything more charming?" + +By this time Cecil could see over the heads of the front rank of +children. She hardly knew the conservatory. All the veteran +camellia and orange-trees, and a good many bay and laurel boughs +besides, were ranged along the central alley, gorgeous with fairy +lamps and jewels, while strains of soft music proceeded from some +unseen quarter. "Very pretty!" said Cecil, hastily, trying another +of her intended guests with her intelligence. "Really--yes, +presently, thank you," was the absent answer. "There is some +delightful mystery in there." + +Cecil found her attempts were vain, and was next asked, as one of +the household, what delicious secret was going on there; and as it +hurt her feelings to be left out, she pressed into the conservatory, +with some vague intention of ordering Anne, if not Rosamond, to +release her grown-up audience, and confine their entertainment to +the children; but she found herself at once caught by the hand by a +turbaned figure like a prince in the Arabian Nights, who, with a low +salaam, waved her on. + +"No, thank you. I'm looking for--" + +But retreat was impossible, for many were crowding up in eager +curiosity; moreover, a muslin bandage descended-on her eyes. +"Don't!" she expostulated; "I'm not at play--I'm--" but her words +were lost. + +"Hush! the Peri's cave is near, +No one enters scatheless here; +Lightly tread and lowly bend, +Win the Peri for your friend," + +sung a voice to the mysterious piano accompaniment; and Cecil found +both hands taken, and was forced to move on, as she guessed the +length of the conservatory, amid sounds of suppressed laughter that +exceedingly annoyed her, till there was a pause and repetition of +the two last lines with an attempt to make her obey them. She was +too impatient and angry to perceive that it would have been much +better taste to enter into the humour of the thing; and she only +said with all her peculiar cold petulance, just like sleet, "Let me +go, if you please; I am engaged. I am waited for." + +"Peri gracious, +She's contumacious; +Behold, every hair shall bristle +When she hears the magic whistle!" + +and a whistle, sharp, long, and loud, sounded behind her, amid peals +of merriment. She turned sharply round, but still the whistle was +behind her, and rang out again and again, till she was half +deafened, and wholly irate; while the repetition of + +"Bend, bend, lowly bend, +Win the Peri for your friend," + +forced on her the conviction that on no other condition should she +be set free, though the recognition of Terry's voice made the +command doubly unpalatable, and as she made the stiffest and most +reluctant of courtesies, a voice said, + +"Homage done, you may be +Of this merry company;" + +and with a last blast of the whistle the bandage was removed, and +she found herself in the midst of a half circle of laughing children +and grown people; in front of her a large opening, like a cavern, +hung with tiny lamps of various colours, in the midst of which stood +the Peri, in a Persian pink robe, white turban, and wide white +trousers, with two oriental genies attendant upon her. + +A string was thrust into Cecil's hand, apparently fastened to her, +and accounting for some sharp pulls she had felt during the +whistling. She drew it in front in sharp haste, to be rid of the +obnoxious instrument; but instead of a whistle, she found in her +hand a little dust-pan and brush, fit for a baby-house, drawn +through a ring, while the children eagerly cried, "What have you +got? What have you got?" + +"Some nonsense. I do not approve of practical jokes," began Cecil; +but the song only replied, + +"Away, away, +In the cave no longer stay; +Others come to share our play;" + +and one of the genies drew her aside, while another blindfolded +victim was being introduced with the same rites, only fare more +willingly. The only way open to here was that which led to the +window of the dining-room, where she found Anne with the children +who had had their share, and were admiring their prizes. Anne tried +to soothe her by saying, "You see every one is served alike. They +thought it would be newer than a tree." + +"Did you mean to _give_ me _this_?" asked a little girl, in whose +hands Cecil had thrust her dust-pan, without a glance at it. + +"Oh the ring!" said Anne. "You must keep that, Mrs. Poynsett +thought you would like it. It is a gem--some Greek goddess, I +think." + +"Is this her arrangement?" asked Cecil, pointing to the dust-pan. + +"Oh no! she knew nothing about that, nor I; but you see every one +has something droll. See what Mr. Bowater has!" + +And Herbert Bowater showed that decidedly uncomplimentary penwiper, +where the ass's head declares "There are two of us;" while every +child had some absurdity to show; and Miss Moy's shrieks of delight +were already audible at a tortoise-shell pen-holder disguised as a +hunting-whip. + +"I must go to my friends," said Cecil, vouchsafing no admiration of +the ring, though she had seen enough to perceive that it was a +beautifully engraved ruby; and she hurried back to the library, but +only to find all her birds flown, and the room empty! Pursuing them +to the drawing-room, she saw only the backs of a few, in the +rearmost rank of the eager candidates for admission to the magic +cave. + +Lady Tyrrell alone saw her, and turned back from the eager +multitude, to say in her low, modulated voice, "Beaten, my dear. +Able strategy on la belle mere's part." + +"Where's Mrs. Tallboys?" + +"Don't you see her blue feather, eagerly expectant? Just after you +were gone, Edith Bowater came in, and begged us to come and see the +conservatory lighted up; and then came a rush of the Brenden +children after their aunt, exclaiming wildly it was delicious-- +lights, and a fairy, and a secret, and every one got something, if +they were ever so old. Of course, after that there was nothing but +to follow the stream." + +"It is a regular plot for outwitting us! Rosamond is dressed up for +the fairy. They are all in league." + +"Well, we must put a good face on it for the present," said Lady +Tyrrell. "Don't on any account look as if you were not in perfect +accordance. You can show your sentiments afterwards, you know." + +Cecil saw she must acquiesce, for Mrs. Tallboys was full in the +midst. With an infinitely better grace than her hostess, she +yielded herself to the sports, bowed charmingly to the Peri, whirled +like a fairy at the whistling, and was rewarded with a little enamel +padlock as a brooch, and two keys as ear-rings; indeed she +professed, with evident sincerity, that she was delighted with these +sports of the old country, and thought the two genies exquisite +specimens of the fair, useless, gentle English male aristocracy. + +Mrs. Duncombe, too, accepted the inevitable with considerable spirit +and good-humour, though she had a little passage-at-arms with +Julius; when showing him the ivory card-case that had fallen to her +lot, she said, "So this is the bribe! Society stops the mouth of +truth." + +"That is as you choose to take it," he said. + +"Exactly. When we want to go deep into eternal verities you silence +us with frivolous din and dainty playthings for fear of losing your +slaves." + +"I don't grant that." + +"Then why hinder an earnest discussion by all this hubbub?" + +"Because this was not the right place or time." + +"It never is the right time for the tyrants to let their slaves +confer, or to hear home-truths." + +"On the contrary, my curiosity is excited. I want to hear Mrs. +Tallboys' views." + +"Then when will you dine with us? Next Wednesday?" + +"Thank you. Wednesday has an evening service." + +"Ah! I told you it was never the right time! Then Thursday? And +you'll trust your wife with us?" + +"Oh yes, certainly." + +"It is a bargain, then? Seven o'clock, or there will be no time." + +Julius's attention suddenly wandered. Was not a whisper pervading +the room of a railway accident? Was not Frank due by that night's +train? + +There were still so many eager to visit the magic cave, that Julius +trusted his wife would remain there sheltered from the report; Jenny +Bowater was behind a stand of trees, acting orchestra; but when +Terry came to the outskirts of the forest in search of other knights +of the whistle, Julius laid a hand on him, and gave instructions in +case any rumour should reach Rosamond to let her know how vague it +was, tell her that he was going to ascertain the truth, and beg her +to keep up the game and cause no alarm. + +Next encountering Anne, he begged her to go to his mother and guard +her from any alarm, until there was some certainty. + +"Can't we send all these people away?" she asked. + +"Not yet. We had better make no unnecessary disturbance. There +will be time enough if anything be amiss. I am going down to +Hazlitt's Gate." + +Anne was too late. Charlie had not outgrown the instinct of rushing +to his mother with his troubles; and he was despairingly telling the +report he had heard of a direful catastrophe, fatal to an unknown +quantity of passengers, while she, strong and composed because he +gave way, was trying to sift his intelligence. No sooner did he +hear from Anne that Julius was going to the station, than he started +up to accompany him--the best thing he could do in his present +state. Hardly, however, had he closed the door, before he returned +with fresh tears in his eyes, leading in Eleonora Vivian, whom he +had found leaning against the wall outside, white and still, scarce +drawing her breath. + +"Come," he said; and before she knew what he was doing, she was at +Mrs. Poynsett's side. "Here, mother," he said, "take her." And he +was gone. + +Mrs. Poynsett stretched out her arms. The hearts of the two women +who loved Frank could not help meeting. Eleonora sank on her knees, +hiding her face on the mother's breast, with two tender arms clasped +round her. + +Anne was kneeling too, but she was no longer the meek, shy stranger. +Now, in the hour of trouble, she poured forth, in a voice fervent +and sweet, a prayer for protection and support for their beloved +one, so that it might be well with him, whatever might be his +Heavenly Father's Will. + +As she paused, Mrs. Poynsett, in a choked voice, said, "Thank you, +dear child;" when there were steps in the hall. Anne started up, +Lenore buried her face on Mrs. Poynsett's bosom, the mother clasped +her hands over her convulsively, then beheld, as the door opened, a +tall figure, with a dark bright face full of ineffable softness and +joy. Frank himself, safe and sound, with his two brothers behind +him. They stayed not to speak, but hastened to spread the glad +tidings; while he flung himself down, including both his mother and +Lenore in one rapturous embrace, and carrying his kiss from one to +the other--conscious, if no one else was, that this first seal of +his love was given in his mother's arms. + +Lenore did indeed extricate herself, and stand up as rosy red as she +had been pale; but she had no room for any thought beyond his +mother's trembling "Not hurt, my dear?" + +"Not hurt! Not a scratch! Thank God! Oh! thank God!" answered +Frank, quivering all over with thankfulness, though probably far +more at the present joy than the past peril. + +"Yes--oh, thanks for His mercy!" echoed Anne, giving fervent hand +and tearful cheek to the eager salutation, which probably would have +been as energetic to Clio or old Betty at that moment! + +"But there's blood on your wristband," cried the mother. "You are +hurt!" + +"No; it's not mine. I didn't know it. It is from the poor fellow I +helped to carry into the public-house at Knoll, just this side +Backsworth, a good deal hurt, I'm afraid. Something had got on the +lines, I believe. I was half asleep, and knew nothing till I found +ourselves all crushed up together in the dark, upside-down, my feet +above my head. There was but one man in my carriage, and we didn't +get foul of one another, and found we were all right, when we +scrambled out of the window. So we helped out the others, and found +that, besides the engineer and stoker--who I don't suppose can live, +poor fellows!--there was only this man much damaged. Then, when +there seemed no more to be done, I took my bag and walked across +country, to reach home before you heard. But oh, this is worth +anything!" + +He had to bend down for another embrace from his mother whose heart +was very full as she held his bright young healthful face between +her hands, though all she said was, "You have walked eleven miles +and more! You must be half starved!--Anne, my dear, pray let him +have something. He can eat it here." + +"I'll see," said Anne, hastening away. + +"Oh, don't go, Lenore," cried Frank, springing up. "Stay, I've not +seen you!--Mother, how sweet of you! But I forgot! You don't know! +I was only waiting till I was through." + +"I understand, my dear boy." + +"But how? How did you find out? Was it only that you knew she was +the precious darling of my heart? and now you see and own why," +cries Frank, almost beside himself with excitement and delight. + +"It was Lady Tyrrell who told me," said Mrs. Poynsett, sympathizing +too much with the lovers to perceive that her standpoint of +resistance was gone from her. + +"Yes," said Lenore. "She knew of our walk, and questioned me so +closely that I could not conceal anything without falsehood." + +"After she met me at Aucuba Villa?" asked Frank. + +"Yes. Did you tell her anything?" + +"I thought she knew more than I found afterwards that she did," said +Frank; "but there's no harm done. It is all coming now." + +"She told my father," said Eleonora, sadly, "and he cannot +understand our delay. He is grieved and displeased, and thinks I +have not been open with him." + +"Oh! that will be all right to-morrow," said Frank. "I'll have it +out with a free heart, now there's no fear but that I have passed; +and I've got the dearest of mothers! I feel as if I could meet him +if he were a dozen examiners rolled into one, instead of the good +old benevolent parent that he is! Ha! Anne--Susan--Jenkins--thank +you--that's splendid! May I have it here? Super-excellent! Only +here's half the clay-pit sticking to me! Let me just run up and +make myself decent. Only don't let her run away." + +Perhaps Clio would have scorned the instinct that made a Charnock +unable to enjoy a much-needed meal in the presence of mother and of +love till the traces of the accident and the long walk had been +removed. His old nurse hurried after--ostensibly to see that his +linen was at hand, but really to have her share of the petting and +congratulation; and Lenore stood a little embarrassed, till Mrs. +Poynsett held out her arms, with the words, "My dear child!" and +again she dropped on her knee by the couch, and nestled close in +thankful joy. + +Presently however, she raised herself, and said sadly, almost +coldly, "I am afraid you have been surprised into this." + +"I must love one who so loves my boy," was the ardent answer. + +"I couldn't help it!" said the maiden, again abandoning herself to +the tenderness. "Oh! it is so good of you!" + +"My dear, dear daughter!" + +"Only please give me one mother's kiss! I have so longed for one." + +"Poor motherless child! My sweet daughter!" + +Then after a pause Eleonora said, "Indeed, I'll try to deserve +better; but oh! pray forgive me, if I cost him much more pain and +patience than I am worth." + +"He thinks you well worth anything, and perhaps I do," said Mrs +Poynsett, who was conquered, won over, delighted more than by either +of the former brides, in spite of all antecedents. + +"Then will you always trust me?" said Eleonora, with clasped hands, +and a wondrous look of earnest sincerity on her grave open brow and +beautiful pensive dark blue eyes. + +"I _must_, my dear." + +"And indeed I don't think I could help holding to _him_, because he +seems my one stay and hope here; and now I know it is all right with +you, indeed it is such happiness as I never knew." + +She laid her head down again in subdued joy and rest: but the pause +was broken by Frank's return; and a moment after, in darted the Peri +in her pink cashmere costume, with a glow transforming her usually +colourless face. "Dear, dear Frank, I'm so glad!" she cried, +bestowing her kiss; while he cried in amazement, "Is it Rose? Is +there a fancy ball?" + +"Only Aladdin's Cave. I'm just out of it; and while Jenny is +keeping up games, and Edith is getting up a charade, I could dash in +to see that Frank was all there, and more too. The exam, is safe, +eh?" + +"I trust so," said Frank; "the list will not come just yet; but I am +told I am certain of a pass--indeed, that I stand high as to +numbers." + +"That's noble!--Now, Mrs. Poynsett, turn him out as soon as he has +eaten his dinner. We want any one who can keep up a respectable +kind of a row. I say, will you two do Ferdinand and Miranda playing +at chess? You look just like it." + +"Must we go?" asked Frank, reluctantly; and there was something in +the expression of his face, a little paler than usual, that reminded +his mother that the young man had for the first time seen sudden and +violent death that day, and that though his present gladness was so +great, yet that he had gone through too much in body and mind for +the revels of the evening not either to jar, or to produce a +vehement reaction, if he were driven into them. So she answered by +pleading the eleven miles' walk; and the queen of the sports was +merciful, adding, "But I must be gone, or Terry will be getting up +his favourite tableau of the wounded men of Clontarf, or Rothesay, +or the Black Bull's Head, or some equally pleasing little incident." + +"Is it going on well?" asked Mrs. Poynsett. + +"Sweetly! Couldn't be better. They have all amalgamated and are in +the midst of the 'old family coach,' with Captain Duncombe telling +the story. He is quite up to the trick, and enjoys turning the +tables on his ladies." + +"And Camilla?" asked Lenore, in a hesitating, anxious tone + +"Oh! she's gone in for it. I think she is the springs! I heard her +ask where you were, and Charley told her; so you need not be afraid +to stay in peace, if you have a turn that way. Good-bye; you'd +laugh to see how delighted people are to be let off the lecture." +And she bent over Lenore with a parting kiss, full of significance +of congratulation. + +She returned, after changing her dress, to find a pretty fairy +tableau, contrived by the Bowater sisters, in full progress, and +delighting the children and the mothers. Lady Vivian contrived to +get a word with her as she returned. + +"Beautifully managed, Lady Rosamond. I tell Cecil she should enjoy +a defeat by such strategy." + +"It is Mrs. Poynsett's regular Christmas party," said Rosamond, not +deigning any other reply. + +"I congratulate her on her skilful representatives," said Lady +Tyrrell. "May I ask if we are to see the hero of the day? No? +What! you would say better employed? Poor children, we must let +them alone to-night for their illusion, though I am sorry it should +be deepened; it will be only the more pain by and by." + +"I don't see that," said Rosamond, stoutly. + +"Ah! Lady Rosamond, you are a happy young bride, untaught what is +l'impossible." Rosamond could not help thinking that no one +understood it better than she, as the eldest of a large family with +more rank and far more desires than means; but she disliked Lady +Tyrrell far too much for even her open nature to indulge in +confidences, and she made a successful effort to escape from her +neighbourhood by putting two pale female Fullers into the place of +honour in front of the folding doors into the small drawing-room, +which served as a stage, and herself hovered about the rear, wishing +she could find some means of silencing Miss Moy's voice, which was +growing louder and more boisterous than ever. + +The charade which Rosamond had expected was the inoffensive, if +commonplace, Inspector, and the window she beheld, when the curtain +drew up, was, she supposed, the bar of an inn. But no; on the board +were two heads, ideals of male and female beauty, one with a waxed +moustache, the other with a huge chignon, vividly recalling Mr. +Pettitt's Penates. Presently came by a dapper professor, in blue +spectacles and a college cap, who stood contemplating, and indulging +in a harangue on entities and molecules, spirit and matter, +affinities and development, while the soft deep brown eyes of the +chignoned head languished, and the blue ones of the moustached one +rolled, and the muscles twitched and the heads turned till, by a +strong process of will explained by the professor, they bent their +necks, erected themselves, and finally started into life and the +curtain fell on them with clasped hands! + +It rose to show the newly-animated pair, Junius Brutus and Barberina +his wife, at the breakfast table, with a boar's head of brawn before +them, while the Lady Barberina boldly asserted her claims to the +headship of the house. Had she not lately been all head? + +The pathetic reply was, "Would it were so still, my dear. All head +and no tongue, like our present meal." + +The lady heaved up the boar's head to throw at him, and the scene +closed. + +Next, Brutus was seen awkwardly cleaning his accoutrements, having +enlisted, as he soliloquized, to escape from woman. + +Enter a sergeant with a rich Irish brogue, and other recruits, +forming the awkward squad. The drill was performed with immense +spirit, but only one of the soldiers showed any dexterity; but while +the sergeant was upholding him as 'the very moral of a patthern to +the rest,' poor Brutus was seized with agonizing horror at the +recognition of Barberina in this disguise! + +"Why not?" she argued. "Why should not woman learn to use the arms +of which man has hitherto usurped the use?" + +Poor Brutus stretched out his arms in despair, and called loudly for +the professor to restore him to his original state of silent +felicity in the barber's window. + +"Ye needn't do that, me boy," quoth the sergeant with infinite +scorn. "Be ye where ye will, ye'll never be aught but a blockhead." + +Therewith carriages were being announced to the heads of families; +and with compliments and eager thanks, and assurances that nothing +could have been more delightful, the party broke up. + +Captain Duncombe, while muffling his boys, declared that he never +saw a cleverer hit in his life, and that those two De Lancey +brothers ought to be on the stage; while Miss Moy loudly demanded +whether he did not feel it personal; and Mrs. Tallboys, gracefully +shaking hands with Anne and Rosamond, declared it a grand challenge +where the truth had been unconsciously hit off. Cecil was nowhere +to be seen. + + + + +CHAPTER XVIII +Demonstrations + + +Nursing her wrath to keep it warm.--BURNS + +The hours of the soiree had been early; but the breakfast was so +irregular and undecided as to time, that no one took much notice of +an intimation which Jenkins had received from the grim Mrs. +Grindstone that Mrs, Charnock Poynsett would take breakfast in her +own room. Indeed, they all felt glad that her views of etiquette +did not bind them to their places; for Frank was burning to be off +to Sirenwood, forgetting that it was far easier to be too early than +too late for Sir Harry Vivian, who was wont to smoke till long after +midnight, and was never visible till the midday repast. + +And thus it was Lady Tyrrell who came to Frank alone. "Early +afoot," she said; "you foolish, impatient fellow! You _will_ outrun +my best advice." + +"Ah! but I'm armed. I always told you we might trust to my mother, +and it is all right. She loves Lenore with all her heart, and +consents freely and gladly." + +"Indeed! Well, the dear child has made her conquest!" + +"I always knew she would when once reserve was broken down." + +"Did you get up the alarm on purpose?" + +"Really, one would think I had done so. One such moment was worth +years of ordinary meetings! Half the battle is won!" + +"Have you seen your mother this morning?" + +"No; but she knew I was coming." + +"Then you do not know what her feelings are on cooler reflection?" + +"My mother would never retract what she has once assured me of," +said Frank, haughtily. + +"Forgive me--of what has she assured you?" + +"That she regards Eleonora as a dear daughter, and that implies +doing the same for me as for my brothers. If Sir Harry would but be +so good as to come and see her--' + +"Stay, Frank, you have not come that length. You forget that if you +have, as you say, gained half the battle, there is another half; and +that my father very reasonably feels hurt at being the last to be +favoured with the intelligence." + +"Dear Lady Tyrrell, you can see how it was. There was no helping it +when once I could speak to Lenore; and then no one would have let me +utter a word till I had gone through the examination. We never +meant to go on a system of concealment; but you know how every one +would have raved and stormed if I had betrayed a thought beyond old +Driver, and yet it was only being at rest about Lenore that carried +me through without breaking down. Can't you see?" + +"You special pleader! May you win over my father; but you must +remember that we are a fallen house, unable to do all we wish." + +"If I might see Sir Harry! I must make him forgive me." + +"I will see whether he is ready." + +Could Frank's eyes have penetrated the walls, he would have seen +Lady Tyrrell received with the words, "Well, my dear, I hope you +have got rid of the young man--poor fellow!" + +"I am afraid that cannot be done without your seeing him yourself." + +"Hang it! I hate it! I can't abide it, Camilla. He's a nice lad, +though he is his mother's son; and Lenore's heart is set on him, and +I can't bear vexing the child." + +"Lena cares for him only because she met him before she knew what +life is like. After one season she will understand what five +hundred a year means." + +"Well, you ought to know your sister best; but if the lad has spoken +to her, Lena is not the girl to stand his getting his conge so +decidedly." + +"Exactly; it would only lead to heroics, and deepen the mischief." + +"Hang it! Then what do you want me to say?" + +"Stand up for your rights, and reduce him to submission by +displeasure at not having been consulted. Then explain how there +can be no engagement at once; put him on his honour to leave her +free till after her birthday in November." + +"What! have him dangling after her? That's no way to make her +forget him." + +"She never will under direct opposition--she is too high-spirited +for that; but if we leave it alone, and they are unpledged, there is +a fair chance of her seeing the folly both for her and for him." + +"I don't know that. Lena may be high-flown; but things go deep with +the child--deeper than they did with you, Camilla!" + +Perhaps this was a stab, for there was bitterness in the answer. +"You mean that she is less willing to give up a fancy for the family +good. Remember, it is doubly imperative that Lena should marry a +man whose means are in his own power, so that he could advance +something. This would be simply ruin--throwing up the whole thing, +after all I have done to retrieve our position." + +"After all, Camilla, I am growing an old man, and poor Tom is gone. +I don't know that the position is worth so much to me as the +happiness to her, poor child!" said Sir Harry, wistfully. + +"Happiness!" was the scornful answer. "If you said 'her own way,' +it would be nearer the truth. A back street in London--going about +in a cab--and occasional holidays on sufferance from Mrs. Poynsett." + +However little happiness either father or daughter had derived from +their chosen ways, this idea was abhorrent to both; and Lady Tyrrell +pressed her advantage. "If we keep him waiting much longer he will +be rushing after Lena, and if you show the least sign of relenting +he will insist on dragging you to an interview with his mother." + +The threat was effectual; for Sir Harry had had passages-at arms +enough with Mrs. Poynsett to make him dread her curt dry civility +far more than either dun or bailiff, and he was at once roused to +the determination to be explicit. + +Frank met him, with crimson face and prepared speech. "Good +morning, Sir Harry! I am afraid you may think that you have reason +to complain of my not having spoken to you sooner; but I trusted to +your previous knowledge of my feelings, and I was anxious to +ascertain my position before laying it before you, though I don't +believe I should have succeeded unless my mind had been set at +rest." + +Soft-hearted Sir Harry muttered, "I understand, but--" + +The pause at that 'but' was so long that Frank ventured on going on. +"I have not had an official communication, but I know privately that +I have passed well and stand favourably for promotion, so that my +income will go on increasing, and my mother will make over to me +five thousand pounds, as she has done to Miles and Julius, so that +it can be settled on Eleonora at once." + +"There, there, that's enough!" said Sir Harry, coerced by his +daughter's glances; "there's plenty of time before coming to all +that! You see, my dear boy, I always liked you, and had an immense +respect for your--your family; but, you see, Eleonora is young, and +under the circumstances she ought not to engage herself. She can't +any way marry before coming of age, and--considering all things--I +should much prefer that this should go no further." + +"You ought both to be free!" said Lady Tyrrell. + +"That I can never be!" + +"Nor do you think that she can--only it sounds presumptuous," smiled +Lady Tyrrell. "Who can say? But things have to be proved; and +considering what young untried hearts are, it is safer and happier +for both that there should be perfect freedom, so that no harm +should be done, if you found that you had not known your own minds." + +"It will make no difference to me." + +"Oh yes, we know that!" laughed Sir Harry. "Only suppose you +changed your mind, we could not be angry with you." + +"You don't think I could!" + +"No, no," said Lady Tyrrell; "we think no such thing. Don't you +see, if we did not trust your honour, we could not leave this in +suspense. All we desire is that these matters may be left till it +is possible to see our way, when the affairs of the estate are wound +up; for we can't tell what the poor child will have. Come, don't +repeat that it will make no difference. It may not to you; but it +must to us, and to your mother." + +"My mother expects nothing!" said Frank, eagerly; but it was a false +step. + +Sir Harry bristled up, saying, "Sir, my daughter shall go into no +family that--that has not a proper appreciation of--and expectations +befitting her position." + +"Dear papa," exclaimed Lady Tyrrell, "he means no such thing. He is +only crediting his mother with his own romantic ardour and +disinterestedness.--Hark! there actually is the gong. Come and have +some luncheon, and contain yourself, you foolish boy!" + +"I am sorry I said anything that seemed unfitting," said Frank, +meekly. "You know I _could_ not mean it!" + +"Yes, yes, yes, I bear no malice; only one does not like to see +one's own child courted without a voice in the matter, and to hear +she is to be taken as a _favour_, expecting nothing. But, there, +we'll say no more. I like you, Frank Charnock! and only wish you +had ten thousand a year, or were any one else; but you see--you see. +Well, let's eat our luncheon." + +"Does she know this decision?" asked Frank, aside, as he held open +the door for Lady Tyrrell. + +"Yes, she knows it can go no further; though we are too merciful to +deny you the beatific vision, provided you are good, and abstain +from any more little tendresses for the present.--Ah!"--enter Cecil-- +"I thought we should see you to-day, my dear!" + +"Yes; I am on my way to meet my husband at the station," said Cecil, +meeting her in the hall, and returning her kiss. + +"Is Raymond coming home to-day?" said Frank, as he too exchanged +greetings. "Ah! I remember; I did not see you at breakfast this +morning." + +"No!" and there was signification in the voice; but Frank did not +heed it, for coming down-stairs was Eleonora, her face full of a +blushing sweetness, which gave it all the beauty it had ever lacked. + +He could do no more than look and speak before all the rest; the +carriage was ordered for the sisters to go out together, and he +lingered in vain for a few words in private, for Sir Harry kept him +talking about Captain Duncombe's wonderful colt, till Cecil had +driven off one way, and their two hostesses the other; and he could +only ride home to tell his mother how he had sped. + +Better than Rosamond, better even than Charlie, was his mother as a +confidante; and though she had been surprised into her affectionate +acceptance of Eleonora, it was an indescribable delight to mother +and son to find themselves once more in full sympathy; while he +poured out all that had been pent up ever since his winter at +Rockpier. She almost made common cause with him in the question, +what would Raymond say? And it proved to be news to her that her +eldest son was to be immediately expected at home. Cecil had not +come to see her, and had sent her no message; but ungracious +inattention was not so uncommon as to excite much remark from one +who never wished to take heed to it; and it was soon forgotten in +the praise of Eleonora. + +Cecil meanwhile was receiving Raymond at the station. He was +pleased to see her there in her pony-carriage, but a little startled +by the brief coldness of her reply to his inquiry after his mother, +and the tight compression of her lips all the time they were making +their way through the town, where, as usual, he was hailed every two +or three minutes by persons wanting a word with him. When at last +there was a free space, she began: "Raymond, I wish to know whether +you mean me to be set at naught, and my friends deliberately +insulted?" + +"What?" + +A gentleman here hurried up with "I'll not detain you a minute." + +He did, however, keep them for what seemed a great many, to the +chafing spirit which thought a husband should have no ears save for +his wife's wrongs; so she made her preface even more startling-- +"Raymond, I cannot remain in the house any longer with Lady Rosamond +Charnock and those intolerable brothers of hers!" + +"Perhaps you will explain yourself," said Raymond, almost relieved +by the evident exaggeration of the expressions. + +"There has been a conspiracy to thwart and insult me--a regular +conspiracy!" + +"Cecil! let me understand you. What can have happened?" + +"When I arranged an evening for my friends to meet Mrs. Tallboys, I +did not expect to have it swamped by a pack of children, and noisy +nonsensical games, nor that both she and I should be insulted by +practical jokes and a personal charade." + +"A party to meet Mrs. Tallboys?" + +"A ladies' party, a conversazione." + +"What--by my mother's wish?" + +"I was given to understand that I had carte blanche in visiting +matters." + +"You did not ask her consent?" + +"I saw no occasion." + +"You did not?" + +"No." + +"Then, Cecil, I must say that whatever you may have to complain of, +you have committed a grave act of disrespect." + +"I was told that I was free to arrange these things!" + +"Free!" said Raymond, thoroughly roused; "free to write notes, and +order the carriage, and play lady of the house; but did you think +that made you free to bring an American mountebank of a woman to +hold forth absurd trash in my mother's own drawing-room, as soon as +my back was turned?" + +"I should have done the same had you been there." + +"Indeed!" ironically; "I did not know how far you had graduated in +the Rights of Women. So you invited these people?" + +"Then the whole host of children was poured in on us, and everything +imaginable done to interrupt, and render everything rational +impossible. I know it was Rosamond's contrivance, she looked so +triumphant, dressed in an absurd fancy dress, and her whole train +doing nothing but turning me into ridicule, and Mrs. Tallboys too. +Whatever you choose to call her, you cannot approve of a stranger +and foreigner being insulted here. It is that about which I care-- +not myself; I have seen none of them since, nor shall I do so until +a full apology has been made to my guest and to myself." + +"You have not told me the offence." + +"In the first place, there was an absurd form of Christmas-tree, to +which one was dragged blindfold, and sedulously made ridiculous; and +I--I had a dust-pan and brush. Yes, I had, in mockery of our +endeavours to purify that unhappy street." + +"I should have taken it as a little harmless fun," said Raymond. +"Depend on it, it was so intended." + +"What, when Mrs. Tallboys had a padlock and key? I see you are +determined to laugh at it all. Most likely they consulted you +beforehand." + +"Cecil, I cannot have you talk such nonsense. Is this all you have +to complain of?" + +"No. There was a charade on the word Blockhead, where your brother +Charles and the two De Lanceys caricatured what they supposed to be +Mrs. Tallboys' doctrines." + +"How did she receive it?" + +"Most good-humouredly; but that made it no better on their part." + +"Are you sure it was not a mere ordinary piece of pleasantry, with +perhaps a spice of personality, but nothing worth resenting?" + +"You did not see it. Or perhaps you think no indignity towards me +worth resentment?" + +"I do not answer that, Cecil; you will think better of those words +another time," said Raymond, sternly. "But when you want your cause +taken up, you have to remember that whatever the annoyance, you +brought it upon yourself and her, by your own extraordinary +proceeding towards my mother--I will not say towards myself. I will +try to smooth matters. I think the De Lanceys must have acted +foolishly; but the first step ought to be an expression of regret +for such conduct towards my mother." + +"I cannot express regret. I ought to have been told if there were +things forbidden." + +"Must I forbid your playing Punch and Judy, or dancing on the tight- +rope?" cried Raymond, exasperated. + +Cecil bit her lip, and treated the exclamation with the silent +dignity of a deeply injured female; and thus they reached home, when +Raymond said, "Come to your senses, Cecil and apologize to my +mother. You can explain that you did not know the extent of your +powers." + +"Certainly not. They all plotted against me, and I am the person to +whom apology is due." + +Wherewith she marched up-stairs, leaving Raymond, horribly +perplexed, to repair at once to his mother's room, where Frank still +was; but after replying about his success in the examination, the +younger brother retreated, preferring that his story should be told +by his mother; but she had not so much as entered on it when Raymond +demanded what had so much disturbed Cecil. + +"I was afraid she would be vexed," said Mrs. Poynsett; "but we were +in a difficulty. We thought she hardly knew what she had been led +into, and that as she had invited her ladies, it would do less harm +to change the character of the party than to try to get it given +up." + +"I have no doubt you did the best you could," said Raymond, speaking +with more like censure of his mother than he had ever done since the +hot days of his love for Camilla Vivian; "and you could have had +nothing to do with the personalities that seem to have been the +sting." + +Mrs. Poynsett, true boy-lover that she was, had been informed of the +success of Tom's naughtiness--not indeed till after it was over, +when there was nothing to be done but to shake her head and laugh; +and now she explained so that her son came to a better understanding +of what had happened. + +As to the extinguishing Women's Rights in child's play, he saw that +it had been a wise manoeuvre of his mother, to spare any appearance +of dissension, while preventing what she disapproved and what might +have injured his interests; but he was much annoyed with the De +Lanceys for having clogged the measure with their own folly; and +judging of cause by effect, he would hear of no excuse for Rosamond +or her brothers, and went away resolved that though nothing should +induce him to quarrel with Julius, yet he should tell him plainly +that he must restrain his wife and her brothers from annoying Cecil +by their practical jokes. He was, as usual, perfectly gentle to his +mother, and thanked her for her arrangement. "It was not her fault +that it had not turned out better," he said; and he did not seem to +hear her exoneration of Rosamond. + +He had scarcely gone when Rosamond came in from the village, asking +whether he had arrived, as she had seen his hat in the hall. + +"Yes, Rosamond. You did not tell me of Cecil's vexation!" + +"Cecil? Have I seen her since? No, I remember now. But is she +angry? Was it the dust-pan? Oh! Tom, Tom!" + +"That and the Blockhead. Did Tom say anything very cutting?" + +"Why it was an old stock charade they acted two years ago! I had +better tell her so." + +"If you would it would be an immense relief, my dear. Raymond is +very much annoyed; she says she will speak to nobody till she has +had an apology." + +"Then she can be as great a goose as I! Why, the Yankee muse and +Mrs. Duncombe took all in good part; but Cecil has not atom of fun +in her. Don't you think that was the gift the fairies left out at +the christening of the all-endowed princess?" + +Mrs. Poynsett laughed, but anxiously. "My dear, if you can make +peace, it will be a family blessing." + +"I! I'll eat any dirt in the world, and make Tom eat it too, rather +than you should be vexed, or make discord in the house," cried +Rosamond, kissing her, and speeding away to Cecil's door. + +It was Raymond who opened it, looking perturbed and heated, but a +good deal amazed at seeing his intended scapegoat coming thus boldly +to present herself. + +"Let me in," she breathlessly said. "I am come to tell Cecil how +sorry I am she was so much vexed; I really did not know it before." + +"I am ready to accept any proper apology that is offered me," said +Cecil, with cold dignity; "but I cannot understand your profession +that you did not know I was vexed. You could have intended nothing +else." + +"But, Cecil, you misunderstood--" began Rosamond. + +"I never misunderstand--" + +"No human creature can say that!" interposed Raymond, immensely +thankful to Rosamond--whatever her offence--for her overtures, and +anxious they should be accepted. + +"I could not," continued Cecil, "misunderstand the impertinent +insults offered to my friends and to myself; though if Lady Rosamond +is willing to acknowledge the impropriety I will overlook it." + +Raymond's face and neck crimsoned, but Raymond's presence helped her +to rein in her temper; and she thought of Julius, and refrained from +more than a "Very well. It was meant as a harmless joke, and--and +if you--you did not take it so, I am very sorry." + +Raymond saw the effort, and looked at his wife for softening; but as +he saw none, he met the advance by saying kindly, "I am sure it was +so meant, though the moment was unfortunate." + +"Indeed it was so," cried Rosamond, feeling it much easier to speak +to him, and too generous to profess her own innocence and give up +Tom. "It was just a moment's idle fancy--just as we've chaffed one +another a hundred times; and for the Blockhead, it is the boys' pet +old stock charade that they've acted scores of times. It was mere +thoughtlessness; and I'll do or say anything Cecil pleases, if only +she won't bother Julius or Mrs. Poynsett about our foolishness." +And the mist of tears shone in the dark lashes as she held out her +hand. + +"I cannot suppose it mere thoughtlessness--" began Cecil; but +Raymond cut her short with angry displeasure, of which she had not +supposed him capable. "This is not the way to receive so kind an +apology. Take Rosamond's hand, and respond properly." + +To respond _properly_ was as little in Cecil's power as her will; +but she had not been an obedient daughter for so large a proportion +of her life without having an instinct for the voice of real +authority, and she did not refuse her hand, with the words, "If you +express regret I will say no more about it." + +And Rosamond, thinking of Julius and his mother, swallowed the +ungraciousness, and saying "Thank you," turned to go away. + +"Thank you most heartily for this, my dear Rosamond," said Raymond, +holding out his hand as he opened the door for her; "I esteem it a +very great kindness." + +Rosamond, as she felt the strong pressure of his hand, looked up in +his face with a curious arch compassion in her great gray eyes. He +shut the door behind her, and saw Cecil pouting by the mantelpiece, +vexed at being forced into a reconciliation, even while she knew she +could not persist in sending all the family except Frank to +Coventry. He was thoroughly angry at the dogged way in which she +had received this free and generous peace-making, and he could not +but show it. "Well," he said, "I never saw an apology made with a +better grace nor received with a worse one." + +Cecil made no reply. He stood for a minute looking at her with eyes +of wondering displeasure, then, with a little gesture of amazement, +left the room. + +Cecil felt like the drowning woman when she gave the last scissor- +like gesture with her fingers. She was ready to fall into a chair +and cry. A sense of desolateness was very strong on her, and that +look in his dark eyes had seemed to blast her. + +But pride came to her aid. Grindstone was moving about ready to +dress her for dinner. No one should see that she was wounded, or +that she took home displeasure which she did not merit. So she held +up her head, and was chilling and dignified all dinner-time; after +which she repaired to Lady Tyrrell's conversazione. + + + + +CHAPTER XIX +The Monstrous Regiment of Women + + +Descend, my muse! + +Raymond had been invited by one of his fellow-guests to make a visit +at his house, and this was backed up on the morning after his return +by a letter containing a full invitation to both himself and his +wife. He never liked what he called "doing nothing in other +people's houses," but he thought any sacrifice needful that might +break up Cecil's present intimacies, and change the current of her +ideas; and his mother fully agreed in thinking that it would be well +to being a round of visits, to last until the Session of Parliament +should have begin. By the time it was over Julius and Rosamond +would be in their own house, and it might be easier to make a new +beginning. + +The friends whom he could reckon on as sure to welcome him and his +bride were political acquaintances of mark, far above the Dunstone +range, and Cecil could not but be gratified, even while Mrs. +Duncombe and her friend declared that they were going to try to +demoralize her by the seductions of the aristocracy. + +After all, Cecil was too much of an ingrained Charnock to be very +deeply imbued with Women's Rights. All that she wanted was her own +way, and opposition. Lady Tyrrell had fascinated her and secured +her affection, and she followed her lead, which was rather that of +calm curiosity and desire to hear the subject ventilated than actual +partisanship, for which her ladyship was far too clever, as well as +too secure in her natural supremacy. They had only seemed on that +side because other people were so utterly alien to it, and because +of their friendship with the really zealous Mrs. Duncombe. + +The sanitary cause which had become mixed with it was, however, +brought strongly before their minds by Mrs. Tallboys' final lecture, +at which she impressed on the ladies' minds with great vehemence +that here they might lead the way. If men would not act as a body, +the ladies should set the example, and shame them, by each doing her +very utmost in the cleansing of the nests of disease that reeked in +the worn-out civilization of the cities of the old country. The +ladies listened: Lady Tyrrell, with a certain interest in such an +eager flow of eloquence; Eleonora, with thoughts far away. Bessie +Duncombe expressed a bold practical determination to get one +fragment, at least, of the work done, since she knew Pettitt, the +hair-dresser, was public-spirited enough to allow her to carry out +her ideas on his property, and Cecil, with her ample allowance, as +yet uncalled for, in the abundance of her trousseau, promised to +supply what the hair-dresser could not advance, as a tangible proof +of her sincerity. + +She held a little council with Mrs. Duncombe at the working society, +when she resigned her day into that lady's hands on going away. "I +shall ask Mrs. Miles Charnock," said that lady. "You don't object?" + +"Oh no, only don't ask her till I'm gone, and you know she will only +come on condition of being allowed to expound." + +"We must have somebody, and now the thing has gone on so long, and +will end in three months, the goody element will not do much harm, +and, unluckily, most women will not act without it." + +"You have been trying to train Miss Moy." + +"I shall try still, but I can't get her to take interest in anything +but the boisterous side of emancipation." + +"I can't bear the girl," said Cecil; "I am sure she comes only for +the sake of the horses." + +"I'm afraid so; but she amuses Bob, and there's always a hope of +moving her father through her, though she declares that the Three +Pigeons is his tenderest point, and that he had as soon meddle with +it as with the apple of his eye. I suppose he gets a great rent +from that Gadley." + +"Do you really think you shall do anything with her?" said Cecil, +who might uphold her at home, but whose taste was outraged by her. + +"I hope so! At any rate, she is not conventional. Why, when I was +set free from my school at Paris, and married Bob three months +later, I hadn't three ideas in my head beyond horses and balls and +soldiers. It has all come with life and reading, my dear." + +And a very odd 'all' it was, so far; but there was this difference +between Bessie Duncombe and Cecil Charnock Poynsett, that the +'gospel of progress' was to the one the first she had ever really +known, and became a reaching forward to a newly-perceived standard +of benevolence and nobleness: to the other it was simply +retrograding, and that less from conviction than from the spirit of +rivalry and opposition. + +Lady Tyrrell with her father and sister were likewise going to leave +home, to stay among friends with whom Sir Harry could hunt until the +London campaign, when Eleonora was to see the world. Thus the +bazaar was postponed until the return of the ladies in the summer, +when the preparations would be more complete and the season more +suitable. The church must wait for it, for nothing like a +sufficient amount of subscription had been as yet promised. + +There was still, however, to come that select dinner-party at Mrs. +Duncombe's, to which Julius, moved by her zeal and honesty, as well +as by curiosity, had promised his presence with Rosamond, "at his +peril," as she said. + +They were kept so long at the door of Aucuba Villa that they had +begun to doubt if they had not mistaken the day, until the Sirenwood +carriage crashed up behind them; and after the third pull at the +bell they were admitted by an erect, alert figure,--a remnant of +Captain Duncombe's military life. + +He marshalled them into the drawing-room, where by dim firelight +they could just discern the Professor and a certain good-natured +horsey friend of the Captain's, who sprang up from easy-chairs on +the opposite sides of the fire to greet them, while the man hastily +stirred up the fire, lighted the gas, dashed at the table, shutting +up an open blotting-book that lay on it, closing an ink-bottle, and +gathering up some torn fragments or paper, which he would have +thrown into the scrap-basket but that it was full of little books on +the hundred ways of dressing a pumpkin. Then he gave a wistful look +at the ami de la maison, as if commending the guests to him, and +receiving a nod in return, retired. + +"I fear we are too early," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"Fact is," said the familiar, whose name Julius was trying to +remember, "there's been a catastrophe; cook forgot to order the +turkey, went to bed last night in hysterics, and blew out the gas +instead of turning it off. No, no"--as the guests expecting fatal +consequences, looked as if they thought they had better remove +themselves: "she came round, and Duncombe has driven over to +Backsworth to bring home the dinner. He'll soon be back." + +This not appearing greatly to reassure the visitors, the Professor +added, "No, no, ladies. Mrs. Duncombe charged me to say that she +will be perfectly fixed in a short time, and I flatter myself that +my wife is equal to any emergency." + +"It is very kind in her," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"I confess," said Professor Tallboys, "that I am not sorry that such +an occasion should occur of showing an American lady's domestic +powers. I flatter myself they do not discredit her cause." + +Just then were heard the wheels of the drag, and in rushed one of +the boys, grasping Eleonora's skirts, and proclaiming, "We've got +the grub! Oysters and a pie! Oh my!" + +"Satisfactory!" said the friend. "But let go, Ducky, you are +rumpling Miss Vivian." + +"She's coming to see the quarion! You promised, Lena! Here's a +jolly crayfish! He'll pinch!" + +There was a small conservatory or glazed niche on one side of the +room, into which the boy dragged Lenore, and Julius followed, dimly +sensible of what the quarion might be, and hoping for a word with +the young lady, while he trusted to his wife to occupy her sister. + +The place contained two desolate camellias, with leaves in the same +proportion as those on trees in the earlier ages of illumination, +and one scraggy, leafless geranium, besides a green and stagnant +tank, where a goldfish moved about, flapping and gasping, as the boy +disturbed it in his search for the crayfish. He absorbed all the +conversation, so that Julius could only look back into the room, +where an attempt at artistic effect was still dimly visible through +accumulated litter. The Venus of Milo stood on a bracket, with a +riding-whip in her arms, and a bundle of working society tickets +behind her, and her vis-a-vis, the Faun of Praxiteles, was capped by +a glove with one finger pointing upwards, and had a ball of worsted +tangled about his legs; but further observation was hindered by the +man-servant's voice at the outer door, "Master Ducky, where are you? +Your ma says you are to go to bed directly." + +"No, no, I'll put myself to bed!" + +"Come, sir, please do, like a good boy--Master Pinney won't go +without you, and I must put him to bed while they are dishing up. +Come, sir, I've got a mince-pie for you." + +"And some oysters--Bobby said I should have some oysters!" + +"Yes, yes; come along, sir." + +And Master Ducky submitted to his fate, while Julius looked his +wonder, and asked, "Is he nursery-maid?" + +"Just now, since the bonne went," said Lenore. "He is a most +faithful, attached servant, who will do anything for them. _She_ +does attach people deeply when the first shock is over." + +"I am coming to believe so," he answered. "There seem to me to be +excellent elements." + +"I am so glad!" said Lenore; "she is so thorough, so true and frank; +and much of this oddness is really an inconsistent struggle to keep +out of debt." + +"Well! at any rate I am thankful to her for this opportunity of +seeing you," said Julius. "We have both been longing to speak our +welcome to you." + +"Thank you. It is so kind," she fervently whispered; "all the +kinder for the state of things that is insisted on--though you know +that it can make no real difference," she added, apparently +addressing the goldfish. + +"Frank knows it," said Julius, in a low voice. + +"I trust he does, though I cannot see him to assure him--you will?" +she added, looking up at him with a shy brightness in her eye and a +flush on her cheek. + +"Yes, indeed!" he said, laying his hand on hers for a moment. "I +fear you may both have much to pull through, but I think you are of +a steadfast nature." + +"I hope so--I think I am, for none of my feelings seem to me ever to +change, except that I get harder, and, I am afraid, bitterer." + +"I can understand your feeling that form of trial." + +"Oh, if you could, and would help me!" + +"As a brother; if I may." + +Again she laid a hand on his, saying, "I have longed to talk openly +to you ever since we met in the cow-shed; but I could not make any +advance to any of you, because," she whispered in haste, "I thought +it my duty to hold back from Frank. And now, till we go away, +Camilla watches me and occupies me every minute, will not even let +me ride out with papa. I wonder she lets me talk to you now." + +"We know each other," said Julius, shortly. + +It was so. Once, in the plain-spoken days of childhood, Miles and +Julius had detected Camilla Vivian in some flagrant cheating at a +game, and had roundly expressed their opinion. In the subsequent +period of Raymond's courtship, Miles had succumbed to the +fascination, but Julius had given one such foil, that she had never +again attempted to cajole him. + +"I have seen that you did from the first," said Lenore. "And it +would make it much easier to talk to you than to any outsider, who +would never understand, even if it were possible for me to explain, +how hard it is to see which way my duty lies--especially filial." + +"Do you mean in general, or in this special matter?" + +"Both. You see, in her hands he is so different from what he was +before she came home, that I don't feel as if I was obeying him-- +only her; and I don't think I am bound to do that. Not in the great +matter, I am clear. Nobody can meddle with my real sincere pledge +of myself to Frank, nobody!" she spoke as if there was iron in her +lips. "But as far as overt acts go, they have a right to forbid me, +till I am of age at least, and we must bear it." + +"Yes, you are right there." + +"But there are thousands of other little cases of right and wrong, +and altogether I have come to such a spirit of opposition that I +find it easier to resist than to do anything with a good grace." + +"You cannot always tell when resistance is principle, and when +temper or distaste." + +"There's distaste enough always," said poor Lenore. + +"To gaieties?" he said, amazed as one habituated to his wife's +ravenous appetite for any sort of society or amusement. + +"Of course," she answered sadly. "A great deal of trouble just for +a little empty babble. Often not one word worth remembering, and a +general sense of having been full of bad feelings." + +"No enjoyment?" he asked in surprise. + +"Only by the merest chance and exception," she answered, surprised +at his surprise; "what is there to enjoy?" + +The peculiar-looking clergyman might have seemed more likely to ask +such a question than the beautiful girl, but he looked at her +anxiously and said, "Don't nourish morbid dislike and contempt, my +dear Lena, it is not a safeguard. There are such things as perilous +reactions. Try to weigh justly, and be grateful for kindness, and +to like what is likeable." + +At that moment, after what had been an interval of weary famine to +all but these two, host and hostess appeared, the lady as usual, +picturesque, though in the old black silk, with a Roman sash tied +transversely, and holly in her hair; and gaily shaking hands-- +"That's right, Lady Rosamond; so you are trusted here! Your husband +hasn't sent you to represent him?" + +"I'm afraid his confidence in me did not go so far," said Rosamond. + +"Ah! I see--Lady Tyrrell, how d'ye do--you've brought Lena? Well, +Rector, are you prepared?" + +"That depends on what you expect of me." + +"Have you the convinceable spot in your mind?" + +"We must find it. It is very uncommon, and indurates very soon, so +we had better make the most of our opportunity," said the American +lady, who had entered as resplendent as before, though in so +different a style that Rosamond wondered how such a wardrobe could +be carried about the world; and the sporting friend muttered, +"Stunning! she has been making kickshaws all day, and looks as if +she came out of a bandbox! If all women were like that, it might +pay." + +It was true. Mrs. Tallboys was one of those women of resource whose +practical powers may well inspire the sense of superiority, and with +the ease and confidence of her country. + +The meal was a real success. That some portion had been procured, +ready dressed, at Backsworth, was evident, but all that had been +done at home had a certain piquant Transatlantic flavour, in which +the American Muse could be detected; and both she and her husband +were polished, lively, and very agreeable, in spite of the twang in +their voices. Miss Moy, the Captain and his friend, talked horses +at one end of the table, and Rosamond faltered her woman's horror +for the rights of her sex, increased by this supposed instance. + +When the ladies rose at dessert, Mrs. Duncombe summoned him: "Come, +Rector!--come, Professor! you're not to sit over your wine." + +"We rise so far above the ordinary level of manhood!" said Julius, +obediently rising. + +"Once for all, Mr. Charnock," said Mrs. Duncombe, turning on him +with flashing eyes and her Elizabethan majesty, "if you come +prepared to scoff, we can have nothing to do with you." + +Rosamond's eyes looked mischievous, and her brow cocked, but Julius +answered in earnest, "Really, I assure you I have not come in a +spirit of sarcasm; I am honestly desirous of hearing your +arguments." + +"Shall I stay in your stead?" added Miss Moy. "They'll be much more +amusing here!" + +"Come, Gussie, you're on your good behaviour," said Mrs. Duncombe. +"Bob kept you to learn the right way of making a sensation." + +As they entered the drawing-room two more guests arrived, namely, +Joanna Bowater, and Herbert, who walked in with a kind of grim +submission, till he saw Lady Tyrrell, when he lighted up, and, on a +little gracious gesture with her hand, he sat down on the sofa +beside her; and was there solaced by an occasional remark in an +undertone; for indeed the boy was always in a trance wherever she +was, and she had a fair amount of by-play wherewith to entertain +herself and him during the discussion. + +"You are just in time, Jenny," said Rosamond; "the great question is +going to be started." + +"And it is--?" + +"The Equality of the Sexes," pronounced Mrs. Duncombe. + +"Ex cathedra?" said Julius, as the graceful Muse seated herself in a +large red arm-chair. "This scene is not an easy one in which to +dispute it." + +"You see, Bessie," said Mrs. Tallboys, "that men are so much afraid +of the discussion that they try to elude it with empty compliment +under which is couched a covert sneer." + +"Perhaps," returned Julius, "we might complain that we can't open +our lips without compliments and sneers being detected when we were +innocent of both." + +"Were you?" demanded Mrs. Tallboys. + +"Honestly, I was looking round and thinking the specimens before us +would tell in your favour." + +"What a gallant parson!" cried Miss Moy. + +But a perfect clamour broke out from others. + +"Julius, that's too bad! when you know--" + +"Mr Charnock, you are quite mistaken. Bob is much cleverer than I, +in his own line--" + +"Quite true, Rector," affirmed Herbert; "Joan has more brains than +all the rest of us--for a woman, I mean." + +"For a woman!" repeated Mrs. Tallboys. "Let a human being do or be +what she will, it is disposed of in a moment by that one verdict, +'Very well for a woman!'" + +"How is it with the decision of posterity?" said Jenny. "Can you +show any work of woman of equal honour and permanence with that of +men?" + +"Because her training has been sedulously inferior." + +"Not always," said Jenny; "not in Italy in the cinque cento, nor in +England under Elizabeth." + +"Yes, and there were names--!" + +"Names, yes, but that is all. The lady's name is remembered for the +curiosity of her having equalled the ordinary poet or artist of her +time, but her performances either are lost or only known to curious +scholars. They have not the quality which makes things permanent." + +"What do you say to Sappho?" + +"There is nothing of her but a name, and fragments that curious +scholars read." + +"Worse luck to her if she invented Sapphics," added Herbert. + +"One of womankind's torments for mankind, eh?" said his neighbour. + +"And there are plenty more such," asserted Mrs. Duncombe, boldly +(for these were asides). "It is only that one can't recollect--and +the men have suppressed them." + +"I think men praised them," said Jenny, "and that we remember the +praise, not the works. For instance, Roswitha, or Olympia Morata, +or Vittoria Colonna. Vittoria's sonnets are extant, but we only +value them as being hers, more for what she _was_ than for their +intrinsic merit." + +"And," added Eleonora, "men did not suppress Hannah More, or Joanna +Baillie. You know Scott thought Miss Baillie's dramas would rank +with Shakespeare's." + +Mrs. Tallboys was better read in logic and mathematics than in +history, and did not follow Jenny, but she turned her adversary's +argument to her own advantage, by exclaiming, "Are the gentlemen +present familiar with these bright lights?" + +"I confess my ignorance of some of them," said Julius. + +"But my youngest brother knows all that," said Rosamond at a brave +venture. + +"Macaulay's school-boy," murmured Lady Tyrrell, softly. + +"Let us return to the main point," said Mrs. Tallboys, a little +annoyed. "It is of the present and future that I would speak, not +of the past." + +"Does not the past give the only data on which to form a +conclusion?" said Julius. + +"Certainly not. The proposition is not what a woman or two in her +down-trodden state may have exceptionally effected, but her natural +equality, and in fact superiority, in all but the physical strength +which has imposed an unjust bondage on the higher nature." + +"I hardly know where to meet you if you reject all arguments from +proved facts," said Julius. + +"And the Bible. Why don't you say the Bible?" exclaimed his wife in +an undertone; but Mrs. Tallboys took it up and said, "The precepts +of Scripture are founded on a state of society passed away. You may +find arguments for slavery there." + +"I doubt that," said Julius. "There are practical directions for an +existing state of things, which have been distorted into sanction +for its continuance. The actual precepts are broad principles, +which are for all times, and apply to the hired servant as well as +to the slave. So again with the relations of man and wife; I can +nowhere find a command so adapted to the seclusion and depression of +the Eastern woman as to be inapplicable to the Christian matron. +And the typical virtuous woman, the valiant woman, is one of the +noblest figures anywhere depicted." + +"I know," said Mrs. Tallboys, who had evidently been waiting +impatiently again to declaim, "that men, even ministers of religion, +from Paul if you like downwards, have been willing enough to exalt +woman so long as they claim to sit above her. The higher the +oppressed, so much higher the self-exaltation of the oppressor. +Paul and Peter exalt their virtuous woman, but only as their own +appendage, adorning themselves; and while society with religious +ministers at the head of it call on woman to submit, and degrade the +sex, we shall continue to hear of such disgraces to England as I see +in your police reports--brutal mechanics beating their wives." + +"I fear while physical force is on the side of the brute," said +Julius, "no abstract recognition of equality would save her." + +"Society would take up her cause, and protect her." + +"So it is willing to do now, if she asks for protection." + +"Yes," broke in Rosamond, "but nothing would induce a woman worth +sixpence to take the law against her husband." + +"There I think Lady Rosamond has at once demonstrated the higher +nature of the woman," said Mrs. Tallboys. "What man would be +capable of such generosity?" + +"No one denies," said Julius, "that generous forbearance, patience, +fortitude, and self-renunciation, belong almost naturally to the +true wife and mother, and are her great glory; but would she not be +stripped of them by self-assertion as the peer in power?" + +"Turning our flank again with a compliment," said Mrs. Duncombe. +"These fine qualities are very convenient to yourselves, and so you +praise them up." + +"Not so!" returned Julius, "because they are really the higher +virtues!" + +"Patience!" at once exclaimed the American and English emancipators +with some scorn. + +"Yes," said Julius, in a low tone of thorough earnest. "The +patience of strength and love is the culmination of virtue." + +Jenny knew what was in his mind, but Mrs. Tallboys, with a curious +tone, half pique, half triumph, said, "You acknowledge this which +you call the higher nature in woman--that is to say, all the passive +qualities,--and you are willing to allow her a finer spiritual +essence, and yet you do not agree to her equal rights. This is the +injustice of the prejudice which has depressed her all these +centuries." + +"Stay," broke in Jenny, evidently not to the lady's satisfaction. +"That does not state the question. Nobody denies that woman is +often of a higher and finer essence, as you say, than man, and has +some noble qualities in a higher degree than any but the most +perfect men; but that is not the question. It is whether she have +more force and capacity than man, is in fact actually able to be on +an equality." + +"And, I say," returned Mrs. Tallboys, "that man has used brute force +to cramp woman's intellect and energy so long, that she has learnt +to acquiesce in her position, and to abstain from exerting herself, +so that it is only where she is partially emancipated, as in my own +country, that any idea of her powers can be gained." + +"I am afraid," said Julius, "that more may be lost to the world than +is gained! No; I am not speaking from the tyrant point of view. I +am thinking whether free friction with the world way not lessen that +sweetness and tender innocence and purity that make a man's home an +ideal and a sanctuary--his best earthly influence." + +"This is only sentiment. Innocence is worthless if it cannot stand +alone and protect itself!" said Mrs. Tallboys. + +"I do not mean innocence unable to stand alone. It should be strong +and trustworthy, but should have the bloom on it still, not rubbed +off by contact or knowledge of evil. Desire of shielding that bloom +from the slightest breath of contamination is no small motive for +self-restraint, and therefore a great preservative to most men." + +"Women purify the atmosphere wherever they go," said the lady. + +"Many women do," returned Julius; "but will they retain that power +universally if they succeed in obtaining a position where there will +be less consideration for them, and they must be exposed to a +certain hardening and roughening process?" + +"If so," exclaimed Mrs. Tallboys, "if men are so base, we would soon +assert ourselves. We are no frail morning glories for you to guard +and worship with restraint, lest forsooth your natural breath should +wither us away." + +As she spoke the door opened, and, with a strong reek of tobacco, in +came the two other gentlemen. "Well, Rector, have you given in?" +asked the Captain. "Is Lady Rosamond to mount the pulpit +henceforth?" + +"Ah! wouldn't I preach you a sermon," returned Rosamond. + +"To resume," said Mrs. Tallboys, sitting very upright. "You still +go on the old assumption that woman was made for you. It is all the +same story: one man says she is for his pleasure, another for his +servant, and you, for--for his refinement. You would all have us +adjectives. Now I defy you to prove that woman is not a +substantive, created for herself." + +"If you said 'growed,' Mrs. Tallboys, it would be more consistent," +said Jenny. "Her creation and her purpose in the world stand upon +precisely the same authority." + +"I wonder at you, Miss Bowater," said Mrs. Tallboys. "I cannot +understand a woman trying to depreciate her sex." + +"No," thrust in Gussie Moy; "I want to know why a woman can't go +about without a dowager waddling after her" ("Thank you," breathed +Lady Tyrrell into Herbert's ear), "nor go to a club." + +"There was such a club proposed in London," said Captain Duncombe, +"and do you know, Gussie, the name of it?" + +"No!" + +"The Middlesex Club!" + +"There! it is just as Mrs. Tallboys said; you will do nothing but +laugh at us, or else talk sentiment about our refining you. Now, I +want to be free to amuse myself." + +"I don't think those trifling considerations will be great +impediments in your way," said Lady Tyrrell in her blandest tone. +"Is that actually the carriage? Thank you, Mrs. Tallboys. This is +good-bye, I believe. I am sorry there has not been more time for a +fuller exposition to-night." + +"There would have been, but I never was so interrupted," said Mrs. +Tallboys in an undertone, with a displeased look at Jenny at the +other end of the room. + +Declamation was evidently more the Muse's forte than argument, but +her aside was an aside, and that of the jockey friend was not. "So +you waited for us to give your part of the lecture, Miss Moy?" + +"Of course. What's the use of talking to a set of women and +parsons, who are just the same?" + +Poor Herbert's indignant flush infinitely amused the party who were +cloaking in the hall. "Poor Gussie; her tongue runs fast," said +Mrs. Duncombe. + +"Emancipated!" said Jenny. "Good-bye, Mrs. Duncombe. Please let us +be educated up to our privileges before we get them." + +"A Parthian shot, Jenny," said Julius, as they gave her a homeward +lift in the carriage. "You proved yourself the fittest memberess +for the future parliament to-night." + +"To be elected by the women and parsons," said Jenny, with little +chuckle of fun. "Poor Herbert!" + +"I only wish that girl was a man that I might horsewhip her," the +clerical sentiment growled out from Herbert's corner of the +carriage. "Degradation of her sex! She's a standing one!" + + + + +CHAPTER XX +Vivienne + + +Of all the old women that ever I saw, +Sweet bad luck to my mother in law.--Irish Song + +The Parliamentary Session had reached the stage that is ended by no +power save that of grouse, and the streets were full of vans +fantastically decorated with baths, chairs, bedsteads, and nursery +gear. + +Cecil could see two before different house-doors as she sat behind +her muslin curtains, looking as fresh and healthful as ever, and +scarcely more matronly, except that her air of self-assertion had +become more easy and less aggressive now that she was undisputed +mistress of the house in London. + +There was no concern on her part that she was not the mother of +either of the two latest scions of the house of Charnock. Certainly +she did not like to be outdone by Rosamond; but then it was only a +girl, and she could afford to wait for the son and heir; indeed, she +did not yet desire him at the cost of all the distinguished and +intellectual society, the concerts, soirees, and lectures that his +non-arrival left her free to enjoy. The other son and heir +interested her nearly, for he was her half-brother. There had been +something almost ludicrous in the apologies to her. His mother +seemed to feel like a traitor to her, and Mr. Charnock could hardly +reconcile his darling's deposition with his pride in the newcomer. +Both she and Raymond had honestly rejoiced in their happiness and +the continuance of the direct line of Dunstone, and had completed +the rejoicing of the parents by thorough sympathy, when the party +with this unlooked-for addition had returned home in the spring. +Mrs. Charnock had insisted on endowing his daughter as largely as he +justly could, to compensate for this change in her expectations, and +was in doubt between Swanmore, an estate on the Backsworth side of +Willansborough, and Sirenwood itself, to purchase and settle on her. +Raymond would greatly have preferred Sirenwood, both from its +adjoining the Compton property and as it would be buying out the +Vivians; but there were doubts about the involvements, and nothing +could be done till Eleonora's majority. Mr. Charnock preferred +Swanmore as an investment, and Raymond could, of course, not press +his wishes. + +A short visit had been made at Dunstone to join in the festivities +in honour of the little heir, but Cecil had not been at Compton +since Christmas, though Raymond had several times gone home for a +Sunday when she had other companionship. Charlie had been with them +preparing his outfit for India whither he had been gone about a +month; and Frank, though living in lodgings, was the more frequently +at his sister-in-law's service, because wherever she was the Vivian +sisters might be looked for. + +No sooner had Raymond taken the house in --- Square than Lady +Tyrrell had engaged the opposite one, so that one household could +enjoy evening views of the other's interior, and Cecil had chiefly +gone into society under her friend's auspices. Her presentation at +Court had indeed been by the marchioness; she had been staying with +an old friend of Mrs. Poynsett's, quite prepared to be intimate with +Raymond Poynsett's wife, if only Cecil would have taken to her. But +that lady's acceptance of any one recommended in this manner was not +to be thought of, and besides, the family were lively, merry people, +and Cecil was one of those who dislike and distrust laughter, lest +it should be at themselves. So she remained on coldly civil terms +with that pleasant party, and though to a certain degree following +her husband's lead as to her engagements, all her ways were moulded +by her friend's influence. Nor was the effect otherwise than +becoming. Nothing could be in better taste than all in Mrs. +Charnock Poynsett's establishment, and London and Lady Tyrrell +together had greatly improved her manners. All her entertainments +went off well, and she filled her place in the world with grace and +skill, just as she had always figured herself doing. + +Yet there was a sense of disappointment and dissatisfaction, which +increased upon her as the time drew nearer for returning to be again +only a guest in her married home. It was a tangible grievance on +which her mind could fix itself. Surely it was hard on her that her +husband should require it of her, and yet she perceived that he +could not avoid it, since his mother was mistress. She knew too +that he was unfailingly kind, attentive, and indulgent, except on +that one occasion when he had sharply reproved her for her behaviour +in the Tallboys matter; and strange to say, a much stronger feeling +towards him had been setting in ever since that one time when she +had seen him thoroughly angry. She longed and craved to stir that +even, gentle courtesy to frowns or smiles; and yet there was a +perversity in her nature that seem to render it impossible to her to +attempt to win a smile from him, far more so to lay aside any device +or desire of her own to gratify him. All she did know was, that to +be all that her ambition had sought, a Charnock by marriage as well +as birth, and with a kind, considerate husband, was not enough to +hinder a heartsickness she had never known or supposed possible. + +Presently, through the flowers in her balcony, Cecil saw the opening +and closing of the opposite house-door, and a white parasol +unfurled, and she had only time to finish and address her letter to +Mrs. Duncombe before Lady Tyrrell was announced. + +"Here I am after a hard morning's work, winding up accounts, &c." + +"You go to-morrow?" + +"Yes, trusting that you will soon follow; though you might be a +cockney born, your bloom is town-proof." + +"We follow as soon as the division on the Education Question is +over, and that will not be for ten days. You are come to look at my +stores for the bazaar; but first, what are you going to do this +afternoon?" + +"What are your plans?" + +"I must leave cards at half-a-dozen people's at the other end of the +park. Will you come with me? Where is Lenore?" + +"She is gone to take leave of the Strangeways' party; Lady Susan +insisted on having her for this last day. Poor Frank! I confess +impartially that it does not look well for him." + +"Poor Frank!" repeated Cecil, "he does look very forlorn when he +hears where she is." + +"When, after all, if the silly boy could only see it, it is the most +fortunate thing that could happen to him, and the only chance of +keeping his head above water. I have made Lady Susan promise me two +of her daughters for the bazaar. They thoroughly know how to make +themselves useful. Oh, how pretty!" + +For Cecil was producing from the shelves of various pieces of +furniture a large stock of fancy articles--Swiss carvings, Spa toys, +Genevese ornaments, and Japanese curiosities, which, as Lady Tyrrell +said, "rivalled her own accumulation, and would serve to carry off +the housewives and pen-wipers on which all the old maids of +Wil'sbro' were employed." + +"We must put out our programmes," Cecil added; "people will not work +in earnest till the day is fixed and they know the sellers." + +"Yes, the lady patronesses are most important," said Lady Tyrrell, +writing them down: "Mrs. Raymond Charnock Poynsett; Lady Rosamond, +eh?" + +"Oh no, Julius won't hear of it." + +"And opposition is sweet: so we lose her romantic name, and the +stall of the three brides. Mrs. Miles Charnock is too much out of +the world to be worth asking. Then myself--Mrs. Duncombe, Mrs. +Fuller, as a matter of necessity, Mrs. Moy." + +"Oh!" + +"Needful, my dear, to propitiate that set. Also that mayoress, Mrs. +Truelove, isn't she? Six. We'll fill up with country people!" + +Six more distinguished names were soon supplied of ladies who would +give their patronage, provided neither toil nor care was required of +them; and still consulting, the two friends took their seats in the +carriage. The time of the bazaar was to be fixed by the opening of +the town-hall, which was to take place on the 12th of September--a +Thursday, the week before the races; and the most propitious days +appeared to be the Tuesday and Wednesday before the Great Backsworth +Cup Day, since the world would then be in an excited, pleasure- +seeking state, favourable to their designs. + +"I shall have a party in the house," said Lady Tyrrell: "shall you +be able?" + +"I can't tell; you know it does not depend on me, and I certainly +shall not ask it as a favour. Camilla, did I tell you that I tried +to make my father understand the state of things, and speak to +Raymond? But he would only say, that while I am so young and +inexperienced, it is a great advantage for me to live with Mrs. +Poynsett, and that I must be the greatest comfort to her. Papa is +an intense believer in Mrs. Poynsett, and when he once has taken up +a notion nothing will convince him." + +"You can't even make capital of this purchase of a house of your +own?" + +"I don't like to do that." + +"My dear, I see your delicacy and forbearance, and I would not urge +you, if I did not see how deeply your happiness is concerned. Of +course I don't mean merely the authority over the wirthschaft, +though somehow the cares of it are an ingredient in female +contentment; but forgive me, Cecil, I am certain that you will never +take your right place--where you care for it more--till you have a +home of your own." + +"Ah!" The responsive sound burst from the very depths of Cecil's +heart, penetrated as they had never been before; but pride and +reserve at once sprang up, and she answered coldly, "I have no +reason to complain." + +"Right, my dear Cecil, I like you the better;" and she pressed her +hand. + +"It is quite true," said Cecil, withdrawing hers. + +"Quite, absolutely true. He would die rather than give you any +reason for the slightest murmur; but, Cecil, dearest, that very +heedfulness shows there is something he cannot give you." + +"I don't know why you should say so," answered a proud but choked +voice. + +"I say so," replied the clear tones, firmly, though with a touch of +pity, "because I see it. Cecil, poor child, they married you very +young!" + +"I missed nothing," exclaimed Cecil; but she felt that she could +only say so in the past, and her eyes burnt with unshed tears. + +"No, my dear, you were still a girl, and your deeper woman's heart +had not grown to perceive that it was not met." + +"He chose me," she faintly said. + +"His mother needed a daughter. It was proper for him to marry, and +you were the most eligible party. I will answer for it that he +warned you how little he could give." + +"He did," cried Cecil. "He did tell me that he could not begin in +freshness and warmth, like a young man; but I thought it only meant +that we were too sensible to care about nonsense, and liked him for +it. He always must have been staid and reserved--he could never +have been different, Camilla. Don't smile in that way! Tell me +what you mean." + +"My dear Cecil, I knew Raymond Poynsett a good many years before you +did." + +"And--well? Then he had a first love?" said Cecil, in a voice +schooled into quiet. "Was he different then? Was he as desperate +as poor Frank is now?" + +"Frank is a very mild copy of him at that age. He overbore every +one, wrung consent from all, and did everything but overcome his +mother's calm hostility and self-assertion." + +"Did that stop it? She died of course," said Cecil. "She could not +have left off loving him." + +"She did not die, but her family were wearied out by the continual +objections to their overtures, and the supercilious way of treating +them. They thought it a struggle of influence, and that he was too +entirely dominated for a daughter-in-law to be happy with her. So +they broke it off." + +"And she--" Cecil looked up with searching eyes. + +"She had acutely felt the offence, the weakness, the dutifulness, +whatever you may choose to call it, and in the rebound she married." + +"Who is she?" gasped Cecil. + +"It is not fair to tell you," was the gentle answer, with a shade of +rebuke. "You need not look for her. She is not in the county." + +"I hope I shall never see her!" + +"You need not dread doing so if you can only have fair play, and +establish the power that belongs rightly to you. She would have no +chance with you, even if he had forgiven her." + +"Has not he?" + +"Never!" + +"And he used up all his heart?" said Cecil in a low, musing tone. + +"All but what his mother absorbed. She was a comparatively young +and brilliant woman, and she knew her power. It is a great +ascendancy, and only a man's honest blindness could suppose that any +woman would be content under it." + +Cecil's tongue refused to utter what oppressed her heart--those +evenings beside the sofa, those eager home expeditions for Sunday, +the uniform maintenance of his mother's supremacy. + +"And you think absence from her would lessen her influence?" + +"I am sure of it. There might be a struggle, but if I know Mr. +Charnock Poynsett rightly, he is too upright not to be conscious of +what is due to you, and be grieved not to be able to give you more-- +that is, when his mother is not holding him in her grasp. Nor can +there be any valid objection, since Mrs Miles Charnock is always at +her service." + +"She will return to Africa. I don't know why she and Rosamond have +been always so much more acceptable." + +"They are not her rivals; besides, they have not your strength. She +is a woman who tries to break whatever she cannot bend, and the +instant her son began to slip from her grasp the contest necessarily +began. You had much better have it over once and for ever, and have +him on your side. Insist on a house of your own, and when you have +made your husband happy in it, then, then--Ah! Good morning--Sir +George!" + +She had meant to say, "Then you win his heart," but the words would +not come, and a loathing hatred of the cold-hearted child who had a +property in Raymond so mastered her that she welcomed the +interruption, and did not return to the subject. + +She knew when she had said enough, and feared to betray herself; nor +could Cecil bear to resume the talk, stunned and sore as she was at +the revelation, though with no suspicion that the speaker had been +the object of her husband's affection. She thought it must have +been the other sister, now in India, and that this gave the key to +many allusions she had heard and which she marvelled at herself for +not having understood. The equivocation had entirely deceived her, +and she little thought she had been taking counsel with the rival +who was secretly triumphing in Raymond's involuntary constancy, and +sowing seeds of vengeance against an ancient enemy. + +She could not settle to anything when she came home. Life had taken +a new aspect. Hitherto she had viewed herself as born to all +attention and deference, and had taken it as a right, and now she +found herself the victim of a mariage de convenance to a man of +exhausted affections, who meant her only to be the attendant of his +domineering mother. The love that was dawning in her heart did but +add poignancy to the bitterness of the revelation, and fervour to +her resolve to win the mastery over the heart which was her lawful +possession. + +She was restless till his return. She was going to an evening +party, and though usually passive as to dress, she was so changeable +and difficult to satisfy that Grindstone grew cross, and showed it +by stern, rigid obedience. And Cecil well knew that Grindstone; who +was in authority in the present house, hated the return to be merely +the visitor of Alston and Jenkins. + +In the drawing-room Cecil fluttered from book to window, window to +piano again, throwing down her occupation at every sound and taking +up another; and when at last Raymond came in, his presence at first +made her musings seem mere fancies. + +Indeed it would have been hard to define what was wanting in his +manner. He lamented his unavoidable delay, and entertained her with +all the political and parliamentary gossip he had brought home, and +which she always much enjoyed as a tribute to her wisdom, so much +that it had been an entire, though insensible cure for the Rights of +Woman. Moreover, he was going with her to this 'drum,' though he +would greatly have preferred the debate, and was to be summoned in +case of a division. She knew enough of the world to be aware that +such an attentive and courteous husband was not the rule. But what +was courtesy to one who longed for unity? + +"Is Frank to be there this evening?" he asked. + +"Yes, I believe so." + +"I thought he was to have gone with us." + +"He told me not to depend on him. He had made an engagement to ride +into the country with Sir Harry Vivian." And she added, though the +proud spirit so hated what seemed to her like making an advance that +it sounded like a complaint, "So you can't avoid going with me?" + +"I should any way have gone with you, but I may have to leave you to +Frank to see you away," he said. "And I had rather have Frank here +than with that set." + +"Breaking up one of our few tete-a-tete evenings, and they are +becoming few enough!" + +This murmur gratified him, and he said, "We shall be more alone +together now. The Rectory is almost ready, and Julius means to move +in another week, and I suppose Miles will carry Anne off before the +year is over." + +"Yes, we are the only ones with no home." + +"Rather, we hold fast to the old home." + +"Not my old home." + +"Does not mine become yours?" + +"Not while--." She paused and started afresh. "Raymond, could we +not live at Swanslea, if it is bought for us?" + +"Swanslea! Five miles off! Impossible." + +Cecil was silent. + +"My dear Cecil," he said, after a few moments' consideration, "I can +understand that you felt unfortunately crowded last year, but all +that is over, and you must see that we are necessary to my mother, +and that all my duties require me to live at home." + +"You could attend to the property from Swanslea." + +"The property indeed! I meant my mother!" + +"She has Anne." + +"Anne will soon be in Africa--even if she were more of a companion. +I am sorry it is a trial to you; for my proper place is clearly with +my mother, the more in her helpless state, and with my brothers gone +out into the world. Now that the numbers are smaller, you will find +it much easier to take the part that I most earnestly wish should be +yours." + +"I cannot get on with her." + +"Do not say so! Do not think so! To have Rosamond there with her +Irish ease, and her reserve, kept you in the background before; I +say it, but I could not help it; and now there will be no hindrance +to your drawing together. There is nothing I so desire." + +If the carriage had not stopped as he spoke Cecil would not have +uttered the thought that smote her, namely, that his desire was on +behalf, not of his wife, but of his mother, to whom he was ready to +sacrifice her happiness without a pang. She did not see that he +could imagine no greater happiness for her than a thorough love of +his mother. + +They certainly were not the happiest couple present as they walked +up-stairs, looking like a model husband and wife, with their name +echoing from landing to landing. + +If any expression savouring of slang could possibly be applied to +Raymond, he might be said to be struck all of a heap by his wife's +proposition. He had never even thought of the possibility of making +a home anywhere but at Compton Poynsett, or of his wife wishing that +he should do so; and proverbial sayings about the incompatability of +relatives-in-law suddenly assumed a reasonableness that he could not +bear to remember. + +But his courtesy and sense of protection, trained by a woman of the +old school, would not suffer him to relax his attention to his wife. +Though he was very anxious to get back to the house, he would not +quit her neighbourhood till he had found Frank and intrusted her to +him. + +He was not happy about Frank. The youth was naturally of an +intellectual and poetical temperament, and had only cared for horses +and field-sports as any healthy lad growing up in a country house +must enjoy them; and Raymond had seen him introduced to the style of +men whom he thought would be thoroughly congenial to him, and not +unlikely to lead him on to make a mark in the world. + +But that unfortunate Vivian attachment stood in the way; Sir Harry +and his elder daughter ignored it entirely, but did not forbid Frank +the house; though Lady Tyrrell took care, as only she could do, that +Eleonora should never have ten minutes private conversation with +him, either at home or abroad. Even in a crowd, a ball, or garden- +party, the vigilant sister had her means of breaking into any kind +of confidence; and Frank was continually tantalized by the pursuit. +It could not but unsettle him, and draw him into much more gaiety +than was compatible with the higher pursuits his mother had expected +of him; and what was worse, it threw him into Sir Harry Vivian's +set, veteran roues, and younger men who looked up to their +knowingness and listened to their good stories. + +What amount of harm it was doing Raymond could not guess. He had +known it all himself, and had escaped unscathed, but he did not fear +the less for his younger brother, and he only hoped that the +inducement to mingle with such society would be at an end before +Frank had formed a taste for the habits that there prevailed. + +Eleonora Vivian had been much admired at first, but her cold manner +kept every one at a distance, and her reserve was hardly ever seen +to relax. However, her one friendship with the Strangeways family +gave Raymond hopes that her constancy was not proof against the +flattering affection, backed by wealth, that seemed to await her +there. The best he could wish for Frank was that the infatuation +might be over as soon as possible, though he pitied the poor fellow +sincerely when he saw him, as he did to-night, waiting with scarcely +concealed anxiety while Miss Vivian stood listening to a long +discourse about yachting from an eager pair of chattering girls. + +Then some break occurred, and Frank moved up to her. "Your last +evening! How little I have seen of you!" + +"Little indeed!" + +"I called, but you were at the Strangeways'." + +"They are very kind to me. When is your holiday?" + +"Not till spring, but I may get a few days in the autumn: you will +be at home?" + +"As far as I know." + +"If I thought for a moment you cared to see me; but you have shown +few signs of wishing it of late." + +"Frank--if I could make you understand--" + +They were walking towards a recess, when Lady Tyrrell fastened upon +Raymond. "Pray find my sister; she forgets that we have to be at +Lady Granby's--Oh! are you there, Lenore! Will you see her down, +Mr. Poynsett? Well, Frank, did you get as far as you intended?" + +And she went down on his arm, her last words being, "Take care of +yourself till we meet at home. For this one year I call Sirenwood +home--then!" + +Raymond and Lenore said no more to one another. The ladies were put +into the carriage. The elder brother bade Frank take care of Cecil, +and started for Westminster with the poor lad's blank and +disappointed face still before his eyes, hoping at least it was well +for him, but little in love with life, or what it had to offer. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXI +Awfully Jolly + + +When life becomes a spasm, + And history a whiz, +If that is not sensation, + I don't know what it is.--LEWIS CARROLL + +"Is Lady Rosamond at home?" + +"No, ma'am." + +"Nor Mrs. Charnock?" + +"No, ma'am; they are both gone down to the Rectory." + +"Would you ask whether Mrs. Poynsett would like to see me?" + +"I'll inquire, ma'am, if you will walk in," said Mr. Jenkins moved +by the wearied and heated looks of Miss Vivian, who had evidently +come on foot at the unseasonable visiting hour of 11.15 a.m. + +The drawing-room was empty, but, with windows open on the shady +side, was most inviting to one who had just become unpleasantly +aware that her walking capacity had diminished under the stress of a +London season, and that a very hampering one. She was glad of the +rest, but it lasted long enough to be lost in the uncomfortable +consciousness that hers was too truly a morning call, and she would +have risen and escaped had not that been worse. + +At last the door of communication opened, and to her amazement Mrs. +Poynsett was pushed into the room by her maid in a wheeled chair. +"Yes, my dear," she said, in reply to Eleonora's exclamation of +surprise and congratulation, "this is my dear daughters' +achievement; Rosamond planned and Anne contrived, and they both +coaxed my lazy bones." + +"I am so very glad! I had no notion I should see you out of your +room." + +"Such is one's self-importance! I thought the fame would have +reached you at least." + +"Ah, you don't know how little I see of any one I can hear from! +And now I am afraid I have disturbed you too early." + +"Oh no, my dear; it was very good and kind, and I am only grieved +that you had so long to wait; but we will make the most of each +other now. You will stay to luncheon?" + +"Thank you, indeed I am afraid I must not: papa would not like it, +for no one knows where I am." + +"You have taken this long walk in the heat, and are going back! I +don't like it, my dear; you look fagged. London has not agreed with +you." + +Mrs. Poynsett rang her little hand-bell, and ordered in biscuits and +wine, and would have ordered the carriage but for Lenore's urgent +entreaties to the contrary, amounting to an admission that she +wished her visit to be unnoticed at home. This was hardly settled +before there was a knock at the door, announcing baby's daily visit; +and Miss Julia was exhibited by her grandmamma with great +satisfaction until another interruption came, in a call from the +doctor, who only looked in occasionally, and had fallen on this +unfortunate morning. + +"Most unlucky," said Mrs. Poynsett. "I am afraid you will doubt +about coming again, and I have not had one word about our Frankie." + +"He is very well. I saw him at a party the night before we left +town. Good-bye, dear Mrs. Poynsett." + +"You will come again?" + +"If I can; but the house is to be full of visitors. If I don't, you +will know it is because I can't." + +"I shall be thankful for whatever you can give me. I wish I could +save you that hot walk in the sun." + +But as Mrs. Poynsett was wheeled into her own room some compensation +befell Eleonora, for she met Julius in the hall, and he offered to +drive her to the gates of Sirenwood in what he called 'our new +plaything, the pony carriage,' on his way to a clerical meeting. + +"You are still here?" she said. + +"Till Tuesday, when we go to the Rectory to receive the two De +Lancey boys for the holidays." + +"How Mrs. Poynsett will miss you." + +"Anne is a very efficient companion," said Julius, speaking to her +like one of the family; "the pity is that she will be so entirely +lost to us when Miles claims her." + +"Then they still mean to settle in Africa?" + +"Her heart has always been there, and her father is in treaty for a +farm for him, so I fear there is little hope of keeping them. I +can't think what the parish will do without her. By the bye, how +does Joe Reynolds get on with his drawings?" + +"I must show them to you. He is really very clever. We sent him to +the School of Art twice a week, and he has got on wonderfully. I +begin to believe in my academician." + +"So you don't repent?" + +"I think not. As far as I can judge he is a good boy still. I make +him my escort to church, so that I am sure of him there. Renville +would have taken him for a boy about his studio, and I think he will +go there eventually; but Camilla thinks he may be an attraction at +the bazaar, and is making him draw for it." + +"I was in hopes that the bazaar would have blown over, but the +Bishop has been demanding of Fuller and his churchwardens how soon +they mean to put the building in hand, and this seems to be their +only notion of raising money." + +"I am very glad of this opportunity of asking what you think I had +better do about it. Your wife takes no part in it?" + +"Certainly not; but I doubt whether that need be a precedent for +you. I am answerable for her, and you could hardly keep out of it +without making a divided household." + +"I see the difference, and perhaps I have made myself quite +unpleasant enough already." + +"As the opposition?" + +"And Camilla has been very kind in giving me much more freedom than +I expected, and pacifying papa. She let me go every Friday evening +to help Lady Susan Strangeways at her mothers' meeting." + +"Lady Susan Strangeways! I have heard of her." + +"She has been my comforter and help all this time. She is all +kindness and heartiness,--elbow-deep in everything good. She got up +at five o'clock to finish the decorations at St. Maurice's, and to- +day she is taking five hundred school-children to Windsor forest." + +"Is she the mother of the young man at Backsworth?" + +"Yes," said Eleonora, in rather a different tone. "Perhaps she goes +rather far; and he has flown into the opposite extreme, though they +say he is improving, and has given up the turf, and all that sort of +thing." + +"Was he at home? I heard he was on leave." + +"He was said to be at home, but I hardly ever saw him. He was +always out with his own friends when I was there." + +"I should not suppose Lady Susan's pursuits were much in his line. +Is not one of the daughters a Sister?" + +"Yes, at St. Faith's. She was my great friend. The younger ones +are nice girls, but have not much in them. Camilla is going to have +them down for the bazaar." + +"What, do they patronize bazaars?" + +"Everything that is _doing_ they patronize. I have known them be +everywhere, from the Drawing-room to a Guild-meeting in a back slum, +and all with equal appetite. That is one reason why I fear I shall +not see much of your mother; they are never tired, and I shall never +get out alone. The house is to be full of people, and we are to be +very gay." + +She spoke with a tone that betrayed how little pleasure she +expected, though it strove to be uncomplaining; and Julius, who had +learnt something of poor Frank's state of jealous misery, heartily +wished the Strangeways family further, regarding the intimacy as a +manoeuvre of Lady Tyrrell's, and doubting how far all Eleonora's +evident struggles would keep her out of the net; and though while +talking to her he had not the slightest doubt of her sincerity, he +had not long set her down at the lodge before he remembered that she +was a Vivian. + +Meantime Rosamond, carrying some medicament to old Betty Reynolds, +found the whole clan in excitement at the appearance of Joe in all +his buttons, looking quite as honest and innocent, though a good +deal more civilized, than when he was first discovered among the +swine. + +"Only to think," said his great-grandmother, "that up in London all +they could gie to he was a bad penny." + +"It is the bronze medal, my lady," said Joshua, with a blush; "the +second prize for crayons in our section." + +"Indeed," cried Rosamond. "You are a genius, Joe, worthy of your +namesake. There are many that would be proud to have the grandson +you have, Betty." + +"Tubby sure," added an aunt-in-law, "'tis cheap come by. Such +things to make a young lad draught. They ought to be ashamed of +themselves, they did oughter. Shut it up, Josh; don't be showing it +to the lady--'tis nothing but the bare back of a sweep." + +"My lady and Miss Vivian have seen it," said Joshua, blushing. +"'Tis torso, my lady, from a cast from the museum." + +"A black-looking draught," repeated the grandmother. "I tells Joe +if he drawed like King Geaarge's head up at Wil'sbro' on the sign, +with cheeks like apples, and a gould crown atop, he'd arn his +bread." + +"All in good time, Betty. He can't colour till he can draw. I'm +glad to see him looking so well." + +"Yes, my lady, he do have his health torrablish, though he lives in +a underground sort of a place; and they fine servants puts upon he +shameful." + +"Granny!" muttered Joshua, in expostulation. + +"He's a brave boy, and does not mind roughing it, so he can get on," +said Rosamond. + +"And the ladies are very good to me," said the boy. + +"Show Lady Rosamond the draught you did of Miss Vivian, like a +hangel," suggested the aunt. + +The rising artist coloured, saying, "Please, my lady, don't name it +to no one. I would not have shown it, but little Bess, she pulled +down all my things on the floor when I was not looking. It is from +memory, my lady, as she looks when she's doing anything for Sir +Harry." + +It was a very lovely sketch--imperfect but full of genius, and +wonderfully catching, the tender, wistful look which was often on +Eleonora's face, as she waited on her father. Rosamond longed that +Frank should see it; but the page was very shy about it, and his +grandmother contrasted it with the performances of the painter 'who +had draughted all the farmers' wives in gould frames for five pound +a head; but satin gownds and gold chains was extry.' + +But Joe had brought her a pound of tea, and an 'image' for her +mantelpiece, which quite satisfied her, though the image, being a +Parian angel of Thorwaldsen's, better suited his taste than its +surroundings. + +The whole scene served Rosamond for a narrative in her most lively +style for Mrs. Poynsett's amusement that evening. There was the +further excitement of a letter from Miles, and the assurance that he +would be at home in November. Anne had become far less chary of +communications from his letters than she had at first been, but of +this one she kept back so large a portion in public, that the +instant Mrs. Poynsett had bidden them good night and been wheeled +away, Rosamond put a hand on each shoulder, and looking into her +face, said, "Now, Anne, let us hear! Miles has found Archie +Douglas. It is no use pretending. Fie, Mrs. Anne, why can't you +tell me?" + +"I was not to tell any one but Julius." + +"Well, I'm Julius. Besides, wasn't I at the very bottom of the +tracing him out? Haven't I the best right to know whether it is bad +or good?" + +"Not bad, I am sure," said Julius, quickly and anxiously. + +"Oh, no, not bad," answered Anne. "He has seen him--had him on +board for a night." + +"Where?" + +"Off Durban. But this whole sheet about it is marked 'Private--only +for Julius,' so I could say nothing about it before your mother. I +have hardly glanced at it myself as yet, but I think he says Mr. +Douglas made him promise not to tell her or Joanna Bowater." + +"Not tell Jenny!" cried Rosamond. "And you said it was not bad. He +must have gone and married!" + +"I do not think that is it," said Anne; "but you shall hear. Miles +says:--'I have at last seen our poor Cousin Archie. I told you I +was following up your brother Sandie's hint about the agents for the +hunters; and at last I fell in with a merchant, who, on my inquiry, +showed me an invoice that I could have sworn to as in Archie's hand, +and described his white hair. It seems he has been acting as +manager on an ostrich farm for the last three years, far up the +country. So I lost no time in sending up a note to him, telling +him, if he had not forgotten old times, to come down and see me +while I was lying off Durban Bay. I heard no more for ten days, and +had got in the stores and was to sail the next day, thinking he had +given us all up, when a boat hailed us just come over the bar. I +saw Archie's white head, and in ten minutes I had him on deck. 'For +Heaven's sake--am I cleared, Miles?' was the first thing he said; +and when I could not say that he was, it went to my heart to see how +the eager look sank away, and he was like a worn-down man of fifty. +Poor fellow, I found he had ridden two hundred miles, with the hope +that I had brought him news that his innocence was proved, and the +revulsion was almost more than he could bear. You see, he had no +notion that we thought him dead, and so he took the entire absence +of any effort to trace him as acquiescence in his guilt; and when he +found out how it was, he laid me under the strongest injunctions to +disclose to no one that he is living--not that he fears any results, +but that he says it would only disturb every one and make them +wretched--" + +"He must have gone and married. The wretch!" broke in Rosamond. + +"No, oh no!" cried Anne. "Only hear the rest. 'I told him that I +could not see that at all, and that there was a very warm and tender +remembrance of him among us all, and he nearly broke down and said, +'For Heaven's sake then, Miles, let them rest in that! There's more +peace for them so.' I suppose I looked--I am sure I did not speak-- +as though I were a little staggered as to whether he were ashamed to +be known; for he drew himself up in the old way I should have known +anywhere, and told me there was no reason I should fear to shake +hands with him; however his name might be blasted at home, he had +done nothing to make himself unworthy of his mother and Jenny--and +there was a sob again. So I let him know that up to my last letters +from home Jenny was unmarried. I even remembered those descriptive +words of yours, Nannie, 'living in patient peacefulness and +cheerfulness on his memory.'" + +"I was called on deck just then, so I gave him my home photograph- +book, and left him with it. I found him crying like a child over it +when I came back; I was obliged to strip it of all my best for him, +for I could not move him. We went through the whole of the old +story, to see if there were any hope; and when he found that Tom +Vivian was dead, and George Proudfoot too, without a word about him, +he seemed to think it hopeless. He believes that Proudfoot at +least, if not Moy, was deeply in debt to Vivian, though not to that +extent, and that Vivian probably incited them to 'borrow' from my +mother's letter. He was very likely to undertake to get the draft +cashed for them, and not to account for the difference. It may have +helped to hasten his catastrophe. Moy I never should have +suspected; Archie says he should once have done so as little; but he +was a plausible fellow, and would do things on the sly, while all +along appearing to old Proudfoot as a mentor to George. Archie +seemed to feel his prosperity the bitterest pill of all--reigning +like one of the squirearchy at Proudfoot Lawn--a magistrate +forsooth, with his daughter figuring as an heiress. One thing worth +note--Archie says, that when it was too late, he remembered that the +under-clerk, Gadley, might not have gone home, and might have heard +him explain that the letter had turned up.'" + +"Gadley? Why that's the landlord of the 'Three Pigeons!'" exclaimed +Rosamond. "It is Mr. Moy's house, and he supports him through thick +and thin." + +"Yes," said Julius, "the magistrates have been on the point of +taking away his license, but Moy always stands up for him. There is +something suspicious in that." + +"I heard Miss Moy, with my own ears, tell Mrs. Duncombe that he was +the apple of her father's eye," cried Rosamond. + +"He's bribed! he's bribed! Oh, I see it all. Well, go on, Anne. +If Archie isn't at home before he is a year older--" + +Anne went on. "'He allowed that he would have done more wisely in +facing it out and standing his trial; but he said, poor fellow, that +he felt as if the earth had given way under him. There was not a +soul near who believed him; they brought his father's history +against him, and moreover he had been at the races, and had been +betting, though in fact he had won, and not lost, and the 201. he +had become possessed of was his capital, besides the little he could +draw out of the bank + +"'If he could only have seen Jenny in London she would have turned +him back. Indeed, that first stage was to consult her, but he +fancied he saw the face of the Wil'sbro' Superintendent in a cab, +and the instinct of avoiding arrest carried him to Southampton, +where he got a steerage berth in a sailing vessel, and came out to +the Cape. He has lived hard enough, but his Scots blood has stood +him in good stead, and he has made something as an ivory-hunter, and +now has a partnership in an ostrich farm in the Amatongula country. +Still he held to it that it was better he should continue dead to +all here, since Mr. Bowater would never forgive him; and the +knowledge of his existence would only hinder Jenny's happiness. You +should have seen the struggle with which he said that! He left me +no choice, indeed; forbade a word to any one, until I suggested that +I had a wife, and that my said wife and Julius had put me on the +scent. He was immensely struck to find that my sweet Nan came from +Glen Fraser. He said the evenings he spent there had done more to +renew his home-sickness, and made him half mad after the sight or +sound of us, than anything else had done, and I got him to promise +to come and see us when we are settled in the bush. What should you +say to joining him in ostrich-hatching? or would it be ministering +too much to the vanities of the world? However, I'll do something +to get him cleared, if it comes to an appeal to old Moy himself, +when I come home. Meantime, remember, you are not at liberty to +speak a word of this to any one but Julius, and, I suppose, his +wife. I hope--' There, Rose, I beg your pardon." + +"What does he hope?" asked Rosamond. + +"He only hopes she is a cautious woman." + +"As cautious as his Nan, eh? Ah, Anne! you're a canny Scot, and +maybe think holding your tongue as fine a thing as this Archie does; +but I can't bear it. I think it is shocking, just wearing out the +heart of the best and sweetest girl in the world." + +"At any rate," said Julius, "we must be silent. We have no right to +speak, however we may feel." + +"You don't expect it will stay a secret, or that he'll go and pluck +ostriches like geese, with Miles and Anne, and nobody know it? +'Twould be taking example by their ostriches, indeed!" + +"I think so," said Julius, laughing; "but as it stands now, silence +is our duty by both Miles and Archie, and Anne herself. We must not +make her repent having told us." + +"It's lucky I'm not likely to fall in with Jenny just yet," said +Rosamond. "Don't leave me alone with her, either of you; if you do, +it is at your peril. It is all very well to talk of honour and +secrets, but to see the look in her eyes, and know he is alive, +seems to me rank cruelty and heartlessness. It is all to let Miles +have the pleasure of telling when he comes home." + +"Miles is not a woman, nor an Irishwoman," said Julius. + +"But he's a sailor, and he's got a feeling heart," said Rosamond; +"and if he stands one look of Jenny, why, I'll disown him for the +brother-in-law I take him for. By the bye, is not Raymond to know?" + +"No," said Anne; "here is a postscript forbidding my telling him or +Mrs. Poynsett." + +"Indeed! And I suppose Herbert knows nothing?" + +"Nothing. He was a boy at school at the time. Say nothing to him, +Rose." + +"Oh, no; besides, his brain is all run to cricket." + +It was but too true. When the sun shone bright in April, and the +wickets were set up, Herbert had demonstrated that his influence was +a necessity on the village green; and it was true that his goodly +and animated presence was as useful morally to the eleven as it was +conducive to their triumphs; so his Rector suppressed a few sighs at +the frequency of the practices and the endless matches. Compton had +played Wil'sbro' and Strawyers, Duddingstone and Woodbury; the choir +had played the school, the single the married; and when hay and +harvest absorbed the rustic eleven, challenges began among their +betters. The officers played the county--Oxonians, Cantabs-- +Etonians, Harrovians--and wherever a match was proclaimed, that +prime bowler, the Reverend Herbert Bowater, was claimed as the +indispensable champion of his cause and country. + +If his sister had any power to moderate his zeal, she had had little +chance of exercising it; for Mrs. Bowater had had a rheumatic fever +in March, and continued so much of an invalid all the summer that +Jenny seldom went far from home, only saw her brother on his weekly +visits to the sick-room, and was, as Rosamond said, unlikely to +become a temptation to the warm heart and eager tongue. + +* * * * * + +The week-day congregation were surprised one August morning at eight +o'clock by the entrance of three ladies in the most recent style of +fashionable simplicity, and making the most demonstrative tokens of +reverence. As the Rector came out he was seized upon at once by the +elder lady. + +"Mr. Charnock! I must introduce myself; I knew your dear mother so +well when we were both girls. I am so delighted to find such a +church--quite an oasis; and I want to ascertain the best hour for +calling on her. Quite an invalid--I was so shocked to hear it. +Will the afternoon suit her? I am only here for three days to +deposit these two girls, while I take the other on a round of +visits. Three daughters are too great an affliction for one's +friends, and Bee and Conny are so delighted to be near their brother +and with dear Lena Vivian, that I am very glad above all, since I +find there are real church privileges--so different from the Vicar +of Wil'sbro'. Poor man; he is a great trial." + +All this was said between the church and the lych-gate, and almost +took Julius's breath away; but Mrs. Poynsett was prepared to welcome +her old friend with some warmth and more curiosity. + +Lady Susan Strangeways was a high-bred woman, but even high breeding +could not prevent her from being overwhelming, especially as there +was a great deal more of her than there had been at the last meeting +of the friends, so that she was suggestive of Hawthorne's inquiry, +whether a man is bound to so many more pounds of flesh than he +originally wedded. However, it was prime condition, and activity +was not impeded, but rather received impetus. She had already, +since her matutinal walk of more than a mile and back, overhauled +the stores for the bazaar, inspected the town-hall, given her +advice, walked through the ruins for the church, expressed herself +strongly on the horrors of the plan, and begun to organize shilling +cards, all before Sir Harry had emerged from his room. + +She was most warm-hearted and good-natured, and tears glistened in +her honest gray eyes as she saw her old friend's helpless state. +"You don't know how much I have improved," said Mrs. Poynsett; "I +feel quite at liberty in this chair, all owing to my good daughters- +in-law." + +"Ah! I have so pitied you for having no girls! My dear daughters +have been so entirely one with me--such a blessing in all I have +gone through." + +Mrs. Poynsett of course declared her complete comfort in her five +sons, but Lady Susan was sure that if she had had as many boys, +instead of one son and four daughters, she should have been worn +out. Lorimer was a dear, affectionate fellow. Those he loved could +guide him with a leash of gossamer, but young men in his position +were exposed to so many temptations! There ensued a little sighing +over the evils of wealth; and to see and hear the two ladies, no one +would have thought that Julia Poynsett had married a young man for +love--Susan Lorimer an old man for independence. + +Possibly with her present principles she would not have done so; but +through the vista of a long and prosperous widowhood deficiencies in +the courtship were easily forgotten; and perhaps there was the more +romance and sentiment now because she had been balked of it in her +youth. She had freely allowed her eldest daughter to enter a +sisterhood from the purest, most unselfish motives, but there was +compensation in talking of her Margaret as a Sister of Mercy. + +And ere long she was anxiously inquiring Mrs. Poynsett's opinion of +Eleonora Vivian, and making confidences somewhat trying to the +mother of the young lady's ardent lover. + +She was quite aware that as to fortune there could hardly be a worse +match than Miss Vivian; but she was sensible enough to see that her +son had a sufficiency, and generous enough to like the idea of +redeeming the old estate. Her husband had spent his latter years in +a vain search for a faultless property, and his wealth was waiting +for Lorimer's settling down. She had always regretted the having no +vassals rightfully her own, and had felt the disadvantages of being +Lady Bountiful only by tenant right. To save an old estate from +entirely passing out of a family, and relieve 'a noble old wreck,' +like Sir Harry, seemed to her so grand a prospect that she could not +but cast a little glamour over the manner of the shipwreck. Still, +to do her justice, her primary consideration was the blessing such a +woman as Lenore might be to her son. + +She had not fathomed Lady Tyrrell. No woman could do so without +knowing her antecedents, but she understood enough to perceive that +Eleonora was not happy with her, and this she attributed to the +girl's deep nature and religious aspirations. Rockpier was an +ecclesiastical paradise to Lady Susan, and a close bond with Lenore, +to whom in London she had given all the facilities that lay in her +power for persevering in the observances that were alien to the gay +household at home. She valued this constancy exceedingly, and +enthusiastically dilated on the young lady's goodness, and +indifference to the sensation she had created. "Lorimer allows he +never saw her equal for grace and dignity." + +Allows! Fancy Frank _allowing_ any perfection in his Lenore! Was +it not possible that a little passing encomium on unusual beauty was +being promoted and magnified by the mother into a serious +attachment? But Lady Tyrrell was playing into her hands, and +Lenore's ecclesiastical proclivities were throwing her into the arms +of the family! + +It hardly seemed fair to feign sympathy, yet any adverse hint would +be treason, and Mrs. Poynsett only asked innocently whether her +friend had seen her son Frank. + +"Oh yes, often; the handsomest of all your sons, is he not?" + +"Perhaps he is _now_." + +"My girls rave about his beautiful brown eyes, just as you used to +do, Julia, five-and-thirty years ago." + +Mrs. Poynsett was sure that whatever she had thought of Miles +Charnock's eyes five-and-thirty years ago, she had never raved about +them to Susan Lorimer, but she only said, "All my boys are like +their father except Charlie." + +"But Master Frank has no eyes for any one but Miss Vivian. Oh yes, +I see the little jealousies; I am sorry for him; but you see it +would be a shocking bad thing for a younger son like him; whereas +Lory could afford it, and it would be the making of him." + +Mrs. Poynsett held her peace, and was not sorry that her visitor was +called away while she was still deliberating whether to give a hint +of the state of the case. + +Lady Susan was, however, more aware of it than she knew; Lady +Tyrrell had 'candidly' given her a hint that there had been 'some +nonsense about Frank Charnock,' but that he could never afford such +a marriage, even if his mother would allow it, all which she never +would. Besides, he had not fallen into a satisfactory set in +London--why, it was not needful to tell. + +When, after the drive, Lady Tyrrell, fairly tired out by her +visitor's unfailing conversation and superabundant energy, had gone +to lie down and recruit for the evening, Lady Susan pressed on +Eleonora a warm invitation to the house in Yorkshire which she was +renting, and where Lorimer would get as much shooting as his colonel +would permit. The mention of him made Lenore blush to the ears, and +say, "Dear Lady Susan, you are always so kind to me that I ought to +be open with you. Don't fancy--" + +"I understand, I understand, my dear," broke in Lady Susan. "You +shall not be teased. Do not the girls and I care for you for your +own sake?" + +"I hope so." + +The elder lady sprang up and embraced her. Affection was very +pleasant to the reserved nature that could do so little to evoke +caresses. Yet Eleonora clasped her Rockpier charm in her hand, and +added, "I must tell you that so far as I can without disobedience, I +hold myself engaged to Frank Charnock." + +"To Frank Charnock?" repeated Lady Susan, startled at this positive +statement. "My dear, are you quite sure of his ways?--since he has +been in town I mean." + +"I know him, and I trust him." + +"I'm sure he is a fine-looking young man, and very clever, they say; +dear Julia Poynsett's son too, and they have all turned out so +well," said honest Lady Susan; "but though you have been used to it +all your life, my dear, a taste for horses is very dangerous in a +young man who can't afford to lose now and then, you know." + +"I have seriously made up my mind never to marry a man who has +anything to do with the turf," said Eleonora. + +"Ah, my poor dear, I can understand that," said Lady Susan, aware +how ill this told for her Lory. "May I ask, does he know it?" + +"It would insult him to say it. None of the Charnocks ever meddle +with those things. Ah! I know your son saw him on the Derby-day; +but he went down with his eldest brother and his wife--and _that_ is +a very different thing! I stayed at home, you remember--papa had a +fit of the gout." + +"My dear, I don't want to accuse him. Don't bristle up; only I am +sorry, both for my own little plan of having you for my _very_ own, +and because I fear there is trouble in store for you. It can't be +palatable." Here Eleonora shook her head, and her worn, wearied +look went to the good-natured heart. "Dear child, you have gone +through a great deal. You shan't be worried or fretted about +anybody or anything at Revelrig." + +"I should be very glad," said Lenore, who had no fears of Lory +personally, though she could not be invited on false pretences. + +"You had better come when Bee and Conny meet me. Let me see--will +the retreat be over by that time? Are you going to it? You are an +associate of St. Faith." + +"Yes, but I don't see how I could go to the retreat. Oh, what a +relief it would be to have such a week!" + +"Exactly what I feel," said Lady Susan, somewhat to her surprise. +"It strengthens and sets me right for the year. Dr. Easterby +conducts this one. Do you not know him? Is not Rood House near +Backsworth?" + +"Yes on the other side, but he is utterly out of my reach. Julius +Charnock looks up to him so much; but his name--even more than St. +Faith's--would horrify my father." + +"You could not go direct there," said Lady Susan; "but when once you +are with me you are my charge, and I could take you." + +She considered a little. Both she and her friend knew that all her +religious habits were alien to Sir Harry, and that what he had +freely permitted, sometimes shared at Rockpier, was now only winked +at, and that if he had guessed the full extent of her observances he +would have stormily issued a prohibition. Could it be wrong to +spend part of her visit to Lady Susan with her hostess in a +sisterhood, when she had no doubt as to attending services which he +absolutely never dreamt of, and therefore did not forbid? The +sacred atmosphere and holy meditations, without external strife and +constant watchfulness, seemed to the poor girl like water to the +thirsty; and she thought, after all the harass and whirl of the +bazaar and race week, she might thus recruit her much-needed +strength for the decisive conflicts her majority would bring. + +Lady Susan had no doubts. The 'grand old wreck' was in his present +aspect a hoary old persecutor, and charming Lady Tyrrell a worldly, +scheming elder sister. It was as much an act of charity to give +their victim an opportunity of devotion and support as if she had +been the child of abandoned parents in a back court in East London. +Reserve to prevent a prohibition was not in such cases treachery or +disobedience; and she felt herself doing a mother's part, as she +told her daughters, with some enjoyment of the mystery. Eleonora +made no promise, hoping to clear her mind by consideration, or to +get Julius's opinion. He and his wife dined at Sirenwood, and found +Joe Reynolds's drawings laid out for inspection, while Lady Susan +was advising that, instead of selling them, there should be an +industrial exhibition of all curiosities of art and nature to be +collected in the neighbourhood, and promising her own set of foreign +photographs and coloured costumes, which had served such purposes +many and many a time. + +After dinner the good dame tried to talk to Rosamond on what she +deemed the most congenial subjects; but my Lady Rose had no notion +of 'shop' at a dinner-party, so she made languid answer that she +'left all that to the curates,' and escaped to a frivolous young +matron on the other side of the room, looking on while her husband +was penned in and examined on his services, and his choir, and his +system, and his decorations, and his classes, and his schools, for +all or any of which Lady Susan pressed on him the aid of the two +daughters she was leaving at Sirenwood; and on his hint that this +was beyond his parish, she repeated her strong disapproval of the +Vicar of Wil'sbro', whom she had met at dinner the night before, and +besides, the school there had numerous Sunday teachers. + +Julius assented, for he had no redundance of the article, and his +senior curate had just started on a vacation ramble with a brother; +but a sort of misgiving crossed him as he heard Herbert Bowater's +last comic song pealing out, and beheld the pleasingly plain face of +a Miss Strangeways on either side of him. Had he not fought the +Eton and Harrow match over again with one of them at dinner? and had +not a lawn tennis challenge already passed? + +For Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. Charnock Poynsett were to have garden- +parties on alternate Wednesdays, and the whole neighbourhood soon +followed suit. + +"You'll find nobody at home, Jenny," said Julius, coming out of a +cottage opposite, as she rode up to Mrs. Hornblower's, on one of the +last days of August. "Nobody--that is, but my mother. Can you come +up and see her?" + +"With all my heart; but I must get down here; I'm sent for one of +Herbert's shirts. The good boy lets mamma and aunty manage them +still! I believe their hearts would break outright if he took to +shop ones, like the rest of them. Hush, Tartar, for shame! don't +you know me? Where's your master?" + +"At a garden-party at Duddingstone. Your mother is better, I see." + +"Yes, thank you--out driving with papa. Good Rollo!" as the +dignified animal rose from the hearthrug to greet her, waving his +handsome tail, and calmly expelled a large tabby cat from the easy- +chair, to make room for his friends. "Well done, old Roll! Fancy a +cat in such company." + +"Herbert's dogs partake his good-nature." + +"Mungo seems to be absent too." + +"Gone with him no doubt. He is the great favourite with one of the +Miss Strangeways." + +"Which--Herbert or Mungo?" + +"Both! I might say, I know the young ladies best by one being +rapturous about Tartar and the other about Mungo. Rollo treats both +with equally sublime and indifferent politeness, rather as Raymond +does." + +"What sort of girls are they? Herbert calls them 'awfully jolly.'" + +"I'm sorry to say I never can think of any other epithet for them. +For once it is really descriptive." + +"Is it either of them in particular?" + +"Confess, Joan, that's what brought you over." + +"Perhaps so. Edith heard some nonsense at Backsworth, and mamma +could not rest till she had sent me over to see about it; but would +there be any great harm in it if it were true? Is not Lady Susan a +super-excellent woman?" + +"You've hit it again, Jenny. Couple the two descriptions." + +"I gather that you don't think the danger great." + +"Not at present. The fascination is dual, and is at least a +counteraction to the great enchantress." + +"That _is_ well! It was not wholesome!" + +"Whereas, these two are hearty, honest, well-principled girls, quite +genuine." + +"Yet you don't say it with all your heart." + +"I own I should like to find something they had left undone." + +"What, to reduce them to human nature's daily food?" + +"Daily indeed! There's just no escaping them. There they are at +matins and evensong." + +"How shocking! What, gossip afterwards?" + +"Ask Rollo whether Mungo and Tartar don't stand at the lych-gate, +and if he finds it easy to put an end to the game at play." + +"Oh! and he said they never missed a Sunday service, or the school. +Do they distract him?" + +"Whom would it not distract to see two figures walking in with +hunches on their backs like camels, and high-heeled shoes, and hats +on the back of their heads, and chains and things clattering all +over them?" + +"Aren't they lady-like?" + +"Oh! they are quite that. Rose says it is all the pink of fashion-- +only coming it strong--I declare they are infectious!" + +"I believe so. I never heard so many nibbles at slang from any of +you five, as from the Rector of Compton in the last five minutes. I +gather that he is slightly bothered." + +"There's so much of it. We are forced to have them to all the meals +on Sunday, and their lectures on functions have nearly scared poor +Anne to the Pilgrim level again. They have set upon me to get up a +choir-concert and a harvest-feast; but happily no one has time for +the first at this season, and as to the other, I doubted whether to +make this first start after such a rainy summer, and they decide me +against it. To have them decorating the church!" + +"Awfully jolly," suggested Jenny. + +"Even so. They are, if you understand me, technically reverent; +they have startled the whole place with their curtsies and crossings +in church; but they gabble up to the very porch; and the familiarity +with which they discuss High Mass, as they are pleased to call it! +I was obliged to silence them, and I must say they took it nicely." + +"How do they suit Lena?" + +"She likes them. Lady Susan was a great help to her in London, and +she feels the comfort of their honesty. They brought her to church +with them one or two mornings, but it knocked her up to walk so +early. Insensibly, I think they do Lady Tyrrell's work in shutting +her up from any of us." + +"Spite of croquet, which seems perpetual." + +"Chronic and sporadic parties make it so. There are few days +without that or something else. Cricket or the band at the +barracks." + +"People say the neighbourhood has never been so gay since Camilla +Vivian's marriage. I sometimes wonder whether anything can be going +to happen," said Jenny with a sigh, not guessing at what Julius was +thinking of; then changing her tone: "Surely Herbert does not go to +it all, and leave you alone? O, Julius! you should not let him." + +"Never mind, Jenny, there's no more work now in the holidays than I +am sufficient for; and for him, it is quite as guileless play as +ever he had twenty years ago. It will soon be over, or I should +take it more seriously." + +"But it is at such a time!" + +"Yes, that is the worst of it. I have thought it over; but while he +is in this mood, the making him feel victimized and interfered with +has a worse effect than the letting him have his swing." + +"What is he doing now, I wonder? Here's his sermon-paper on the +table, and a Greek Testament, and Hints on Decorating Churches, with +'Constance Strangeways' on the first leaf--no other book. How long +will this saturnalia last?" + +"Up to the Ordination, I fear. You know the good people have +contrived to put bazaar, races, and ball, all into the Ember Week, +and they are the great object of the young ladies' visit. Could you +have him home for a quiet week first?" + +"It would not be a quiet week; Edith is in the way of most of these +affairs; besides, to open fire about these young ladies might just +be putting nonsense into an innocent head. Now, I've not seen your +Rectory!" + +The said Rectory was in a decided state of fresh, not to say raw, +novelty outside, though the old trees and garden a little softened +its hard grays and strong reds; but it promised to look well when +crumbling and weather-stain had done their work. At the door they +met the pretty young nurse, with a delicate sea-green embroidered +cashmere bundle in her arms. + +"Little Lady Green Mantle," exclaimed Jenny. + +"Erin-go-bragh," said Julius. "Rose clung to her colours in spite +of all predictions about 'the good people.' Asleep of course," as +Jenny took her and uncovered her face. "She won't exhibit her eyes, +but they are quite _proper_ coloured." + +"Yes, I see she is like Raymond!" + +"Do you? They all say she is a perfect Charnock, though how they +know I can't guess. There," after a little more baby-worship, "you +may take her Emma." + +"Is that the under-nurse?" asked Jenny, rather surprised by her +juvenility. + +"The sole one. My mother and Susan are rather concerned, but Rose +asserts that experience in that department is always associated with +gin; and she fell in love with this girl--a daughter of John +Gadley's, who is much more respectable than he of the 'Three +Pigeons.' I suppose it is not in the nature of things for two women +to have the same view of nursery matters, unless one have brought up +the other." + +"Or even if she have. Witness mamma's sighs over Mary's nurses." + +"I thought it was the common lot. You've not seen the dining-room." +And the full honours were done. They were pleasant rooms, still +unpapered, and the furniture chiefly of amber-coloured varnished +deal; the drawing-room, chiefly with green furniture, with only a +few brighter dashes here and there, and a sociable amount of +comfortable litter already. The study was full of new shelves and +old books, and across the window-sill lay a gray figure, with a book +and a sheet of paper. + +"You here, Terry! I thought you were gone with Rose," said Julius, +as the boy rose to greet Miss Bowater. + +"She said I need not, and I hate those garden-parties," said Terry; +and they relieved him of their presence as soon as Jenny had paid +her respects to the favourite prints and photographs on the walls. + +"He has a passion for the history of Poland just now," said Julius. +"Sobieski is better company than he would meet at Duddingstone, I +suspect--poor fellow! Lord Rathforlane has been so much excited by +hearing of Driver's successes as a coach, as to desire Terry to read +with him for the Royal Engineers. The boys must get off his hands +as soon as possible, he says, and Terry, being cleverest, must do so +soonest; but the boy has seen the dullest side of soldiering, and +hates it. His whole soul is set on scholarship. I am afraid it is +a great mistake." + +"Can't you persuade him?" + +"We have both written; but Rose has no great hopes of the result. I +wish he could follow his bent." + +"Yes," said Jenny, lingering as she looked towards Church-house, +"the young instinct ought not to be repressed." + +Julius knew that she was recollecting how Archie Douglas had +entreated to go to sea, and the desire had been quashed because he +was an only son. His inclination to speak was as perilous as if he +had been Rosamond herself, and he did not feel it unfortunate that +Jenny found she must no longer stay away from home. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXII +Times Out of Joint + + +Alte der Meere, +Komm und hore; +Meine Frau, die Ilsebill, +Will nicht als ich will! + +Life at Compton Poynsett was different from what it had been when +the two youngest sons had been at home, and Julius and Rosamond in +the house. The family circle had grown much more stiff and quiet, +and the chief difference caused by Mrs. Poynsett's presence was that +Raymond was deprived of his refuge in her room. Cecil had taken a +line of polite contempt. There was always a certain languid amount +of indifferent conversation, 'from the teeth outward,' as Rosamond +said. Every home engagement was submitted to the elder lady with +elaborate scrupulousness, almost like irony. Visitors in the house +or invitations out of it, were welcome breaks, and the whirl of +society which vaguely alarmed Joanna Bowater was a relief to the +inhabitants of the Hall. + +Anne's companionship was not lively for her mother-in-law, but she +was brightening in the near prospect of Miles's return, and they had +established habits that carried them well through the evening. Anne +covered screens and made scrap-books, and did other work for the +bazaar; and Mrs. Poynsett cut out pictures, made suggestions, and +had associations of her own with the combinations of which Anne had +little notion. Or she dictated letters which Anne wrote, and +through all these was a kindly, peaceful spirit, most unlike the +dreary alienation in which Cecil persevered. + +To Cecil this seemed the anxious desire for her lawful rights. She +had been used to spend the greater part of the evening at the piano, +but her awakened eyes perceived that this was a cover to Raymond's +conversations at his mother's sofa; so she sat tying knots in stiff +thread at her macrame lace pillow, making the bazaar a plea for +nothing but work. Raymond used to arm himself with the newspapers +as the safest point d'appui, and the talk was happiest when it +_only_ languished, for it could do much worse. + +"Shall you be at Sirenwood to-morrow, Cecil?" asked Mrs. Poynsett, +as she was wheeled to her station by the fire after dinner. "Will +you kindly take charge of a little parcel for me? One of the Miss +Strangeways asked me to look for some old franks, so Anne and I have +been turning out my drawers." + +"Are they for sale?" asked Raymond. + +"Yes," said Cecil. "Bee Strangeways is collecting; she will pay for +all that are new to her, and sell any duplicates." + +"Has she many?" asked Mrs. Poynsett, glad of this safe subject. + +"Quantities; and very valuable ones. Her grandfather knew +everybody, and was in the Ministry." + +"Was he?" said Raymond, surprised. + +"Lord Lorimer?" said Mrs. Poynsett. "Not when I knew them. He was +an old-fashioned Whig, with some peculiar crotchets, and never could +work with any Cabinet." + +"Beatrice told me he was," said Cecil, stiffly. + +"I rather think he was Master of the Buckhounds for a little while +in the Grey Ministry," said Mrs. Poynsett, "but he gave it up +because he would not vote with ministers on the poor laws." + +"I knew I was not mistaken in saying he was in the Ministry," said +Cecil. + +"The Master of the Buckhounds is not in the Cabinet, Cecil," said +her husband. + +"I never said he was. I said he was in office," returned the +infallible lady. + +Mrs. Poynsett thought it well to interrupt by handing in an envelope +franked by Sir Robert Peel; but Cecil at once declared that the +writing was different from that which Bee already owned. + +"Perhaps it is not the same Sir Robert," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"She got it from the Queen, and they are all authenticated. The +Queen newspaper, of course" (rather petulantly). + +"Indisputable," said Raymond; "but this frank contained a letter +from the second Sir Robert to my father." + +Mrs. Poynsett made a sign of acquiescence, and Cecil pouted in her +dignified way, though Mrs. Poynsett tried to improve matters by +saying, "Then it appears that Miss Strangeways will have a series of +Peel autographs, all in fact but the first generation." + +Common sense showed she was right, but Cecil still felt +discontented, for she knew she had been resisted and confuted, and +she believed it was all Mrs. Poynsett's doing instead of Raymond's. + +And she became as mute as Anne for the next half-hour, nor did +either Raymond or his mother venture on starting any fresh topic, +lest there might be fresh jarring. + +Only Anne presently came up to Mrs. Poynsett and tenderly purred +with her over some little preparation for Miles. + +Certainly Anne was the most improved in looks of all the three +brides, who had arrived just a year ago. The thin, scraggy Scotch +girl, with the flabby, washed-out look alternating with angular +rigidity was gone, but the softening and opening of her expression, +the light that had come into her eyes, and had made them a lovely +blue instead of pale gray; the rose-tint on her cheeks, the delicate +rounded contour of her face, the improved carriage of her really +fine figure, the traces of style in the braiding of her profuse +flaxen hair, and the taste that was beginning to conquer in the +dress, were all due to the thought that the Salamanca might soon be +in harbour. She sat among them still as a creature whose heart and +spirit were not with them. + +That some change must come was felt as inevitable by each woman, and +it was Mrs. Poynsett who began, one forenoon when her son had +brought a lease for her to sign. "Raymond," said she, "you know +Church-house is to be vacant at Michaelmas. I wish you would look +at it, and see what repairs it wants, and if the drawing-room +windows could be made to open on the lawn." + +"Are you hoping to tempt Miles to settle there?" + +"No, I fear there is no hope of that; but I do not think an old +broken-backed invalid ought to engross this great house." + +"Mother, I cannot hear you say so! This is your own house!" + +"So is the other," she said, trying to smile, "and much fitter for +my needs, with Susan and Jenkins to look after me." + +"There is no fit place for you but this. You said that once." + +"Under very different circumstances. All the younger boys were +still under my wing, and needed the home, and I was strong and +vigorous. It would not have been acting right by them to have given +up the place; but now they are all out in the world, and I am laid +by, my stay here only interferes with what can be much better +managed without me or my old servants." + +"I do not see that. If any one moves, it should be ourselves." + +"You are wanted on the spot continually. If Sirenwood were in the +market, that might not be so much amiss." + +"I do not think that likely. They will delay the sale in the hope +of Eleonora's marrying a rich man; besides, Mr. Charnock has set his +mind upon Swanslea. I hope _this_ is from nothing Cecil has said or +done!" + +"Cecil wishes to part then? She has said nothing to me, but I see +she has to you. Don't be annoyed, Raymond; it is in the nature of +things." + +"I believe it is all Lady Tyrrell's doing. The mischief such a +woman can do in the neighbourhood!" + +"Perhaps it is only what any friend of Cecil would advise." + +"It is the very reverse of what I intended," said Raymond, shading +his face. + +"My dear Raymond, I know what you meant, and what you wish; but I am +also certain it is for no one's happiness to go on in this way." + +He groaned. + +"And the wife's right comes first." + +"Not to this house." + +"But to this man. Indeed I see more hope of your happiness now than +I did last year." + +"What, because she has delivered herself over bound hand and foot to +Camilla Vivian?" + +"No, because she is altered. Last year she was merely vexed at my +position in the house. Now she is vexed at my position with you." + +"Very unjustly." + +"Hardly so. I should not have liked your father to be so much +devoted to his mother. Remember, jealousy is a smoke that cannot +exist without some warmth." + +"If she had any proper feeling for me, she would show it by her +treatment of you." + +"That would be asking too much when she thinks I engross you." + +"Mother, while you show such marvellous candour and generosity, and +she--" + +"Hush! Raymond, leave it unsaid! We cannot expect her to see more +than her own side of the question. She has been put into an +avowedly trying position, and does not deserve hard judgment for not +being happy in it. All that remains is to relieve her. Whether by +my moving or yours is the question. I prefer the Church-house +plan." + +"Either way is shame and misery to me," broke out Raymond in a +choked voice. + +"Nonsense," said his mother, trying to be cheerful. "You made an +impracticable experiment, that's all. Give Cecil free scope, let +her feel that she has her due, and all will come right." + +"Nothing can be done till after the Wil'sbro' business," said +Raymond, glad of the reprieve. He could not bear the prospect of +banishment for his mother or himself from the home to which both +were rooted; and the sentence of detachment from her was especially +painful when she seemed his only consolation for his wife's +perverseness. Yet he was aware that he had been guilty of the +original error, and was bound to give such compensation to his wife +as was offered by his mother's voluntary sacrifice. He was slow to +broach the subject, but only the next morning came a question about +an invitation to a dull house. + +"But," said Cecil, "it is better than home." She spoke on purpose. + +"I am sorry to hear you say so." + +"I can't call it home where I am but a guest." + +"Well, Cecil, my mother offers to leave the home of her life and +retire into Church-house." + +Cecil felt as if the screw she had been long working had come off in +her hands. She frowned, she gazed, collecting her senses, while +Raymond added, "It is to my intense grief and mortification, but I +suppose you are gratified." + +"Uh, it would never do!" she exclaimed, to his surprise and +pleasure. + +"Quite right," he returned. "Just what I felt. Nothing can make me +so glad as to see that you think the idea as socking as I do." + +"Our going to Swanslea would be much better--far more natural, and +no one could object. We could refurnish, and make it perfect; +whereas nothing can be done to this place, so inconveniently built +and buried in trees. I should feel much freer in a place of my +own." + +"So that is what you meant when I thought you were thinking of my +mother?" + +"I am obliged to take thought for myself when you take heed to no +one but her," said Cecil; and as the carriage was at that moment +announced, she left him. Which was the most sick at heart it would +be hard to say, the wife with the sense that she was postponed in +everything to the mother, the husband at the alienation that had +never before been so fully expressed. Cecil's errand was a council +about the bazaar; and driving round by Sirenwood, Lady Tyrrell +became her companion in the carriage. The quick eyes soon perceived +that something had taken place, and confidence was soon drawn forth. + +"The ice is broken; and by whom do you think?" + +"By la belle mere? Skilful strategy to know when the position is +not tenable." + +"She wants to retreat to Church-house." + +"Don't consent to that." + +"I said I should prefer Swanslea for ourselves." + +"Hold to that, whatever you do. If she moves to the village you +will have all the odium and none of the advantages. There will be +the same daily haunt; and as to your freedom of action, there are no +spies like the abdicated and their dependents. A very clever plan, +but don't be led away by it." + +"No," said Cecil, resolutely; but after a moment: "It would be +inconvenient to Raymond to live so far away from the property." + +"Swanslea will be property too, and a ride over on business is not +like strolling in constantly." + +"I know I shall never feel like my own mistress in a house of hers." + +"Still less with her close by, with the Rectory family running in +and out to exchange remarks. No, no, hold fast to insisting that +she must not leave the ancestral halls. That you can do dutifully +and gracefully." + +Cecil knew she had been betrayed into the contrary; but they were by +this time in the High Street, bowing to others of the committee on +their way to the town-hall, a structure of parti-coloured brick in +harlequin patterns, with a peaked roof, all over little sham domes, +which went far to justify its title of the Rat-house, since nothing +larger could well use them. The facade was thus somewhat imposing; +of the rear the less said the better; and as to the interior, it was +at present one expanse of dust, impeded by scaffold-poles, and all +the windows had large blotches of paint upon them. + +It required a lively imagination to devise situations for the +stalls; but Mrs. Duncombe valiantly tripped about, instructing her +attendant carpenter with little assistance except from the well- +experienced Miss Strangeways. The other ladies had enough to do in +keeping their plumage unsoiled. Lady Tyrrell kept on a little +peninsula of encaustic tile, Cecil hopped across bird-like and +unsoiled, Miss Slater held her carmelite high and dry, but poor Miss +Fuller's pale blue and drab, trailing at every step, became +constantly more blended! + +The dust induced thirst. Lady Tyrrell lamented that the Wil'sbro' +confectioner was so far off and his ices doubtful, and Miss Slater +suggested that she had been making a temperance effort by setting up +an excellent widow in the lane that opened opposite to them in a +shop with raspberry vinegar, ginger-beer, and the like mild +compounds, and Mrs. Duncombe caught at the opportunity of exhibiting +the sparkling water of the well which supplied this same lane. The +widow lived in one of the tenements which Pettitt had renovated +under her guidance, and on a loan advanced by Cecil, and she was +proud of her work. + +"Clio Tallboys would view this as a triumph," said Mrs. Duncombe, +as, standing on the steps of the town-hall, she surveyed the four +tenements at the corner of the alley. "Not a man would stir in the +business except Pettitt, who left it all to me." + +"Taking example by the Professor," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"It is strange," said Miss Slater, "how much illness there has been +ever since the people went into those houses. They are in my +district, you know." + +"You should make them open their windows," said Mrs. Duncombe. + +"They lay it on the draughts." + +"And stuff up my ventilators. That is always the way they begin." + +The excellent widow herself had a bad finger, which was a great +impediment in administering the cooling beverages, but these were so +excellent as to suggest the furnishing of a stall therewith for the +thirsty, as something sure to be popular and at small expense. +Therewith the committee broke up, all having been present but Miss +Moy, whose absence was not regretted, though apologized for by Mrs. +Duncombe. "I could not get her away from the stables," she said. +"She and Bob would contemplate Dark Hag day and night, I believe." + +"I wouldn't allow it," said Lady Tyrrell. + +Mrs. Duncombe shrugged her shoulders and laughed. "That's Mr. Moy's +look-out," she said. + +"You don't choose to interfere with her emancipation," said Lady +Tyrrell. + +"Clio would tell you she could take care of herself at the stables +as well as anywhere else." + +"Query?" said Lady Tyrrell. "Don't get into a scrape, Bessie. Does +your Captain report on the flirtation with young Simmonds?" + +"Who is he?" asked Cecil + +"The trainer's son," said Bessie. "It is only a bit of imitation of +Aurora Floyd." + +"You know she's an heiress," said Lady Tyrrell. "You had better +take care how you put such a temptation in his way." + +"I don't suppose the Moys are anybody," said Cecil. + +"Not in your sense, my dear," said Lady Tyrrell, laughing; "but from +another level there's a wide gap between the heiress of Proudfoot +Lawn and the heir of the training stables." + +"Cecil looks simply disgusted," said Bessie. "She can't bear the +Moys betwixt the wind and her nobility." + +"They are the great drawback to Swansea, I confess," said Cecil. + +"Oh! are you thinking of Swanslea?" cried Mrs Duncombe. + +"Yes," said Lady Tyrrell, "she is one to be congratulated on +emancipation." + +"Well can I do so," said Mrs. Duncombe. "Don't I know what mothers- +in-law are? Mine is the most wonderful old Goody, with exactly the +notions of your meek Mrs. Miles." + +"Incompatibility decidedly," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"Only she was the Spartan mother combined with it," continued Mrs. +Duncombe. "When Bob was a little urchin, he once, in anticipation +of his future tastes, committed the enormity of riding on a stick on +Sunday; so she locked him up till he had learnt six verses of one of +Watts's hymns about going to church being like a little heaven +below, isn't it?" + +"Increasing his longing that way," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"She doesn't even light the drawing-room fire on Sunday, for fear +people should not sit in their rooms and meditate," continued Mrs. +Duncombe. "Bob manages to be fond of her through all; but she +regularly hates me." + +"Not very wonderful," said Lady Tyrrell, laughing. "I suppose there +is a charming reciprocity of feeling." + +"I think I can afford to pity her," said Mrs. Duncombe, lightly. +"Just fancy what I must have been to her! You know I was brought up +in a convent at Paris. The very bosom of the scarlet woman." + +"But," interrupted Cecil, "you were never a Roman Catholic, Bessie!" + +"Oh dear, no; the Protestant boarders were let entirely alone. +There were only two of us, and we lay in bed while the others went +to mass, and played while they went to confession, that was all. I +was an orphan; never remember my mother, and my father died abroad. +Luckily for me, Bob was done for by my first ball. Very odd he +should have liked a little red-haired thing like me; but every one +is ticketed, I believe. My uncle was glad enough to get rid of me, +and poor old Mrs. Duncombe was unsuspecting till we went home--and +then!" + +"And then?" + +"Cecil may have some faint idea." + +"Of what you underwent?" + +"She wanted to begin on me as if I were a wild savage heathen, you +know! I believe she nearly had a fit when I declined a prayer- +meeting, and as to my walking out with Bob on Sunday evening!" + +"Did she make you learn Watts's hymns?" + +"No! but she did what was much worse to poor Bob. She told him she +had spent the time in prayer and humiliation, and the poor fellow +very nearly cried." + +"Ah, those mothers have such an advantage over their sons," said +Lady Tyrrell. + +"I determined I would never go near her again after that," said Mrs. +Duncombe. "Bob goes; he is really fond of her; but I knew we should +keep the peace better apart. I let her have the children now and +then, when it is convenient, and oddly enough they like it; but I +shall soon have to stop that, for I won't have them think me a +reprobate; and she has thought me ten times worse ever since I found +out that I had brains and could use them." + +"Quite true," said Camilla; "there's no peacemaker like absence." + +"The only pity is that Swanslea is no further off," returned Bessie. + +And so it was that Cecil, backed by her two counsellors, held her +purpose, and Raymond sadly spoke of the plan of separation to +Julius. Both thought Mrs. Poynsett's own plan the best, though they +could not bear the idea of her leaving her own house. Raymond was +much displeased. + +"At least," he said, "there is a reprieve till this frantic +fortnight is over. I envy your exemption from the turmoil." + +"I wish you would exempt yourself from the races," said Julius. +"The mischief they have done in these villages is incalculable! The +very men-servants are solicited to put into sweepstakes, whenever +they go into Wil'sbro'; and only this morning Mrs. Hornblower has +been to me about her son." + +"I thought he was the great feather in Herbert Bowater's cap." + +"Showing the direction of the wind only too well. Since Herbert has +been infected with the general insanity, poor Harry Hornblower has +lapsed into his old ways, and is always hanging about the 'Three +Pigeons' with some of the swarm of locusts who have come down +already to brawl round the training stables. This has come to +Truelove's ears, and he has notice of dismissal. At the mother's +desire I spoke to Truelove, but he told me that at last year's races +the lad had gambled at a great rate, and had only been saved from +dishonesty by detection in time. He was so penitent that Truelove +gave him another trial, on condition that he kept out of temptation; +but now he has gone back to it, Mr. Truelove thinks it the only way +of saving him from some fresh act of dishonesty. 'It is all up with +them,' he says, 'when once they take that turn.'" + +"You need not speak as if I were accountable for all the +blackguardism." + +"Every man is accountable who lends his name and position to bolster +up a field of vice." + +"Come, come, Julius. Remember what men have been on the turf." + +"If those men had withheld their support, fashion would not have led +so many to their ruin." + +"Hundreds are present without damage. It is a hearty out-of-doors +country amusement, and one of the few general holidays that bring +all ranks together." + +"You speak of racing as it has been or might be in some golden age," +said Julius. "Of course there is no harm in trying one horse's +speed against another; but look at the facts and say whether it is +right to support an amusement that becomes such an occasion of +evil." + +"Because a set of rascals choose to bring their villainies there you +would have the sport of the whole neighbourhood given up. 'No cakes +and ale' with a vengeance!" + +"The cakes and ale that make a brother offend ought to be given up." + +"That sentences all public amusements." + +"Not necessarily. The question is of degree. Other amusements may +have evil incidentally connected with them, and may lead to +temptation, but it is not their chief excitement. The play or the +opera is the prime interest, and often a refined and elevated one, +but at races the whole excitement depends upon the horses, and is so +fictitious that it needs to be enhanced by this betting system. No +better faculty is called into play. Some few men may understand the +merits of the horse; many more, and most of the ladies, simply like +the meeting in numbers; but there is no higher faculty called out, +and in many cases the whole attraction is the gambling, and the +fouler wickedness in the background." + +"Which would be ten thousand times worse if all gentlemen stood +aloof." + +"What good do these gentlemen do beyond keeping the contest +honourable and the betting in which they are concerned? Do not they +make themselves decoys to the young men on the border-land who would +stay away if the turf were left to the mere vulgar? Why should they +not leave it to drop like bull-baiting or cock-fighting?" + +"Well done, Julius!" said Raymond. "You will head a clerical +crusade against the turf, but I do not think it just to compare it +with those ferocious sports which were demoralizing in themselves; +while this is to large numbers simply a harmless holiday and excuse +for an outing, not to speak of the benefit to the breed of horses." + +"I do not say that all competitions of speed are necessarily wrong, +but I do say that the present way of managing races makes them so +mischievous that no one ought to encourage them." + +"I wonder what Backsworth and Wil'sbro' would say to you! It is +their great harvest. Lodgings for those three days pay a quarter's +rent; and where so many interests are concerned, a custom cannot +lightly be dropped." + +"Well," said Raymond with a sigh, "it is not pleasure that takes me. +I shall look on with impartial eyes, if that is what you wish." + +Poor Raymond! it was plain that he had little liking for anything +that autumn. He rode over to Swanslea with Cecil, and when he said +it was six miles off, she called it four; what he termed bare, +marshy, and dreary, was in her eyes open and free; his swamp was her +lake; and she ran about discovering charms and capabilities where he +saw nothing but damp and dry rot, and, above all, banishment. + +Would she have her will? Clio would have thought her lecture had +taken effect, and mayhap, it added something to the general temper +of self-assertion, but in fact Cecil had little time to think, so +thickly did gaieties and preparations crowd upon her. It was the +full glory and importance of the Member's wife, her favourite ideal, +but all the time her satisfaction was marred by secret heartache as +she saw how wearily and formally her husband dragged through +whatever fell to his lot, saw how jaded and depressed he looked, and +heard him laugh his company laugh without any heart in it. She +thought it all his mother's fault, and meant to make up for +everything when she had him to herself. + +Julius had his troubles. When Rosamond found that races were what +she called his pet aversion, she resisted with all her might. Her +home associations were all on fire again. She would not condemn the +pleasures she had shared with her parents, by abstinence from them, +any more than she would deviate from Lady Rathforlane's nursery +management to please Mrs. Poynsett and Susan. A bonnet, which +Julius trusted never to see in church, was purchased in the face of +his remark that every woman who carried her gay attire to the stand +made herself an additional feather on the hook of evil. At first +she laughed, and then grew tearfully passionate in protests that +nothing should induce her to let her brothers see what their own +father did turned into a crime; and if they went without her to take +care of them, and fell into mischief, whose fault would that be? + +It was vain to hint that Tom was gone back to school, and Terry +cared more for the Olympic dust than that of Backsworth. She had +persuaded herself that his absence would be high treason to her +father, whom she respected far more at a distance than when she had +been struggling with his ramshackle, easy-going ways. Even now, she +was remonstrating with him about poor Terry's present misery. His +last half year had been spent under the head-master, who had +cultivated his historical and poetical intelligence, whereas Mr. +Driver was nothing but an able crammer; and the moment the lad +became interested and diverged from routine, he was choked off +because such things would not 'tell.' If the 'coach' had any +enthusiasm it was for mathematics, and thitherwards Terry's brain +was undeveloped. With misplaced ingenuity, he argued that sums came +right by chance and that Euclid was best learnt by heart, for 'the +pictures' simply confused him; and when Julius, amazed at finding so +clever a boy in the novel position of dunce, tried to find out what +he did know of arithmetic, his ignorance and inappreciation were so +unfathomable that Julius doubted whether the power or the will was +at fault. At any rate he was wretched in the present, and dismal as +to the future, and looked on his brother-in-law as in league with +the oppressors for trying to rouse his sense of duty. + +Remonstrance seemed blunted and ineffective everywhere. When +Herbert Bowater tried to reclaim Harry Hornblower into giving up his +notorious comrades, he received the dogged reply, "Why should not a +chap take his pleasure as well as you?" With the authority at once +of clergyman and squire's son, he said, "Harry, you forget yourself. +I am not going to discuss my occupations with you." + +"You know better," rudely interrupted the lad. "Racketing about all +over the country, and coming home late at night. You'd best not +speak of other folks!" + +As a matter of fact, Herbert had never been later than was required +by a walk home from a dinner, or a very moderate cricket supper; and +his conscience was clear as to the quality of his amusements; but +instead of, as hitherto, speaking as youth to youth, he used the +language of the minister to the insulting parishioner. "I am sorry +I have disturbed Mrs. Hornblower, but the case is not parallel. +Innocent amusement is one thing--it is quite another to run into +haunts that have _already_ proved dangerous to your principles." + +Harry Hornblower laughed. "It's no go coming the parson over me, +Mr. Bowater! It's well known what black coats are, and how they +never cry out so loud upon other folks as when they've had a jolly +lark among themselves. No concealment now, we're up to a thing or +two, and parsons, and capitalists, and squires will have to look +sharp." + +This oration, smacking of 'The Three Pigeons,' was delivered so loud +as to bring the mother on the scene. "O, Harry, Harry, you aren't +never speaking like that to Mr. Bowater!" + +"When folks jaw me about what's nothing to them I always give them +as good as they bring. That's my principle," said Harry, flinging +out of the house, while the curate tried to console the weeping +mother, and soon after betook himself to his Rector with no mild +comments on the lad's insolence. + +"Another warning how needful it is for us to avoid all occasion for +misconstruction," said Julius. + +"We do, all of us," said Herbert. "Even that wretched decoction, +Fuller, and that mere dictionary, Driver, never gave cause for +imputations like these. What has the fellow got hold of?" + +"Stories of the last century 'two-bottle men,'" said Julius, +"trumped up by unionists now against us in these days. The truth is +that the world triumphs and boasts whenever it catches the ministry +on its own ground. Its ideal is as exacting as the saintly one." + +"I say Rector," exclaimed the curate, after due pause, "you'll be at +Evensong on Saturday? The ladies at Sirenwood want me to go to +Backsworth with them to hear the band." + +"Cannot young Strangeways take care of his sisters?" + +"I would not ask it, sir, but they have set their heart on seeing +Rood House, and want me to go with them because of knowing Dr. +Easterby. Then I'm to dine with them, and that's the very last of +it for me. There's no more croquet after this week." + +"I am thankful to hear it," said Julius, suppressing his distaste +that the man he most reverenced, and the place which was his haven +of rest, should be a mere lion for Bee and Conny, a slight pastime +before the regimental band! + + + + + +CHAPTER XXIII +The Apple of Ate + + +Oh mirror, mirror on the wall, +Who is the fairest of us all?--The Three Bears + +"I do really think Terry has found the secret of happiness, for a +_little_ while at least," said Rosamond, entering Mrs. Poynsett's +room. "That funny little man in the loan museum has asked him to +help in the arrangement." + +"Who is it?" + +"The little watchmaker, or watch cobbler, in the old curiosity +shop." + +"Yes; Terry calls him a descendant of the Genoese Frescobaldi, and +I'm sure his black eyes were never made for an English head. Terry +has always haunted those uncanny wares of his, and has pursued them +to the museum. ''Tis not every young gentleman I would wish to see +there,' says the old man, 'but the Honourable Mr. De Lancey has the +soul of an antiquarian.'" + +"They say the old man is really very clever and well read." + +"He looks like an old magician, with his white cap and spectacles, +and he had need to have a wand to bring order out of that awful +chaos. Everybody all round has gone and cleared out their rubbish- +closet. Upon my word, it looks so. There are pictures all one +network of cracks, and iron caps and gauntlets out of all the halls +in every stage of rust, and pots and pans and broken crocks, and +baskets of coin all verdigris and tarnish!--Pah!" + +"Are Miles's birds safe?" + +"Oh yes, with a swordfish's sword and a sawfish's saw making a +trophy on the top. Terry is in the library, hunting material for a +dissertation upon the ancient unicorn, which ought to conclude with +the battle royal witnessed by Alice in Wonderland. The stuffed +department is numerous but in a bad way as to hair, and chiefly +consists of everybody's grandmother's old parrots and squirrels and +white rats. Then, every boy, who ever had a fit of birds' eggs or +butterflies, has sent in a collection, chiefly minus the lower +wings, and with volunteer specimens of moth; but luckily some give +leave to do what they please with them, so the magician is making +composition animals with the debris." + +"Not really!" + +"I made a feeble attempt with an admiral's wings and an orange tip, +but I was scouted. About four dilapidated ones make up a proper +specimen, and I can't think how it is all to be done in the time; +but really something fit to be seen is emerging. Terry is sorting +the coins, a pretty job, I should say; but felicity to him. But oh! +the industrial articles! There are all the regalia, carved out of +cherry-stones, and a patchwork quilt of 5000 bits of silk each no +bigger than a shilling. And a calculation of the middle verse in +the Bible, and the longest verse, and the shortest verse, and the +like edifying Scriptural researches, all copied out like flies' +legs, in writing no one can see but Julius with his spectacles off, +and set in a brooch as big as the top of a thimble, all done by a +one-legged sergeant of marines. So that the line might not be out +done, I offered my sergeant-major's banner-screen, but I am sorry to +say they declined it, which made me jealous." + +"Are there any drawings of the Reynolds' boy?" + +"Yes, Lenore Vivian brought them down, and very good they are. +Every one says he has the making of a genius, but he does not look +as if it agreed with him; he is grown tall, and thin, and white, and +I should not wonder if those good-for-nothing servants bullied him." + +"Did you see anything of Eleonora?" + +"Nothing so impossible. I meet her every day, but she is always +beset with the Strangeways, and I think she avoids me." + +"I can hardly think so." + +"I don't like it! That man is always hanging about Sirenwood, and +Lenore never stirs an inch without one of those girls. I wish Frank +could see for himself, poor fellow." + +"He does hope to run down next week. I have just heard from him in +high spirits. One of his seniors has come into some property, +another is out of health and retires, so there is some promotion in +view." + +"I wish it would make haste then. I don't like the look of things." + +"I can hardly disbelieve in the dear girl herself; yet I do feel as +if it were against nature for it to succeed. Did you hear anything +of Mrs. Bowater to-day?" + +"Yes, she is much better, and Edith is coming to go into the gallery +with me on Tuesday when they inaugurate the Rat-house. Oh! did you +hear of the debate about it? You know there's to be a procession-- +all the Volunteers, and all the Odd Fellows, and all the Good +Templars, and all the school-children of all denominations--whatever +can walk behind a flag. Our choir boys grew emulous, and asked +Herbert to ask the Rector to let them have our lovely banner with +the lilies on it; but he declined, though there's no choice but to +give the holiday that will be taken." + +"Was that the debate?" + +"Oh no! that was among the higher powers--where the procession +should start from. The precedent was an opening that began with +going to church, and having a sermon from the Bishop; but then +there's no church, and after that spur the Bishop gave them they +can't ask him without one; besides, the mayor dissents, and so do a +good many more of them. So they are to meet at the Market Cross, +and Mr. Fuller, in the famous black gown, supported by Mr. Driver, +is to head them. I'm not sure that Julius and Herbert were not in +the programme, but Mr. Truelove spoke up, and declared that Mr. +Flynn the Wesleyan Methodist, and Mr. Howler the Primitive +Methodist, and Mr. Riffell the Baptist, had quite as good a right to +walk in the foreground and to hold forth, and Mr. Moy supported +him." + +"Popularity hunting against Raymond." + +"Precisely. But Howler, Flynn, and Co. were too much for Mr. +Fuller, so he seceded, and the religious ceremonies are now to be +confined to his saying grace at the dinner. Raymond thinks it as +well, for the inaugural speech would only have been solemn mockery; +but Julius thinks it a sad beginning for the place to have no +blessing because of our unhappy divisions. Isn't that like Julius?" + +"Exactly, though I see it more from Raymond's point of view. So you +are going to the dinner?" + +"Oh yes. Happily my Rector has nothing to say against that, and I +am sure he owes me something for keeping me out of the bazaar. In +fact, having avoided the trouble, I _couldn't_ take the pleasure! +and he must set that against the races." + +"My dear, though I am not set against races like Julius, I think, +considering his strong feelings on the subject--" + +"My dear Mrs. Poynsett, it would be very bad for Julius to give in +to his fancies. The next thing would be to set baby up in a little +hood and veil like a nun!" + +Rosamond's winsome nonsense could not but gain a smile. No doubt +she was a pleasant daughter-in-law, though, for substantial care, +Anne was the strength and reliance. Even Anne was much engrossed by +preparations for the bazaar. It had been a great perplexity to her +that the one thing she thought not worldly should be condemned by +Julius, and he had not tried to prevent her from assisting Cecil, +thinking, as he had told Eleonora, that the question of right and +wrong was not so trenchant as to divide households. + +The banquet and inauguration went off fairly well. There was +nothing in it worth recording, except that Rosamond pronounced that +Raymond only wanted a particle of Irish fluency to be a perfect +speaker; but every one was observing how ill and depressed he +looked. Even Cecil began to see it herself, and to ask Lady Tyrrell +with some anxiety whether she thought him altered. + +"Men always look worn after a Session," said Lady Tyrrell. + +"If this really makes him unhappy!" + +"My dear Cecil, that's the very proof of the necessity. If it makes +him unhappy to go five miles away with his wife, it ought not. You +should wean him from such dependence." + +Cecil had tears in her eyes as she said, "I don't know! When I hear +him sighing in his sleep, I long to give it up and tell him I will +try to be happy here." + +"My dear child, don't be weak. If you give way now, you will rue it +all your life." + +"If I could have taken to his mother, I think he would have cared +more for me." + +"No. The moment her jealousy was excited she would have resumed +him, and you would have been the more shut out in the cold. A +little firmness now, and the fresh start is before you." + +Cecil sighed, feeling that she was paying a heavy price for that +fresh start, but her hands were too full for much thought. Guests +came to dinner, Mrs. Poynsett kept more to her own room, and Raymond +exerted himself to talk, so that the blank of the evenings was less +apparent. The days were spent at the town-hall, where the stalls +were raised early enough for all the ladies, their maids and +footmen, to buzz about them all day, decking them out. + +Mrs. Duncombe was as usual the guiding spirit, contriving all with a +cleverness that made the deficiencies of her household the more +remarkable. Conny and Bee Strangeways were the best workers, having +plenty of experience and resource, and being ready to do anything, +however hard, dusty, or disagreeable; and to drudge contentedly, +with plenty of chatter indeed, but quite as freely to a female as to +a male companion; whereas Miss Moy had a knot of men constantly +about her, and made a noise which was a sore trial to Cecil's heavy +spirit all the first day, exclusive of the offence to her native +fastidiousness. She even called upon Lady Tyrrell and Mrs. Duncombe +to hold a council whether all gentlemen should not be excluded the +next day, as spoiling the ladies' work, and of no use themselves; +but there were one or two who really did toil, and so well that they +could not be dispensed with, and Mrs. Duncombe added that it would +not do to give offence. + +There was a harassed look about Mrs. Duncombe herself, for much +depended on the success of her husband's filly, Dark Hag. The +Captain had hitherto been cautious, and had secured himself against +heavy loss, so as to make the turf a tolerable speculation, on but +the wonderful perfections of this animal had led him to stake much +more on her than had been his wont; and though his wife was assured +of being a rich woman in another week, she was not sorry for the +multiplicity of occupations which hindered her mind from dwelling +too much on the chances. + +"How calm you look,--how I envy you!" she said, as she came to +borrow some tape of Eleonora Vivian, who was fastening the pendent +articles to the drapery of her sister's stall. Eleonora gave a +constrained smile, feeling how little truth there was in her +apparent peace, wearied out as she was with the long conflict and +constant distrust. She was the more anxious to be with Lady Susan, +whose every word she could believe, and she finally promised to +leave home with Bee and Conny the day after the ball, and to meet +their mother in London. They knew there was no chance for Lorimer, +but they took her on her own terms, hoping something perhaps, and at +any rate glad to be a comfort to one whom they really loved, while +Lady Tyrrell was delighted to promote the visit, seeing that the +family did more for Lorimer's cause than he did for himself; and in +his own home who could guess the result, especially after certain +other manoeuvres of her ladyship had taken effect? + +Lady Tyrrell did not know, nor indeed did Conny or Bee, that, though +they would meet their mother in London, she would not at once go +into Yorkshire with them, but would send them to their uncle's, +while she repaired to the retreat at St. Faith's. The harass of +these last few weeks, especially the endeavour to make her go to the +races, had removed all scruples from Lenore's mind as to leaving her +home in ignorance of her intentions. To her mind, the circumstances +of her brother's death had made a race-course no place for any of +the family, especially that of Backsworth; gout coming opportunely +to disable her father in London, and one or two other little +accidents, had prevented the matter from coming to an issue while +she had been in London, and the avowal of her intention to keep away +had filled her father with passion at her for her absurd scruples +and pretences at being better than other people. It had been Lady +Tyrrell who pacified him with assurances that she would soon do +better; no one wished to force her conscience, and Lenore, always on +the watch, began to wonder whether her sister had any reason for +wishing to keep her away, and longed the more for the house of truth +and peace. + +So came on the bazaar day, which Mrs. Poynsett spent in solitude, +except for visits from the Rectory, and one from Joanna Bowater, who +looked in while Julius was sitting with her, and amused them by her +account of herself as an emissary from home with ten pounds to be +got rid of from her father and mother for good neighbourhood's sake. +She brought Mrs. Poynsett a beautiful bouquet, for the elderly +spinsters, she said, sat on the stairs and kept up a constant +supply; and she had also some exquisite Genoese wire ornaments from +Cecil's counter, and a set of studs from a tray of polished pebbles +sent up from Vivian's favourite lapidary at Rockpier. She had been +amused to find the Miss Strangeways hunting over it to match that +very simple-looking charm which Lena wore on to her watch, for, as +she said, "the attraction must either be the simplicity of it, or +the general Lena-worship in which those girls indulge." + +"How does that dear child look?" + +"Fagged, I think, but so does every one, and it was not easy to keep +order, Mrs. Duncombe's counter was such a rendezvous for noisy +people, and Miss Moy was perfectly dreadful, running about forcing +things on people and refusing change." + +"And how is poor Anne enduring?" + +"Like Christian in Vanity Fair as long as she did endure, for she +retired to the spinsters on the back stairs. I offered to bring her +home, and she accepted with delight, but I dropped her in the +village to bestow her presents. I was determined to come on here; +we go on Monday." + +"Shall you be at the Ordination?" + +"I trust so. If mamma is pretty well, we shall both go." + +"Is Edith going to the ball on Thursday?" + +"No, she has given it up. It seems as if we at least ought to +recollect our Ember days, though I am ashamed to think we never did +till this time last year." + +"I confess that I never heard of them," said Mrs. Poynsett. "Don't +look shocked, my dear; such things were not taught in my time." + +Julius showed her the rubric and the prayer from the book in his +pocket, knowing that the one endeared to her by association was one +of the Prayer-books made easy by omission of all not needed at the +barest Sunday service. + +"I see," she said, "it seems quite right. I wish you had told me +before you were ordained, my dear." + +"You kept your Ember days for me by instinct, dear mother." + +"Don't be too sure, Julius. One learns many things when one is laid +on one's back." + +"Think of Herbert now," whispered Jenny. "I am glad he is sheltered +from all this hubbub by being at the palace. I suppose you cannot +go to the Cathedral, Julius?" + +"No, Bindon will not come back till his brother's holiday is over, +nor do I even know where to write to him. Oh! here comes Anne. Now +for her impressions." + +Anne had brought her little gift for Mrs. Poynsett, and displayed +her presents for Glen Fraser, but as to what she had seen it made +her shudder and say, "You were right, Julius, I did not know people +could go on so! And with all those poor people ill close by. Miss +Slater, who sat on the stairs just below me tying up flowers, is +much grieved about a lad who was at work there till a fortnight ago, +and now is dying of a fever, and harassed by all the rattling of the +carriages." + +"What! close by! Nothing infectious, I hope?" + +"The doctor called it gastric fever, but no one was to hear of it +lest there should be an alarm; and it was too late to change the +place of the bazaar, though it is so sad to have all that gaiety +close at hand." + +If these were the impressions of Anne and Joanna early in the day, +what were they later, when, in those not sustained by excitement, +spirit and energy began to flag? Cecil's counter, with her +excellent and expensive wares, and her own dignified propriety, was +far less popular than those where the goods were cheaper and the +saleswomen less inaccessible, and she was not only disappointed at +her failure, but vexed when told that the articles must be raffled +for. She could not object, but it seemed an unworthy end for what +had cost her so much money and pains to procure, and it was not +pleasant to see Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Moy hawking the tickets +about, like regular touters, nor the most beautiful things drawn by +the most vulgar and tasteless people. + +Miss Moy had around her a court of 'horsey' men who were lounging +away the day before the races, and who had excited her spirits to a +pitch of boisterousness such as dismayed Mrs. Duncombe herself when +her attempts at repression were only laughed at. + +Somehow, among these adherents, there arose a proposal for the +election of a queen of beauty, each gentleman paying half-a-crown +for the right of voting. Miss Moy bridled and tried to blush. She +was a tall, highly-coloured, flashing-eyed brunette, to whom a +triumph would be immense over the refined, statuesque, severe Miss +Vivian, and an apple-blossom innocent-looking girl who was also +present, and though Lady Tyrrell was incontestably the handsomest +person in the room, her age and standing had probably prevented her +occurring to the propounders of the scheme. + +The design was taking shape when young Strangeways, who was willing +to exchange chaff with Gussie Moy, but was gentleman enough to feel +the indecorum of the whole thing, moved across to his sister, and +muttered, "I say, Con, they are getting up that stupid trick of +election of a queen of beauty. Does Lady Tyrrell know it?" + +"Wouldn't it be rather fun?" + +"Horrid bad form, downright impudence. Mother would squash it at +once. Go and warn one of them," signing with his head. + +Constance made her way to Eleonora, who had already been perplexed +and angered by more than one critical stare, as one and another man +loitered past and gazed intrepidly at her. She hurried at once to +her sister, who was sitting passively behind her counter as if +wearied out, and who would not be stirred to interference. "Never +mind, Lenore, it can't be helped. It is all for the cause, and to +stop it would be worse taste, fitting on the cap as an acknowledged +beauty, and to that I'm not equal." + +"It is an insult." + +"Never fear, they'll never choose you while you look so forbidding, +though perhaps it is rather becoming. They have not the taste." + +Eleonora said no more, but went over to the window where Raymond was +keeping his guard, with his old-fashioned sense of protection. She +had no sooner told him than he started into incredulous indignation, +in which he was joined by his wife who only wished him to dash +forward to prevent the scheme before he would believe it real. + +However, when the ballot-box came his way, and a simpering youth +presented him with a card, begging for his opinion, he spoke so as +to be heard by all, "No, thank you, sir. I am requested by the +ladies present to state that such competition was never contemplated +by their committee and would be repugnant to all their sentiments. +They beg that the election may be at once dropped and the money +returned." + +Mr. Charnock Poynsett had a weight that no one resisted. There was +a moment's silence, a little murmur, apologetic and remonstrant, but +the deed was done. + +Only a clear voice, with the thrillings of disappointed vanity and +exultation scarcely disguised by a laugh, was heard saying, louder +than the owner knew, "Oh, of course Mr. Charnock Poynsett spoiled +sport. It would have been awkward between his wife and his old +flame." + +"For shame, Gussie," hushed Mrs. Duncombe, "they'll hear." + +"I don't care! Let them! Stuck-up people!" + +Whoever heard, Cecil Charnock Poynsett did, and felt as if the +ground were giving way with her. + + + + +CHAPTER XXIV +The Lady Green Mantle + + +The night, just like the night before, + In terrors passed away, +Nor did the demons vanish thence + Before the dawn of day.--MOORE + +The turmoil was over, the gains had been emptied into bags to be +counted at leisure, the relics of the sale left to be disposed of +through the Exchange and Mart. Terry, looking tired to death, +descended from his post as assistant showman; and, with some +gentlemen who were to dine at Compton Poynsett, Cecil drove home to +dress in haste, and act hostess to a large dinner-party. All the +time she felt giddy at the words she had heard--"Mr. Poynsett's old +flame." It was constantly ringing in her ears, and one conviction +was before her mind. Her cheeks burnt like fire, and when she +reached her own room at night, and leant from the window to cool +them, they only burnt the more. + +Had she been wilfully deceived? had she been taking the counsel of a +jealous woman about her husband? Had not Camilla assured her that +the object of his first love was not in the country? Ay; but when +that was spoken Camilla herself was in London, and Cecil knew enough +of her friend to be aware that she viewed such a subterfuge as +ingenious. Even then she had perceived that the person alluded to +could only have been a Vivian, and the exclamation of careless spite +carried assurance to her that she had been tricked into confidence, +and acceptance of the advice of a rival. She had a feverish longing +to know more, and obtain explanation and external certainty. But +how? + +Raymond was one of the very tired that night. He fell asleep the +instant his head touched the pillow; but it was that sobbing, +sighing sleep which had before almost swept away, from very ruth, +her resolution; and on this night there were faltering words, +strangely, though unconsciously, replying to her thoughts. +"Camilla, a cruel revenge!" "Poor child! but for you she might have +learnt." "My mother!" "Why, why this persistent hatred?" "Cannot +you let us alone?" "Must you destroy our home?" + +These were the mutterings at intervals. She listened, and in the +darkness her impulse was to throw herself on her husband, tell him +all, show him how she had been misled, and promise to give up all to +which that true Vivienne had prompted her. She did even try to wake +him, but the attempt caused only a more distinct expostulation of +"Cannot you let her alone?" "Cannot you let us learn to love one +another?" "It may be revenge on me or my mother; but what has she +done?" "Don't!--oh, don't!" + +The distress she caused forced her to desist, and she remembered how +Raymond had always warned her. The intimacy with Lady Tyrrell had +been in the teeth of his remonstrances. He had said everything to +prevent it short of confessing his former attachment, and though +resentful that the warning had been denied her, she felt it had been +well that she had been prevented from putting the question on her +first impulse. Many ways of ascertaining the fact were revolved by +her as with an aching head she lay hopelessly awake till morning, +when she fell into a doze which lasted until she found that Raymond +had risen, and that she must dress in haste, unless she meant to +lose her character for punctuality. Her head still ached, and she +felt thoroughly tired; but when Raymond advised her to stay at home, +and recruit herself for the ball, she said the air of the downs +would refresh her. Indeed, she felt as if quiet and loneliness +would be intolerable until she could understand herself and what she +had heard. + +Raymond took the reins of the barouche, and a gentleman who had +slept at the Hall went on the box beside him, leaving room for +Rosamond and her brother, who were to be picked up at the Rectory; +but when they drew up there, only Rosamond came out in the wonderful +bonnet, just large enough to contain one big water-lily, which +suited well with the sleepy grace of her movements, and the glossy +sheen of her mauve silk. + +"Terry is not coming. He has a headache, poor boy," she said, as +Julius shut her into the barouche. "Take care of him and baby." + +"Take care of yourself, Madam Madcap," said Julius, with a smile, as +she bent down to give him a parting kiss, with perhaps a little +pleading for forgiveness in it. But instead of, as last year, +shuddering, either at its folly or publicity, Cecil felt a keen pang +of desire for such a look as half rebuked, while it took a loving +farewell of Rosamond. Was Camilla like that statue which the +husband inadvertently espoused with a ring, and which interposed +between him and his wife for ever? + +Rosamond talked. She always had a certain embarrassment in tete-a- +tetes with Cecil, and it took form in a flow of words. "Poor Terry! +he turned faint and giddy at breakfast. I thought he had been +indulging at the refreshment-stall, but he says he was saving for a +fine copy of the Faerie Queen that Friskyball told him of at a book- +stall at Backsworth, and existed all day on draughts of water when +his throat grew dry as showman; so I suppose it is only inanition, +coupled with excitement and stuffiness, and that quiet will repair +him. He would not hear of my staying with him." + +"I suppose you do not wish to be late?" + +"Certainly not," said Rosamond, who, indeed, would have given up +before, save for her bonnet and her principle; and whatever she said +of Lady Rathforlane's easy management of her nurslings, did not +desire to be _too_ many hours absent from her Julia. + +"I only want to stay till the Three-year-old Cup has been run for," +said Cecil. "Mrs. Duncombe would feel it unkind if we did not." + +"You look tired," said Rosamond, kindly; "put your feet upon the +front seat--nobody will look. Do you know how much you cleared?" + +"Not yet," said Cecil. "I do not know what was made by the raffles. +How I do hate them! Fancy that lovely opal Venetian vase going to +that big bony Scotswoman, Mr. M'Vie's mother." + +"Indeed! That is a pity. If I had known it would be raffled for, I +would have sent a private commission, though I don't know if Julius +would have let me. He says it is gambling. What became of the Spa +work-box, with the passion-flower wreath?" + +"I don't know. I was so disgusted, that I would not look any more. +I never saw such an obnoxious girl as that Miss Moy." + +"_That_ she is," said Rosamond. "I should think she was acting the +fast girl as found in sensation novels." + +"Exactly," said Cecil, proceeding to narrate the proposed election; +and in her need of sympathy she even told its sequel, adding, +"Rosamond, do you know what she meant?" + +"Is it fair to tell you?" said Rosamond, asking a question she knew +to be vain. + +"I must know whether I have been deceived." + +"Never by Raymond!" cried Rosamond. + +"Never, never, never!" cried Cecil, with most unusual excitement. +"He told me all that concerned himself at the very first. I wish he +had told me who it was. How much it would have saved! Rosamond, +you know, I am sure." + +"Yes, I made Julius tell me; but indeed, Cecil, you need not mind. +Never has a feeling more entirely died out." + +"Do you think I do not know that?" said Cecil. "Do you think my +husband could have been my husband if he had not felt _that_?" + +"Dear Cecil, I am so glad," cried impulsive Rosamond; her gladness, +in truth, chiefly excited by the anger that looked like love for +Raymond. "I mean, I am glad you see it so, and don't doubt him." + +"I hope we are both above that," said Cecil. "No, it is Camilla +that I want to know about. I _must_ know whether she told me +truth." + +"She told! what did she tell you?" + +"That _he_--Raymond--had loved some one," said Cecil in a stifled +voice; "that I little knew what his love could be. I thought it had +been for her sister in India. She told me that it was nobody in the +country. But then we were in town." + +"Just like her!" cried Rosamond, and wondered not to be +contradicted. + +"Tell me how it really was!" only asked Cecil. + +"As far as I know, the attachment grew up with Raymond, but it was +when the brother was alive, and Sir Harry at his worst; and Mrs. +Poynsett did not like it, though she gave in at last, and tried to +make the best of it; but then she--Camilla--as you call her--met the +old monster, Lord Tyrrell, made up a quarrel, because Mrs. Poynsett +would not abdicate, and broke it off." + +"She said Mrs. Poynsett only half consented, and that the family +grew weary of her persistent opposition." + +"And she made you think it Mrs. Poynsett's doing, and that she is +not possible to live with! O, Cecil! you will not think that any +longer. Don't you see that it is breaking Raymond's heart?" + +Cecil's tears were starting, and she was very near sobbing as she +said, "I thought perhaps if we were away by ourselves he might come +to care for me. _She_ said he never would while his mother was by-- +that she would not let him." + +"That's not a bit true!" said Rosamond, indignantly. "Is it not +what she has most at heart, to see her sons happy? When has she +ever tried to interfere between Julius and me? Not that she could," +added Rosamond to herself in a happy little whisper, not meant to be +heard, but it was; and with actual though suppressed sobs, Cecil +exclaimed-- + +"O, Rose, Rose! what do you do to make your husband love you?" + +"Do? Be very naughty!" said Rosamond, forced to think of the +exigencies of the moment, and adding lightly, "There! it won't do to +cry. Here are the gentlemen looking round to see what is the +matter." + +Ardently did she wish to have been able to put Cecil into Raymond's +arms and run out of sight, but with two men-servants with crossed +arms behind, a strange gentleman in front, the streets of Wil'sbro' +at hand, and the race-ground impending, sentiment was impossible, +and she could only make herself a tonic, and declare nothing to be +the matter; while Cecil, horrified at attracting notice, righted +herself and made protest of her perfect health and comfort. When +Raymond, always careful of her, stopped the carriage and descended +from his perch to certify himself whether she was equal to going on, +his solicitude went to her heart, and she gave his hand, as it lay +on the door, an affectionate thankful pressure, which so amazed him +that he raised his eyes to her face with a softness in them that +made them for a moment resemble Frank's. + +That was all, emotion must be kept at bay, and as vehicles thickened +round them as they passed through Wil'sbro', the two ladies betook +themselves to casual remarks upon them. Overtaking the Sirenwood +carriage just at the turn upon the down, Raymond had no choice but +to take up his station with that on one side, and on the other +Captain Duncombe's drag, where, fluttering with Dark Hag's colours, +were perched Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Moy, just in the rear of the +like conveyance from the barracks. + +Greetings, and invitations to both elevations were plentiful, and +Rosamond would have felt in her element on the military one. She +was rapidly calculating, with her good-natured eye, whether the +choice her rank gave her would exclude some eager girl, when Cecil +whispered, "Stay with me pray," with an irresistibly beseeching +tone. So the Strangeways sisters climbed up, nothing loth; Lady +Tyrrell sat with her father, the centre of a throng of gentlemen, +who welcomed her to the ground where she used to be a reigning +belle; and the Colonel's wife, Mrs. Ross, came to sit with Lady +Rosamond. The whole was perfect enjoyment to the last. She felt it +a delightful taste of her merry old Bohemian days to sit in the +clear September sunshine, exhilarated by the brilliancy and life +around, laughing with her own little court of officers, exclaiming +at every droll episode, holding her breath with the thrill of +universal expectation and excitement, in the wonderful hush of the +multitude as the thud of the hoofs and rush in the wind was heard +coming nearer, straining her eyes as the glossy creatures and their +gay riders flashed past, and setting her whole heart for the moment +on the one she was told to care for. + +Raymond, seeing his ladies well provided for, gave up his reins to +the coachman, and started in quest of a friend from the other side +of the county. About an hour later, when luncheon was in full +progress, and Rosamond was, by Cecil's languor, driven into doing +the honours, with her most sunshiny drollery and mirth, Raymond's +hand was on the carriage door, and he asked in haste, "Can you spare +me a glass of champagne? Have you a scent-bottle?" + +"An accident?" + +"Yes, no, not exactly. She has been knocked down and trampled on." + +"Who? Let me come! Can't I help? Could Rosamond?" + +"No, no. It is a poor woman, brutally treated. No, I say, I'll +manage. It is a dreadful scene, don't." + +But there was something in his tone which impelled Rosamond to open +the carriage door and spring out. + +"Rose, I say it is no place for a lady. I can't answer for it to +Julius." + +"I'll do that. Take me." + +There was no withstanding her, and, after all, Raymond's tone +betrayed that he was thankful for her help, and knew that there was +no danger for her. + +He had not many yards to lead her. The regions of thoughtless +gaiety were scarcely separated from the regions of undisguised evil, +and Raymond, on his way back from his friend, had fallen on a +horrible row, in which a toy-selling woman had been set upon, thrown +down and trodden on, and then dragged out by the police, bleeding +and senseless. When he brought Rosamond to the spot, she was lying +propped against a bundle, moaning a little, and guarded by a young +policeman, who looked perplexed and only equal to keeping back the +crowd, who otherwise, with better or worse purposes, would have +rushed back in the few minutes during which Mr. Poynsett had been +absent. + +They fell back, staring and uttering expressions of rough wonder at +the advance of the lady in her glistening silk, but as she knelt +down by the poor creature, held her on her arm, bathed her face with +scent on her own handkerchief, and held to her lips the champagne +that Raymond poured out, there was a kind of hoarse cheer. + +"I think her arm is put out," said Rosamond; "she ought to go to the +Infirmary." + +"Send for a cab," said Raymond to the policeman; but at that moment +the girl opened her eyes, started at the sight of him and tried to +hide her face with her hand. + +"It is poor Fanny Reynolds," said he in a low voice to Rosamond, +while the policeman was gruffly telling the woman she was better, +and ought to get up and not trouble the lady; but Rosamond waved off +his too decided assistance, saying: + +"I know who she is; she comes from my husband's parish; and I will +take her home. You would like to go home, would you not, poor +Fanny?" + +The woman shuddered, but clung to her; and in a minute or two an +unwilling fly had been pressed into the service, and the girl lifted +into it by Raymond and the policeman. + +"You are really going with her?" said the former. "You will judge +whether to take her home; but she ought to go to the Infirmary +first." + +"Tell Cecil I am sorry to desert her," said Rosamond, as he wrung +her hand, then paid the driver and gave him directions, the +policeman going with them to clear the way through the throng to the +border of the down. + +The choice of the cabman had not been happy. He tried to go towards +Backsworth, and when bidden to go to Wil'sbro', growled out an +imprecation, and dashed off at a pace that was evident agony to the +poor patient; but when Rosamond stretched out at the window to +remonstrate, she was answered with rude abuse that he could not be +hindered all day by whims. She perceived that he was so much in +liquor that their connection had better be as brief as possible; and +the name on the door showed that he came from beyond the circle of +influence of the name of Charnock Poynsett. She longed to assume +the reins, if not to lay the whip about his ears; but all she could +do was to try to lessen the force of the jolts by holding up the +girl, as the horse was savagely beaten, and the carriage so swayed +from side to side that she began to think it would be well if there +were not three cases for the Infirmary instead of one. To talk to +the girl or learn her wishes was not possible, among the moans and +cries caused by the motion; and it was no small relief to be safely +at the Infirmary door, though there was no release till after a +fierce altercation with the driver, who first denied, and then +laughed to scorn the ample fare he had received, so that had any +policeman been at hand, the porter and house surgeon would have +given him in charge, but they could only take his number and let him +drive off in a fury. + +Poor Fanny was carried away fainting to the accident ward, and +Rosamond found it would be so long before she would be visible +again, that it would be wiser to go home and send in her relations, +but there was not a fly or cab left in Wil'sbro', and there was +nothing for it but to walk. + +She found herself a good deal shaken, and walked fast because thus +her limbs did not tremble so much, while the glaring September +afternoon made her miss the parasol she had left in the carriage, +and find little comfort in the shadeless erection on her head. It +was much further than she had walked for a long time past, and she +had begun to think she had parted with a good deal of her strength +before the Compton woods grew more defined, or the church tower came +any nearer. + +Though the lane to the Reynolds' colony was not full in her way, she +was glad to sit down in the shade to speak to old Betty, who did not +comport herself according to either extreme common to parents in +literature. + +"So Fanny, she be in the 'firmary, be her? I'm sure as 'twas very +good of the young Squire and you, my lady; and I'm sorry her's bin +and give you so much trouble." + +Everybody was harvesting but the old woman, who had the inevitable +bad leg. All men and beasts were either in the fields or at the +races, and Rosamond, uncertain whether her patient was not in a +dying state, rejoiced in her recent acquisition of a pony carriage, +and speeding home with renewed energy, roused her 'parson's man' +from tea in his cottage, and ordered him off to take Betty Reynolds +to see her daughter without loss of time. + +Then at length she opened her own gate and walked in at the drawing- +room window. Terry started up from the sofa, and Anne from a chair +by his side, exclaiming at her appearance, and asking if there had +been any accident. + +"Not to any of us, but to a poor woman whom I have been taking to +the Infirmary," she said, sinking into a low chair. "Where's +Julius?" + +"He went to see old George Willett," said Anne. "The poor old man +has just heard of the death of his daughter at Wil'sbro'." + +"And you came to sit with this boy, you good creature. How are you, +master?" + +"Oh, better, thanks," he said, with a weary stretch. "How done up +you look, Rose! How did you come?" + +"I walked from Wil'sbro'." + +"Walked!" echoed both her hearers. + +"Walked! I liked my two legs better than the four of the horse that +brought me there, though 'twasn't his fault, poor beast, but the +brute of a driver, whom we'll have up before the magistrate. I've +got the name; doing his best to dislocate every bone in the poor +thing's body. Well, and I hope baby didn't disturb you?" + +"Baby has been wonderfully quiet. Julius went to see after her +once, but she was out." + +"I'll go and see the young woman, and then come and tell my story." + +But Rosamond came back almost instantly, exclaiming, "Emma must have +taken the baby to the Hall. I wish she would be more careful. The +sun is getting low, and there's a fog rising." + +"She had not been there when I came down an hour ago," said Anne; +"at least, not with Mrs. Poynsett. They may have had her in the +housekeeper's room. I had better go and hasten her home." + +Julius came in shortly after, but before he had heard the tale of +Fanny Reynolds, Anne had returned to say that neither child nor +nurse had been at the Hall, nor passed the large gate that morning. +It was growing rather alarming. The other servants said Emma had +taken the baby out as usual in the morning, but had not returned to +dinner, and they too had supposed her at the Hall. None of the +dependants of the Hall in the cottages round knew anything of her, +but at last Dilemma Hornblower imparted that she had seen my lady's +baby's green cloak atop of a tax-cart going towards Wil'sbro'. + +Now Emma had undesirable relations, and Rosamond had taken her in +spite of warning that her uncle was the keeper of the 'Three +Pigeons.' The young parents stood looking at one another, and +Rosamond faintly said, "If that girl has taken her to the races!" + +"I'm more afraid of that fever in Water Lane," said Julius. "I have +a great mind to take the pony carriage and see that the girl does +not take her there." + +"Oh! I sent it with Betty Reynolds," cried Rosamond in an agony. + +"At that moment the Hall carriage came dashing up, and as Raymond +saw the three standing in the road, he called to the coachman to +stop, for he and his friend were now within, and Cecil leaning back, +looking much tired. Raymond's eager question was what Rosamond had +done with her charge. + +"Left her at the Infirmary;--but, oh! you've not seen baby?" + +"Seen--seen what! your baby?" asked Raymond, as if he thought +Rosamond's senses astray, while his bachelor friend was ready to +laugh at a young mother's alarms, all the more when Julius answered, +"It is too true; the baby and her nurse have not been seen here +since ten o'clock; and we are seriously afraid the girl may have +been beguiled to those races. There is a report of the child's +cloak having been seen on a tax-cart." + +"Then it was so," exclaimed Cecil, starting forward. "I saw a +baby's mantle of that peculiar green, and it struck me that some +farmer's wife had been aping little Julia's." + +"Where? When?" cried Rosamond. + +"They passed us, trying to find a place. I did not show it to you +for you were talking to those gentlemen." + +"Did you see it, Brown?" asked Julius, going towards the coachman. +"Our baby and nurse, I mean." + +"I can't tell about Miss Charnock, sir," said the coachman, "but I +did think I remarked two young females with young Gadley in a tax- +cart. I would not be alarmed, sir, nor my lady," he added, with the +freedom of a confidential servant, who, like all the household, +adored Lady Rosamond. "It was a giddy thing in the young woman to +have done; and no place to take the young lady to. But there--there +were more infants there than a man could count, and it stands to +reason they come to no harm." + +"The most sensible thing that has been said yet," muttered the +friend; but Rosamond was by no means pacified. "Gadley's cart! +They'll go to that horrid public-house in Water Lane where there's +typhus and diphtheria and everything; and there's this fog--and that +girl will never wrap her up. Oh! why did I ever go?" + +"My dear Rose," said Julius, trying to speak with masculine +composure, "this is nonsense. Depend upon it, Emma is only anxious +to get her home." + +"I don't know, I don't know! If she could take her to the races, +she would be capable of taking her anywhere! They all go and drink +at that beer-shop, and catch--Julius, the pony carriage! Oh! it's +gone!" + +"Yes," said Julius in explanation. "She sent Betty Reynolds into +Wil'sbro' in it." + +"Get in, Rosamond," cried Cecil, "we will drive back till we find +her." + +But this was more than a good coachman could permit for his horses' +sake, and Brown declared they must be fed and rested before the +ball. Cecil was ready to give up the ball, but still they could not +be taken back at once; and Rosamond had by this time turned as if +setting her face to walk at once to the race-ground until she found +her child, when Raymond said, "Rose! would you be afraid to trust to +King Coal and me? I would put him in at once and drive you till you +find Julia." + +"Oh! Raymond, how good you are!" + +The coachman, glad of this solution, only waited to pick up Anne, +and hurried on his horses, while the bachelor friend could not help +grunting a little, and observing that it was plain there was only +one child in the family, and that he would take any bet 'it' was at +home all right long before Poynsett reached the parsonage. + +"Maybe so," said Raymond, "but I would do anything rather than leave +her mother in the distress you take so easily." + +"Besides, there's every chance of her being taken to that low +public-house," said Cecil. "One that Mr. Poynsett would not allow +our servants to go to during the bazaar, though it is close to the +town-hall, and all the others did." + +"Let us hope that early influence may prevent contamination," +solemnly said the friend. + +Cecil turned from him. "I still hope she may be at home," she said; +"it is getting very chill and foggy. Raymond, I hope you may not +have to go." + +"You must lie down and get thoroughly rested," he said, as he helped +her out; and only waiting to equip himself for the evening dance, he +hurried to the stables to expedite the harnessing of the powerful +and fiery steed which had as yet been only experimentally driven by +himself and the coachman. + +Rosamond was watching, and when King Coal was with difficulty pulled +up, she made but one spring to the seat of the dog-cart; and Julius, +who was tucking in the rug, had to leap back to save his foot, so +instantaneous was the dash forward. They went like the wind, +Rosamond not caring to speak, and Raymond had quite enough on his +hands to be glad not to be required to talk, while he steered +through the numerous vehicles they met, and she scanned them +anxiously for the outline of Emma's hat. At last they reached +Wil'sbro', where, as they came to the entrance of Water Lane, +Rosamond, through the hazy gaslight, declared that she saw a tax- +cart at the door of the 'Three Pigeons,' and Raymond, albeit +uncertain whether it were _the_ tax-cart, could only turn down the +lane at her bidding, with difficulty preventing King Coal from +running his nose into the vehicle. Something like an infant's cry +was heard through the open door, and before he knew what she was +about, Rosamond was on the pavement and had rushed into the house; +and while he was signing to a man to take the horse's head, she was +out again, the gaslight catching her eyes so that they glared like a +tigress's, her child in her arms, and a whole Babel of explaining +tongues behind her. How she did it neither she nor Raymond ever +knew, but in a second she had flown to her perch, saying hoarsely, +"Drive me to Dr. Worth's. They were drugging her. I don't know +whether I was in time. No, not a word"--(this to those behind)-- +"never let me see any of you again." + +King Coal prevented all further words of explanation by dancing +round, so that Raymond was rejoiced at finding that nobody was run +over. They were off again instantly, while Rosamond vehemently +clasped the child, which was sobbing out a feeble sound, as if quite +spent with crying, but without which the mother seemed dissatisfied, +for she moved the poor little thing about if it ceased for a moment. +They were soon within Dr. Worth's iron gates, where Raymond could +give the horse to a servant, help his sister-in-law down, and speak +for her; for at first she only held up the phial she had clutched, +and gazed at the doctor speechlessly. + +He looked well both at the bottle and the baby while Raymond spoke, +and then said, "Are you sure she took any, Lady Rosamond?" + +"Quite, quite sure!" cried Rosamond. "The spoon was at her lips, +the dear little helpless darling!" + +"Well, then," said the doctor, dryly, "it only remains to be proved +whether an aristocratic baby can bear popular treatment. I dare say +some hundred unlucky infants have been lugged out to the race-course +to-day, and come back squalling their hearts out with fatigue and +hunger, and I'll be bound that nine-tenths are lulled with this very +sedative, and will be none the worse." + +"Then you do not think it will hurt her?" + +"So far from it, that, under the circumstances, it was the best +thing she could have. She has plainly been exhausted, and though I +would not exactly recommend the practice in your nursery, I doubt if +she could have taken nourishment till she had been composed. She +will sleep for an hour or two, and by that time you can get her +home, and feed her as usual. I should be more anxious about Lady +Rosamond herself," he added, turning to Raymond. "She looks +completely worn out. Let me order you a basin of soup." + +But Rosamond would not hear of it, she must get baby home directly. +Raymond advised a fly, but it was recollected that none was +attainable between the races and the ball, so the little one was +muffled in shawls and cloaks almost to suffocation, and the doctor +forced a glass of wine on her mother, and promised to look in the +next day. Still they had a delay at the door, caused by the +penitent Emma and her aunt, bent on telling how far they had been +from intending any harm; how Emma, when carrying the baby out, had +been over-persuaded by the cousins she had never disappointed +before; how they had faithfully promised to take her home early, +long before my lady's return; how she had taken baby's bottle, but +how it had got broken; how impossible it had been to move off the +ground in the throng; and how the poor baby's inconsolable cries had +caused the young nurse to turn aside to see whether her aunt could +find anything to prevent her from screaming herself into +convulsions. + +Nothing but the most determined volubility on Mrs. Gadley's part +could have poured this into the ears of Raymond; Rosamond either +could not or would not heed, pushed forward, past the weeping Emma, +and pulled away her dress with a shudder, when there was an attempt +to draw her back and make her listen. + +"Don't, girl," said Raymond. "Don't you see that Lady Rosamond +can't attend to you? If you have anything to say, you must come +another time. You've done quite enough mischief for the present." + +"Yes," said the doctor, "tell your brother to put them both to bed, +and keep them quiet. I should like to prescribe the same for you, +Mr. Poynsett; you don't look the thing, and I suppose you are going +to take the ball by way of remedy." + +Raymond thanked the doctor, but was too much employed in enveloping +his passengers to make further reply. + +It was quite dark, and the fog had turned to misty rain, soft and +still, but all pervading, and Rosamond found it impossible to hold +up an umbrella as well as to guard the baby, who was the only +passenger not soaked and dripping by the time they were among the +lighted windows of the village. + +"Oh, Raymond! Raymond!" she then said, in a husky dreamy voice, +"how good and kind you have been. I know there was something that +would make you very, very glad!" + +"Is there?" he said. "I have not met with anything to make me glad +for a long time past!" + +"And I don't seem able to recollect what it was, or even if I ought +to tell," said Rosamond, in the same faint, bewildered voice, which +made Raymond very glad they were at the gate, where stood Julius. + +But before Rosamond would descend into her husband's arms, she +opened all her child's mufflings, saying, "Kiss her, kiss her, +Raymond--how she shall love you!" And when he had obeyed, and +Rosamond had handed the little one down to her father, she pressed +her own wet cheek against his dripping beard and moustache, and +exclaimed, "I'll never forget your goodness. Have you got her safe, +Julius? I'll never, never go anywhere again!" + + + + + +CHAPTER XXV +The Pebbles + + +O no, no, no; 'tis true. Here, take this too; +It is a basilisk unto mine eye, +Kills me to look on't. Let there be no honour, +Where there is beauty; truth, where semblance; love, +Where there's another man.--Cymbeline + +When Julius, according to custom, opened his study shutters, at +half-past six, to a bright sunrise, his eldest brother stood before +the window. "Well, how are they?" he said. + +"All right, thank you; the child woke, had some food, and slept well +and naturally after it; and Rose has been quite comfortable and at +rest since midnight. You saved us from a great deal, Raymond." + +"Ah!" with a sound of deep relief; "may Julia only turn out as sweet +a piece of womanhood as her mother. Julius, I never understood half +what that dear wife of yours was till yesterday." + +"I was forced to cut our gratitude very short," said Julius, laying +his hand on his brother's shoulder. "You know I've always taken +your kindness as a matter of course." + +"I should think so," said Raymond, the more moved of the two. "I +tell you, Julius, that Rosamond was to me the only redeeming element +in the day. I wanted to know whether you could walk with me to ask +after that poor girl; I hear she came home one with her +grandmother." + +"Gladly," said Julius. "I ought to have gone last night; but what +with Rose, and the baby, and Terry, I am afraid I forgot +everything." He disappeared, and presently issued from the front +door in his broad hat, while Raymond inquired for Terry. + +"He is asleep now, but he has been very restless, and there is +something about him I don't like. Did not Worth say he would come +and look at the baby?" + +"Yes, but chiefly to pacify Rosamond, about whom he was the most +uneasy." + +"She is quite herself now; but you look overdone, Raymond. Have you +had any sleep?" + +"I have not lain down. When we came home at four o'clock, Cecil was +quite knocked up, excited and hysterical. Her maid advised me to +leave her to her; so I took a bath, and came down to wait for you." + +Julius would have liked to see the maid who could have soothed his +Rosamond last night without him! He only said, however, "Is Frank +come down? My mother rather expected him." + +"Yes, he came to the race-ground." + +"Indeed! He was not with you when you came back, or were we not +sufficiently rational to see him?" + +"Duncombe gave a dinner at the hotel, and carried him off to it. +I'm mortally afraid there's something amiss in that quarter. What, +didn't you know that Duncombe's filly failed?" + +"No, indeed, I did not." + +"The town was ringing with it. Beaten out-and-out by Fair Phyllida! +a beast that took them all by surprise--nothing to look at--but +causing, I fancy, a good deal of distress. They say the Duncombes +will be done for. I only wish Frank was clear; but that unhappy +engagement has thrown him in with Sir Harry's set, and he was with +them all day--hardly spoke to me. To a fellow like him, a veteran +scamp like old Vivian, with his benignant looks, is ten times more +dangerous than men of his own age. However, having done the damage, +they seem to have thrown him off. Miss Vivian would not speak to +him at the ball." + +"Eleonora! I don't know how to think it!" + +"What you cannot _think_, a Vivian can _do_ and does!" said Raymond, +bitterly. "My belief is that he was decoyed into being fleeced by +the father, and now they have done their worst, he is cast off. He +came home with us, but sat outside, and I could not get a word out +of him." + +"I hope my mother may." + +"If he be not too far gone for her. I always did expect some such +termination, but not with this addition." + +"I don't understand it now--Lena!" + +"I only wonder at your surprise. The girl has been estranged from +us all for a long time. If it is at an end, so much the better. I +only wish we were none of us ever to see the face of one of them +again." + +Julius knew from his wife that there were hopes for Raymond, but of +course he might not speak, and he was revolving these words, which +had a vehemence unlike the wont of the speaker, when he was startled +by Raymond's saying, "Julius, you were right. I have come to the +conclusion that no consideration shall ever make me sanction races +again." + +"I am glad," began Julius. + +"You would not be glad if you had seen all I saw yesterday. You +must have lent me your eyes, for when you spoke before of the evils, +I thought you had picked up a Utopian notion, and were running a- +muck with it, like an enthusiastic young clergyman. For my own part +I can't say I ever came across anything offensive. Of course I know +where to find it, as one does wherever one goes, but there was no +call to run after it; and as we were used to the affair, it was a +mere matter of society--" + +"No, it could never be any temptation to you," said Julius. + +"No, nor to any other reasonable man; and I should add, though +perhaps you might not allow it, that so long as a man keeps within +his means, he has a right to enhance his excitement and amusement by +bets." + +"Umph! He has a right then to tempt others to their ruin, and +create a class of speculators who live by gambling." + +"You need not go on trying to demolish me. I was going to say that +I had only thought of the demoralization, from the betting side; but +yesterday it was as if you had fascinated my eyes to look behind the +scenes. I could not move a step without falling on something +abominable. Roughs, with every passion up to fever-pitch, ferocity +barely kept down by fear of the police, gambling everywhere, +innocent young things looking on at coarseness as part of the humour +of the day, foul language, swarms of vagabond creatures, whose trade +is to minister to the license of such occasions. I declare that +your wife was the only being I saw display a spark of any sentiment +human nature need not blush for!" + +"Nay, Raymond, I begin to wonder whose is the exaggerated feeling +now." + +"You were not there," was the answer; and they were here interrupted +by crossing the path of the policeman, evidently full of an official +communication. + +"I did not expect to see you so early, sir," he said. "I was coming +to the Hall to report to you after I had been in to the +superintendent." + +"What is it?" + +"There has been a burglary at Mrs. Hornblower's, sir. If you +please, sir," to Julius, "when is the Reverend Mr. Bowater expected +home?" + +"Not before Monday. Is anything of his taken?" + +"Yes, sir. A glass case has been broken open, and a silver cup and +oar, prizes for sports at college, I believe, have been abstracted. +Also the money from the till below; and I am sorry to say, young +Hornblower is absconded, and suspicion lies heavy on him. They do +say the young man staked heavily on that mare of Captain +Duncombe's." + +"You had better go on to the superintendent now," said Raymond. +"You can come to me for a summons if you can find any traces." + +Poor Mrs. Hornblower, what horror for her! and poor Herbert too who +would acutely feel this ingratitude. The blackness of it was beyond +what Julius thought probable in the lad, and the discussion of it +occupied the brothers till they reached the Reynolds colony, where +they were received by the daughter-in-law, a much more civilized +person than old Betty. + +After Fanny's dislocated arm had been set, the surgeon had sent her +home in the Rectory carriage, saying there was so much fever in +Wil'sbro', that she would be likely to recover better at home; but +she had been suffering and feverish all night, and Dan Reynolds was +now gone in quest of 'Drake,' for whom she had been calling all +night. + +"Is he her husband?" asked Julius. + +"Well, I don't know, sir; leastways, Granny says he ought to be +answerable for what's required." + +Mrs. Reynolds further betrayed that the family had not been ignorant +of Fanny's career since she had run away from home, leaving her +child on her grandmother's hands. She had made her home in one of +the yellow vans which circulate between fairs and races, driving an +ostensible trade in cheap toys, but really existing by setting up +games which were, in fact, forms of gambling, according to the taste +of the people and the toleration of the police. From time to time, +she had appeared at home, late in the evening, with small sums of +money and presents for her boy; and Mrs. Dan believed that she +thought herself as good as married to 'that there Drake.' She was +reported to be asleep, and the place 'all of a caddle,' and Julius +promised to call later in the day. + +"Yes, sir," said Mrs. Reynolds; "it would be a right good thing, +poor girl. She've a kind heart, they all do say; not as I know, not +coming here till she was gone, nor wanting to know much on her, for +'twas a right bad way she was in, and 'twere well if them nasty +races were put down by Act of Parliament, for they be the very ruin +of the girls in these parts." + +"There's a new suggestion, Raymond," said Julius as he shut the +garden gate. + +Raymond was long in answering, and when he spoke, it was to say, "I +shall withdraw from the subscription to the Wil'sbro' Cup." + +"So much the better." + +Then Raymond began discussing the terms of the letter in which he +would state his reasons, but with an amount of excitement that made +Julius say, "I should think it better not to write in this first +heat. It will take more effect if it is not so visibly done on the +spur of the moment." + +But the usually deliberate Raymond exclaimed, "I cannot rest till it +is done. I feel as if I must be like Lady Macbeth, continually +washing my hands of all this wreck and ruin." + +"No wonder; but I should think there was great need of caution--to +use your own words." + +"My seat must go, if this is to be the price," said Raymond. "I +felt through all the speeches at that gilt-gingerbread place, that +it was a monument of my truckling to expediency. We began the whole +thing at the wrong end, and I fear we are beginning to see the +effects." + +"Do you mean that you are anxious about that fever in Water Lane?" + +"There was an oppressive sickly air about everything, strongest at +the ball. I can't forget it," said Raymond, taking off his hat, so +that the morning air might play about his temples. "We talked about +meddling women, but the truth was that they were shaming us by doing +what they could." + +"I hope others will see it so. Is not Whitlock to be mayor next +time?" + +"Yes. He may do something. Well, they will hardly unseat me! I +should not like to see Moy in my place, and it would be a sore thing +for my mother; but," he continued, in the same strange, dreamy +manner, "everything has turned out so wretchedly that I hardly know +or care how it goes." + +"My dear old fellow!" + +Raymond had stopped to lean over a gate, where he could look up to +the old red house in the green park, set in brightly-tinted trees, +all aglow in the morning sunshine. Tears had sprung on his cheeks, +and a suppressed sob heaved his chest. Julius ventured to say, +"Perhaps there may yet be a change of mind." + +"No!" was the answer. "In the present situation there is nothing +for it but to sacrifice my last shred of peace to the one who has +the chief right--in a certain way." + +They walked on, and he hardly spoke again till, as they reached the +Rectory, Julius persuaded him to come in and have a cup of tea; and +though he said he must go back and see his friend off, he could not +withstand the sight of Rosamond at the window, fresh and smiling, +with her child in her arms. + +"Not a bit the worse for her dissipation," she merrily said. "Oh, +the naughty little thing!--to have begun with the turf, and then the +'Three Pigeons'! Aren't you ashamed of her, papa? Sit down, +Raymond; how horribly tired you do look." + +"Ha! What's this?" exclaimed Julius, who had been opening the post- +bag. "Here's a note from the Bishop, desiring me to come to the +palace to-day, if possible." + +"Oh!" cried Raymond. "Where is there vacant--isn't there a canonry +or a chaplaincy?" + +"Or an archbishopric or two?" said Julius. "The pony can do it, I +think, as there will be a long rest. If he seems fagged, I can put +up at Backsworth and take a fly." + +"You'll let James drive you," said Rosamond. + +"I had rather not," said Julius. "It may be better to be alone." + +"He is afraid of betraying his elevation to James," laughed +Rosamond. + +"Mrs. Daniel Reynolds to see you, sir." + +This was with the information that that there trapezing chap, Drake, +had fetched off poor Fanny in his van. He had been in trouble +himself, having been in custody for some misdemeanour when she was +thrown down; but as soon as he was released, he had come in search +of her, and though at first he seemed willing to leave her to be +nursed at home, he had no sooner heard of the visitors of that +morning than he had sworn he would have no parson meddling with his +poor gal! she was good enough for him, and he would not have a pack +of nonsense put in her head to set her against him. + +"He's good to her, sir," said Mrs. Reynolds, "I think he be; but he +is a very ignorant man. He tell'd us once as he was born in one of +they vans, and hadn't never been to school nor nothin', nor heard +tell of God, save in the way of bad words: he've done nothin' but +go from one races and fairs to another, just like the gipsies, +though he bain't a gipsy neither; but he's right down attacted to +poor Fanny, and good to her." + +"Another product of the system," said Raymond. + +"Like the gleeman, whom we see through a picturesque medium," said +Julius; "but who could not have been pleasant to the mediaeval +clergyman. I have hopes of poor Fanny yet. She will drift home one +of these days, and we shall get hold of her." + +"What a fellow you are for hoping!" returned Raymond, a little +impatiently. + +"Why not?" said Julius. + +"Why! I should say--" replied Raymond, setting out to walk home, +where he presided over his friend's breakfast and departure, and +received a little banter over his solicitude for the precious +infant. Cecil was still in bed, and Frank was looking ghastly, and +moved and spoke like one in a dream, Raymond was relieved to hear +him pleading with Susan for to his mother's room much earlier than +usual. + +Susan took pity and let him in; when at once he flung himself into a +chair, with his face hidden on the bed, and exclaimed, "Mother, it +is all over with me!" + +"My dear boy, what can have happened?" + +"Mother, you remember those two red pebbles. Could you believe that +she has sold hers?" + +"Are you sure she has? I heard that they had a collection of such +things from the lapidary at Rockpier." + +"No, mother, that is no explanation. When I found that I should be +able to come down, I sent a card to Lady Tyrrell, saying I would +meet them on the race-ground--a post-card, so that Lena might see +it. When I came there was no Lena, only some excuse about resting +for the ball--lying down with a bad headache, and so forth--making +it plain that I need not go on to Sirenwood. By and by there was +some mild betting with the ladies, and Lady Tyrrell said, 'There's a +chance for you, Bee; don't I see the very fellow to Conny's charm?' +Whereupon that girl Conny pulled out the very stone I gave Lena +three years ago at Rockpier. I asked; yes, I asked--Lena had sold +it; Lena, at the bazaar; Lena, who--" + +"Stay, Frank, is this trusting Lena as she bade you trust her? How +do you know that there were no other such pebbles?" + +"You have not seen her as I have done. There has been a gradual +alienation--holding aloof from us, and throwing herself into the +arms of those Strangeways. It is no fault of her sister's. She has +lamented it to me." + +"Or pointed it out. Did she know the history of these pebbles?" + +"No one did. Lena was above all reserved with her." + +"Camilla Tyrrell knows a good deal more than she is told. Where's +your pebble? You did not stake that?" + +"Those who had one were welcome to the other." + +"O, my poor foolish Frank! May it not be gone to tell the same tale +of you that you think was told of her? Is this all?" + +"Would that it were!" + +"Well, go on, my dear. Was she at the ball?" + +"Surrounded by all that set. I was long in getting near her, and +then she said her card was full; and when I made some desperate +entreaty, she said, in an undertone that stabbed me by its very +calmness, 'After what has passed to-day, the less we meet the +better.' And she moved away, so as to cut me off from another +word." + +"After what had passed! Was it the parting with the stone?" + +"Not only. I got a few words with Lady Tyrrell. She told me that +early impressions had given Lena a kind of fanatical horror of +betting, and that she had long ago made a sort of vow against a +betting man. Lady Tyrrell said she had laughed at it, but had no +notion it was seriously meant; and I--I never even heard of it!" + +"Nor are you a betting man, my Frank." + +"Ay! mother, you have not heard all." + +"You are not in a scrape, my boy?" + +"Yes, I am. You see I lost my head after the pebble transaction. I +couldn't stand small talk, or bear to go near Raymond, so I got +among some other fellows with Sir Harry--" + +"And excitement and distress led you on?" + +"I don't know what came over me. I could not stand still for fear I +should feel. I must be mad on something. Then, that mare of +Duncombe's, poor fellow, seemed a personal affair to us all; and Sir +Harry, and a few other knowing old hands, went working one up, till +betting higher and higher seemed the only way of supporting +Duncombe, besides relieving one's feelings. I know it was being no +end of a fool; but you haven't felt it, mother!" + +"And Sir Harry took your bets?" + +"One must fare and fare alike," said Frank. + +"How much have you lost?" + +"I've lost Lena, that's all I know," said the poor boy; but he +produced his book, and the sum appalled him. "Mother," he said in a +broken voice, "there's no fear of its happening again. I can never +feel like this again. I know it is the first time one of your sons +has served you so, and I can't even talk of sorrow, it seems all +swallowed up in the other matter. But if you will help me to meet +it, I will pay you back ten or twenty pounds every quarter." + +"I think I can, Frankie. I had something in hand towards my own +possible flitting. Here is the key of my desk. Bring me my +banker's book and my cheque book." + +"Mother! mother!" he cried, catching her hand and kissing it, "what +a mother you are!" + +"You understand," she said, "that it is because I believe you were +not master of yourself, and that this is the exception, not the +habit, that I am willing to do all I can for you." + +"The habit! No, indeed! I never staked more than a box of gloves +before; but what's the good, if she has made a vow against me?" + +Mrs. Poynsett was silent for a few moments, then she said, "My poor +boy, I believe you are both victims of a plot. I suspect that +Camilla Tyrrell purposely let you see that pebble-token and be +goaded into gambling, that she might have a story to tell her +sister, when she had failed to shake her constancy and principle in +any other way." + +"Mother, that would make her out a fiend. She has been my good and +candid friend all along. You don't know her." + +"What would a friend have done by you yesterday?" + +"She neither saw nor heard my madness. No, mother, Lenore's heart +has been going from me for months past, and she is glad of this plea +for release, believing me unworthy. Oh! that stern face of hers! +set like a head of Justice with not a shade of pity--so beautiful-- +so terrible! It will never cease to haunt me." + +He sat in deep despondency, while Mrs. Poynsett overlooked her +resources; but presently he started up, saying, "There's one shadow +of a hope. I'll go over to Sirenwood, insist on seeing one her and +having an explanation. I have a right, whatever I did yesterday; +and you have forgiven me for that, mother!" + +"I think it is the most hopeful way. If you can see her without +interposition, you will at least come to an understanding. Here, +you had better take this cheque for Sir Harry." + +When he was gone, she wondered whether she had been justified in +encouraging him in defending Eleonora. Was this not too like +another form of the treatment Raymond had experienced? Her heart +bled for her boy, and she was ready to cry aloud, "Must that woman +always be the destroyer of my sons' peace?" + +When Frank returned, it was with a face that appalled her by its +blank despair, as he again flung himself down beside her. + +"She is gone," he said. + +"Gone!" + +"Gone, and with the Strangeways. I saw her." + +"Spoke to her?" + +"Oh no. The carriage turned the corner as I crossed the road. The +two girls were there, and she--" + +"Going with them to the station?" + +"I thought so; I went to the house, meaning to leave my enclosure +for Sir Harry and meet her on her way back; but I heard she was gone +to stay with Lady Susan in Yorkshire. Sir Harry was not up, nor +Lady Tyrrell." + +Mrs. Poynsett's hope failed, though she was relieved that Camilla's +tongue had not been in action. She was dismayed at the prone +exhausted manner in which Frank lay, partly on the floor, partly +against her couch, with his face hidden. + +"Do you know where she is gone?" + +"Yes, Revelrig, Cleveland, Yorkshire." + +"I will write to her. Whatever may be her intentions, they shall +not be carried out under any misrepresentation that I can +contradict. You have been a foolish fellow, Frankie; but you shall +not be painted worse than you are. She owes you an explanation, and +I will do my best that you shall have it. My dear, what is the +matter?" + +She rang her bell hastily, and upheld the sinking head till help +came. He had not lost consciousness, and called it giddiness, and +he was convicted of having never gone to bed last night, and having +eaten nothing that morning; but he turned against the wine and soup +with which they tried to dose him, and, looking crushed and +bewildered, said he would go and lie down in his own room. + +Raymond went up with him, and returned, saying he only wanted to be +alone, with his face from the light; and Mrs. Poynsett, gazing at +her eldest son, thought he looked as ill and sunken as his younger +brother. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXVI +A Stickit Minister + + +And the boy not out of him.--TENNYSON'S Queen Mary + +Julius had only too well divined the cause of his summons. He found +Herbert Bowater's papers on the table before the Bishop, and there +was no denying that they showed a declension since last year, and +that though, from men without his advantages they would have been +passable, yet from him they were evidences of neglect of study and +thought. Nor could the cause be ignored by any one who had kept an +eye on the cricket reports in the county paper; but Herbert was such +a nice, hearty, innocent fellow, and his father was so much +respected, that it was with great reluctance that his rejection was +decided on and his Rector had been sent for in case there should be +any cause for extenuation. + +Julius could not say there was. He was greatly grieved and +personally ashamed, but he could plead nothing but his own failure +to influence the young man enough to keep him out of a rage for +amusement, of which the quantity, not the quality, was the evil. So +poor Herbert was sent for to hear his fate, and came back looking +stunned. He hardly spoke till they were in the fly that Julius had +brought from Backsworth, and then the untamed school-boy broke +forth: "What are you doing with me? I say, I can't go back to +Compton like a dog in a string." + +"Where will you go?" + +"I don't care. To Jericho at once, out of the way of every one. I +tell you what, Rector, it was the most ridiculous examination I ever +went up for, and I'm not the only man that says so. There was +Rivers, of St. Mary's at Backsworth,--he says the questions were +perfectly unreasonable, and what no one could be prepared for. This +fellow Danvers is a new hand, and they are always worst, setting one +a lot of subjects of no possible use but to catch one out. I should +like to ask him now what living soul at Compton he expects to be the +better for my views on the right reading of--" + +Julius interrupted the passionate tones at the lodge by saying, "If +you wish to go to Jericho, you must give directions." + +Herbert gave something between a laugh and a growl. + +"I left the pony at Backsworth. Will you come with me to Strawyers +and wait in the park till I send Jenny out to you?" + +"No, I say. I know my father will be in a greater rage than he ever +was in his life, and I won't go sneaking about. I'd like to go to +London, to some hole where no one would ever hear of me. If I were +not in Orders already, I'd be off to the ivory-hunters in Africa, +and never be heard of more. If this was to be, I wish they had +found it out a year ago, and then I should not have been bound," +continued the poor young fellow, in his simplicity, thinking his +thoughts aloud, and his sweet candid nature beginning to recover its +balance. "Now I'm the most wretched fellow going. I know what I've +undertaken. It's not your fault, nor poor Joanna's. You've all +been at me, but it only made me worse. What could my father be +thinking of to make a parson of a fellow like me? Well, I must face +it out sooner or later at Compton, and I had better do it there than +at home, even if my father would have me." + +"I must go to Strawyers. The Bishop gave me a letter for your +father, and I think it will break it a little for your mother. +Would you wait for me at Rood House? You could go into the chapel, +and if they wish for you, I could return and fetch you." + +Herbert caught at this as a relief, and orders were given +accordingly. It seemed a cruel moment to tell him of young +Hornblower's evasion and robbery, but the police wanted the +description of the articles; and, in fact, nothing would have so +brought home to him that, though Compton might not appreciate +minutiae of Greek criticism, yet the habit of diligence, of which it +was the test, might make a difference there. The lingering self- +justification was swept away by the sense of the harm his pleasure- +seeking had done to the lad whom he had once influenced. He had +been fond and proud of his trophies, but he scarcely wasted a +thought on them, so absorbed was he in the thought of how he had +lorded it over the youth with that late rebuke. The blame he had +refused to take on himself then came full upon him now, and he +reproached himself too much to be angered at the treachery and +ingratitude. + +"I can't prosecute," he said, when Julius asked for the description +he had promised to procure. + +"We must judge whether it would be true kindness to refrain, if he +is captured," said Julius. "I had not time to see his mother, but +Rosamond will do what she can for her, poor woman." + +"How shall I meet her?" sighed Herbert; and so they arrived at the +tranquil little hospital and passed under the deep archway into the +gray quadrangle, bright with autumn flowers, and so to the chapel. +As they advanced up the solemn and beautiful aisle Herbert dropped +on his knees with his hands over his face. Julius knelt beside him +for a moment, laid his hand on the curly brown hair, whispered a +prayer and a blessing, and then left him; but ere reaching the door, +the low choked sobs of anguish of heart could be heard. + +A few steps more, and in the broad walk along the quadrangle, Julius +met the frail bowed figure with his saintly face, that seemed to +have come out of some sacred bygone age. + +Julius told his errand. "If you could have seen him just now," he +said, "you would see how much more hope there is of him than of many +who never technically fail, but have not the same tender, generous +heart, and free humility." + +"Yes, many a priest might now be thankful if some check had come on +him." + +"And if he had met it with this freedom from bitterness. And it +would be a great kindness to keep him here a day or two. Apart from +being with you, the showing himself at Compton or at Strawyers on +Sunday would be hard on him." + +"I will ask him. I will gladly have him here as long as the quiet +may be good for him. My nephew, William, will be here till the end +of the Long Vacation, but I must go to St. Faith's on Monday to +conduct the retreat." + +"I leave him in your hands then, and will call as I return to see +what is settled, and report what his family wish. I grieve more for +them than for himself." + +Julius first encountered Jenny Bowater in the village making +farewell calls. He stopped the carriage and joined her, and not a +word was needed to tell her that something was amiss. "You have +come to tell us something," she said. "Herbert has failed?" + +"Prayers are sometimes answered as we do not expect," said Julius. +"I believe it will be the making of him." + +"Oh, but how will mamma ever bear it!" cried Jenny. + +"We must remind her that it is only a matter of delay, not +rejection," said Julius. + +"Have you seen him?" + +"Yes, the Bishop sent for me, and asked me to see your father. It +was partly from slips in critical knowledge, which betrayed the want +of study, and the general want of thought and progress, and all the +rest of it, in his papers--" + +"Just the fact--" + +"Yes, which a man of less reality and more superficial quickness +might have concealed by mere intellectual answers, though it might +have been much worse for him in the end." + +"Where is he?" + +"At Rood House. Unless your mother wishes for him here, he had +better stay there till he can bear to come among us again." + +"Much better, indeed," said Jenny. "I only hope papa and mamma will +see how good it is for him to be there. O, Julius, if he is taking +it in such a spirit, I can think it all right for him; but for them-- +for them, it is very hard to bear. Nothing ever went wrong with +the boys before, and Herbert--mamma's darling!" Her eyes were full +of tears. + +"I wish he had had a better Rector," said Julius. + +"No, don't say that. It was not your fault." + +"I cannot tell. An older man, or more truly a holier man, might +have had more influence. We were all in a sort of laissez-aller +state this autumn, and now comes the reckoning." + +"There's papa," said Jenny. "Had you rather go to him alone, or can +I do any good?" + +"I think I will go alone," said Julius. + +Mr. Bowater, who had grown up in a day when examinations were much +less earnest matters, never guessed what brought Julius over, but +simply thought he had come to wish them good-bye; then believed in +any accident rather than in failure, and finally was exceedingly +angry, and stormed hotly, first at examinations and modern Bishops, +then at cricket and fine ladies, then at Julius, for not having +looked after the lad better, and when this was meekly accepted, +indignation took a juster direction, and Herbert's folly and +idleness were severely lashed more severely than Julius thought they +quite deserved, but a word of pleading only made it worse. Have him +home to take leave? No, indeed, Mr. Bowater hoped he knew his duty +better as father of a family, when a young man had publicly +disgraced himself. "I'll tell you what, Julius Charnock, if you +wish him to forget all the little impression it may have made, and +be ready to run after any amount of folly, you'd make me have him +home to be petted and cried over by his mother and sisters. He has +been their spoilt pet too long, and I won't have him spoilt now. +I'll not see him till he has worked enough to show whether there's +any real stuff in him." + +Mr. Bowater never even asked where his son was, probably taking it +for granted that he was gone back to Compton; nor did Julius see +Jenny again, as she was trying to comfort her mother under the +dreadful certainty that poor dear Herbert was most cruelly treated, +and that the examining chaplain came of a bad stock, and always had +had a dislike to the family. It was to be hoped that Mr. Bowater +would keep to his wise resolution, and not send for Herbert, for +nothing could be worse for him than the sympathy he would have met +with from her. + +What with looking in to report at Rood House and finding Herbert +most grateful for leave to remain there for a few days, Julius did +not reach home till long after dark. Pleasantly did the light greet +him from the open doorway where his Rosamond was standing. She +sprang at once into his arms, as if he had been absent a month, and +cried, "Here you are, safe at last!" Then, as she pulled off his +wraps, "How tired you must be! Have you had any food? No--it's all +ready;" and he could see 'high tea' spread, and lighted by the first +fire of the season. "Come and begin!" + +"What, without washing my hands?" + +"You are to do that in the study; it is all ready." He did not +exactly see why he should be too tired to mount to his dressing- +room; but he obeyed, not ungratefully, and his chair was ready, his +plate heaped with partridge and his tumbler filled with ale almost +before his eyes had recovered the glare of light. The eagerness and +flutter of Rosamond's manner began to make him anxious, and he began +for the third time the inquiries she had always cut short--"Baby all +right? Terry better?" + +"Baby--oh yes, a greater duck than ever. I put her to bed myself, +and she was quite delicious. Eat, I say; go on." + +"Not unless you eat that other wing." + +"I'll help myself then. You go on. I don't see Herbert, so I +suppose it is all right. Where's your canonry?" + +"Alas! poor Herbert is plucked. I had to go round by Strawyers to +tell them." + +"Plucked! I never heard of such a thing. I think it is a great +shame such a nice honest fellow should be so ill-used, and when all +his pretty things have been stolen too! Do you know, they've taken +up young Hornblower; but his friends have made off with the things, +and they say they are in the melting-pot by this time, and there's +no chance of recovering them." + +"I don't think he cares much now, poor fellow. Did you see Mrs. +Hornblower?" + +"No; by the time I could get my hat on she had heard it, poor thing, +and was gone to Backsworth; for he's there, in the county gaol; was +taken at the station, I believe; I don't half understand it." + +Her manner was indeed strange and flighty; and though she recurred +to questions about the Ordination and the Bowaters, Julius perceived +that she was forcing her attention to the answers as if trying to +stave off his inquiries, and he came to closer quarters. "How is +Terry? Has Dr. Worth been here?" + +"Yes; but not till very late. He says he never was so busy." + +"Rosamond, what is it? What did he say of Terry?" + +"He said"--she drew a long breath--"he says it is the Water Lane +fever." + +"Terry, my dear--" + +She held him down with a hand on his shoulder-- + +"Be quiet. Finish your dinner. Dr. Worth said the great point was +to keep strong, and not be overdone, nor to go into infected air +tired and hungry. I would not have let you come in if there had +been any help for it; and now I'll not have you go near him till +you've made a good meal." + +"You must do the same then. There, eat that slice, or I won't;" and +as she allowed him to place it on her plate, "What does he call it-- +not typhus?" + +"He can't tell yet; he does not know whether it is infectious or +only epidemic; and when he heard how the dear boy had been for days +past at the Exhibition at the town-hall, and drinking lots of iced +water on Saturday, he seemed to think it quite accounted for. He +says there is no reason that in this good air he should not do very +well; but, oh, Julius, I wish I had kept him from that horrid place. +They left him in my charge!" + +"There is no reason to distress yourself about that, my Rose. He +was innocently occupied, and there was no cause to expect harm. +There's all good hope for him, with God's blessing. Who is with him +now?" + +"Cook is there now. Both the maids were so kind and hearty, +declaring they would do anything, and were not afraid; and I can +manage very well with their help. You know papa had a low fever at +Montreal, and mamma and I nursed him through it, so I know pretty +well what to do." + +"But how about the baby?" + +"Emma came back before the doctor came, crying piteously, poor +child, as if she had had a sufficient lesson; so I said she might +stay her month on her good behaviour, and now we could not send her +out of the house. I have brought the nursery down to the spare +room, and in the large attic, with plenty of disinfecting fluid, we +can, as the doctor said, isolate the fever. He is quiet and sleepy, +and I do not think it will be hard to manage, if you will only be +good and conformable." + +"I don't promise, if that means that you are to do everything and I +nothing. When did Worth see him?" + +"Not till five o'clock: and he would not have come at all, if Anne +had not sent in some one from the Hall when she saw how anxious I +was. He would not have come otherwise; he is so horribly busy, with +lots of cases at Wil'sboro'. Now, if you have done, you may come +and see my boy." + +Julius did see a flushed sleeping face that did not waken at his +entrance; and as his wife settled herself for her watch, he felt as +if he could not leave her after such a day as she had had, but an +indefinable apprehension made him ask whether she would spare him to +run up to the Hall to see his mother and ask after Raymond, whose +looks had haunted him all day. She saw he would not rest otherwise, +and did not show how unwilling was her consent, for though she knew +little, her mind misgave her. + +He made his way into the Hall by the back door, and found his mother +still in the drawing-room, and Raymond dozing in the large arm-chair +by the fire. Mrs. Poynsett gave a warning look as Julius bent over +her, but Raymond only opened his eyes with a dreamy gaze, without +speaking. "Why, mother, where are the rest?" + +"Poor Frank--I hope it is only the shock and fatigue; but Dr. Worth +wished him to be kept as quiet as possible. He can't bear to see +any one in the room, so that good Anne said she would sit in +Charlie's room close by." + +"Then he is really ill?" said Julius. + +"He nearly fainted after walking over to Sirenwood in vain. I don't +understand it. There's something very wrong there, which seems +perfectly to have crushed him." + +"I'll go up and see him," said Julius. "You both of you look as if +you ought to be in bed. How is Cecil, Raymond?" + +"Quite knocked up," he sleepily answered. "Here's Susan, mother." + +Susan must have been waiting till she heard voices to carry off her +mistress. Raymond pushed her chair into her room, bent over her +with extra tenderness, bade her good night; and when Julius had done +the same they stood by the drawing-room fire together. + +"I've been trying to write that letter, Julius," said Raymond, "but +I never was so sleepy in my life, and I can't get on with it." + +"What letter?" + +"That letter. About the races." + +"Oh! That seems long ago!" + +"So it does," said Raymond, in the same dreamy manner, as if trying +to shake something off. "Some years, isn't it? I wanted it done, +somehow. I would sit down to it now, only I have fallen asleep a +dozen times over it already." + +"Not very good for composition," said Julius, alarmed by something +indefinable in his brother's look, and by his manner of insisting on +what was by no means urgent. "Come, put it out of your head, and go +to bed." + +"How did you find the boy Terry?" asked Raymond, again as if in his +sleep. + +"I scarcely saw him. He was asleep." + +"And Worth calls it--?" + +"The same fever as in Water Lane." + +"I thought so. We are in for it," said Raymond, now quite awake. +"He did not choose to say so to my mother, but I gathered it from +his orders." + +"But Frank only came down yesterday." + +"Frank was knocked down and predisposed by the treatment he met +with, poor boy. They say he drank quarts of iced things at the +dinner and ball, and ate nothing. This may be only the effect of +the shock, but his head is burning, and there is a disposition to +wander. However, he has had his coup de grace, and that may account +for it. It is Cecil." + +"Cecil!" + +"Cecil, poor child. She has been constantly in that pestiferous +place. All Worth would say was that she must be kept quiet and +cool, but he has sent the same draughts for all three. I saw, for +Terry's came here. I fancy Worth spoke out plainly to that maid of +Cecil's, Grindstone; but she only looks bitter at me, says she can +attend to her mistress, and has kept me out of the room all day. +But I will go in to-night before I go to bed," added Raymond, +energetically. "You are ready to laugh at me, Julius. No one has +meddled between you and Rosamond." + +"Thank God, no!" cried Julius. + +"Friend abroad, or you may leave out the r," said Raymond, "maid at +home. What chance have I ever had?" + +"I'll tell you what I should do, Raymond," said Julius, "turn out +the maid, keep the field, nurse her myself." + +"Yes," said Raymond, "that's all very well if--if you haven't got +the fever yourself. There, you need say nothing about it, nobody +would be of any use to me to-night, and it may be only that I am +dead beat." + +But there was something about his eyes and his heavy breath which +confirmed his words, and Julius could only say, "My dear Raymond!" + +"It serves us right, does not it?" said his brother, smiling. "I +only wish it had not fixed on the one person who tried to do good." + +"If I could only stay with you; but I must tell Rosamond first." + +"No, indeed. I want no one to-night, no one; after that you'll look +after my mother, that's the great thing." He spoke steadily, but +his hand trembled so that he could not light his candle, and Julius +was obliged to do it, saying wistfully, "I'll come up the first +thing in the morning and see how you are." + +"Do, and if there is need, you will tell my mother. A night's rest +may set me right, but I have not felt well these three or four days-- +I shall be in my own old room." + +He leant heavily on the balusters, but would not take his brother's +arm. He passed into his dressing-room, and thus to the open door of +the room where he heard his wife's voice; and as Mrs. Grindstone +came forward to warn him off, he said, "She is awake." + +"Yes, sir; but she must not be excited." + +"Raymond!" + +"How are you now?" he asked, coming up to the bed. + +"Oh! it is very hot and heavy," said Cecil wearily, putting her hand +into his; "I'm aching all over." + +"Poor child!" he said softly. + +She lifted her eyes to his face. "I wanted to tell you all day," +she said. "Didn't you come to the door?" + +"Many times, my dear." + +"And now! oh dear! I don't recollect. Don't go, please." + +He sat down by her; she held his hand and dozed again. + +"You had best leave her now, sir," said the maid; "she will only go +on in this way, and I can tend her." + +He would have given a great deal to have been sure that he could +hold up his head ten minutes longer and to venture to send the woman +away. Cecil muttered "Stay," and he sat on till her sleep seemed +deeper, and he felt as if a few moments more might disable him from +crossing the room, but his first movement again made her say +"Don't." + +"Mr. Poynsett cannot stay, ma'am," said Grindstone, in a persuasive +tone. "He is very tired, and not well, and you would not wish to +keep him." + +"Give me a kiss," she said, like a tired child. It was not like the +shy embrace with which they had sometimes met and parted, but he +knew he must not rouse her, and only said very low, "Good night, my +poor dear; God bless you, and grant us a happy meeting, whenever it +is." + +Tears were flowing down his cheeks when Julius presently came to him +again, and only left him when settled for the night. + + + + +CHAPTER, XXVII +The Water Lane Fever + + +The Water Lane Fever. People called it so, as blinking its real +name, but it was not the less true that it was a very pestilence in +the lower parts of Wil'sbro'; and was prostrating its victims far +and wide among the gentry who had resorted to the town-hall within +the last few weeks. + +Cases had long been smouldering among the poor and the workmen +employed, and several of these were terminating fatally just as the +outbreak was becoming decisive. + +On Monday morning Julius returned from visits to his brothers to +find a piteous note from Mrs. Fuller entreating him to undertake two +funerals. Her husband had broken down on Sunday morning and was +very ill, and Mr. Driver had merely read the services and then +joined his pupils, whom he had sent away to the sea-side. He had +never been responsible for pastoral care, and in justice to them +could not undertake it now. "Those streets are in a dreadful +state," wrote the poor lady, "several people dying; and there is +such a panic in the neighbourhood that we know not where to turn for +help. If you could fix an hour we would let the people know. The +doctor insists on the funerals being immediate." + +Julius was standing in the porch reading this letter, and thinking +what hour he could best spare from nearer claims, when he heard the +gate swing and beheld his junior curate with a very subdued and +sobered face, asking, "Is it true?" + +"That the fever is here? Yes, it is." + +"And very bad?" + +"Poor Frank is our worst case as yet. He is constantly delirious. +The others are generally sensible, except that Terry is dreadfully +haunted with mathematics." + +"Then it is all true about the Hall. Any one else ill?" + +"Only the two Willses. They were carousing at the 'Three Pigeons.' +I hope that Raymond's prohibition against that place may have been +the saving of the Hall servants. See here," and he gave the note. + +"I had better take those two funerals. I can at least do that," +said Herbert. "That Driver must be a regular case of a hireling." + +"He never professed that the sheep were his," said Julius. + +"Then I'll go to the Vicarage and get a list of the sick, and see +after them as far as I can," said Herbert, in a grave, humble tone, +showing better than a thousand words how he felt the deprivation he +had brought on himself; and as to shame or self-consciousness, the +need had swallowed them all. + +"It will be a great act of kindness, Herbert. The point of +infection does not seem clear yet, but I am afraid it will be a +serious outbreak." + +"I did not believe it could all be true when the report came to Rood +House, but of course I came to hear the truth and see what I could +do. How is Mrs. Poynsett bearing up?" + +"Bravely. Anne contrived our carrying her up-stairs, and it is the +greatest comfort to Raymond to lie and look at her, and Susan looks +after them both." + +"Then he can't be so very ill." + +"Not so acutely, but there are symptoms that make Worth anxious. +Shall I give you a note for Mrs. Fuller?" + +"Do, and put me at your disposal for all you can spare for, or I can +do. Have you written to Bindon?" + +"I don't know where, within some hundred miles. But, Herbert, I +think we ought to undertake the help that is wanted at Wil'sbro'. +Smith of Duddingstone is too weakly, and poor old Mr. Moulden +neither could nor would. We are the nearest, and having it here +already, do not run the risk of spreading it. As things are, I +cannot be very long away from home, but I would come in for an hour +or so every day, if you could do the rest." + +"Yes, that was what I meant," said Herbert. + +"Worth says the best protection is never to go among the sick hungry +or exhausted. He says he keeps a biscuit in his pocket to eat +before going into a sick house. I shall make Rosamond keep you +supplied, and you must promise to use them." + +"Oh yes, I promise." + +"And never drink anything there. There is to be a public meeting +to-morrow, to see whether the cause of this outbreak is not +traceable to the water down there." + +"Mrs. Duncombe's meddling?" + +"Don't judge without evidence. But it does seem as if the water at +the well at Pettitt's houses had done much of the harm. Terry was +drinking it all that hot day, and to-day we hear that Lady Tyrrell +and two of the servants are ill, besides poor little Joe Reynolds." + +"It is very terrible," said Herbert. "Lady Tyrrell, did you say?" + +"Yes. She was there constantly, like Raymond's wife. Happily there +is not much fear for your people, Herbert. Your father was at the +dinner, but he is not a water drinker, and Jenny only just came to +the bazaar, that was all. Edith happily gave up the ball." + +"I know," said Herbert, colouring. "Jenny persuaded her to give it +up because of--me. Oh, how I have served them all!" + +"I told Jenny that perhaps her Ember prayers had been met in the +true way." + +"Yes," said Herbert. "I can't understand now how I could have been +such an audacious fool as to present myself so coolly after the year +I had spent. God forgive me for it! Rector, thank you for leaving +me at Rood House. It was like having one's eyes opened to a new +life. I say, do you know anything about Harry Hornblower? Is he +come home?" + +"Yes. You wouldn't prosecute?" + +"Happily I couldn't. The things were gone and could not be +identified, and there was nothing about him. So, though they had me +over to Backsworth, they could not fall foul of me for refusing to +prosecute. Have you seen him?" + +"No, I tried, but he had got out of my way. You've not been there?" +seeing that Herbert had brought back his bag. + +"No; I will not till I come back;" and as he took the note he added, +"Rector, I do beg your pardon with all my might." Then, after a +strong clasp of the hand, he sped away with a long, manful, +energetic stride, which made Julius contrast his volunteer courage +with the flight of the man who, if not pledged to pastoral care at +Wil'sbro', still had priestly vows upon him. + +Julius had no scruples about risking this favourite home child. If +he thought about it at all, it was to rejoice that Mrs. Bowater was +safely gone, for he had passed unscathed through scenes at St. +Awdry's that would have made his mother tremble, and he had little +fear of contagion, with reasonable care. Of course the doctors had +the usual debate whether the fever were infectious or epidemic, but +it made little difference. The local ones, as well as an authority +from London, had an inspection previous to the meeting, which took +place in the school, whose scholars were dispersed in the panic. No +ladies were admitted. "We have had enough of them," quoted +Worshipful Mayor Truelove. Mr. Briggs, the ex-mayor, was at the +bedside of his son, and there were hardly enough present to make +decisions. + +The focus of the disease was in Pettitt's well. The water, though +cold, clear, and sparkling, was affected by noxious gases from the +drains, and had become little better than poison; the air was not +much better, and as several neighbouring houses, some swarming with +lodgers, used this water, the evil was accounted for. The 'Three +Pigeons' had been an attraction to the servants waiting with their +ladies' carriages during the entertainments, and though they had not +meddled much with the simple element, spirits had not neutralized +the mischief. Thence too had come water for the tea and iced +beverages used at the bazaar and ball. Odours there had been in +plenty from the untouched drainage of the other houses, and these, +no doubt, enhanced the evil; but every one agreed that the bad +management of the drains on Mr. Pettitt's property had been the main +agency in the present outbreak. + +The poor little perfumer had tears of grief and indignation in his +eyes, but he defended his cause and shielded the ladies with +chivalry worthy of his French ancestry. He said he had striven to +do his duty as a proprietor, and if other gentlemen had done the +same, and the channels could have had a free outlet, this misfortune +would never have occurred. He found himself backed up by Mr. Julius +Charnock, who rose to declare that what Mr. Pettitt had said was +just what his brother, Mr. Charnock Poynsett, had desired should be +stated as his own opinion, namely, that the responsibility rested, +not with those who had done all within their power or knowledge for +the welfare of their tenants, but with those whose indifference on +the score of health had led them to neglect all sanitary measures. + +"He desires me to say," added Julius, "that being concerned both in +the neglect and in the unfortunate consequences, he is desirous to +impress his opinion on all concerned." + +Future prevention was no longer in the hands of the Town Council, +for a sanitary commission would take that in hand; but in the +meantime it was a time of plague and sickness, and measures must be +taken for the general relief. Mr. Moy, to whom most of the houses +belonged, was inquired for; but it appeared that he had carried off +his wife and daughter on Saturday in terror when one of his servants +had fallen ill, and even his clerks would not know where to write to +him till he should telegraph. The man Gadley was meantime driving +an active trade at the 'Three Pigeons,' whither the poor, possessed +with the notion that spirits kept out the infection, were resorting +more than ever, and he set at defiance all the preventives which +doctors, overseer, and relieving officer were trying to enforce, +with sullen oaths against interference. + +Two deaths yesterday, one to-day, three hourly apprehended; doctors +incessantly occupied, nurses, however unfit, not to be procured by +any exertion of the half-maddened relieving-officer; bread-winners +prostrated; food, wine, bedding, everything lacking. Such was the +state of things around the new town-hall of Wil'sbro', and the +gentry around were absorbed by cases of the same epidemic in their +own families. + +To telegraph for nurses from a hospital, to set on foot a +subscription, appoint a committee of management, and name a +treasurer and dispenser of supplies, were the most urgent steps. +Julius suggested applying to a Nursing Sisterhood, but Mr. Truelove, +without imputing any motives to the reverend gentleman, was +unwilling to insert the thin end of the wedge; so the telegram was +sent to a London Hospital, and Mr. Whitlock, the mayor-elect, +undertook to be treasurer, and to print and circulate an appeal for +supplies of all sorts. Those present resolved themselves into a +committee, and consulted about a fever hospital, since people could +hardly be expected to recover in the present condition of Water +Lane; but nothing was at present ready, and the question was +adjourned to the next day. As Julius parted with Mr. Whitlock he +met Herbert Bowater returning from the cemetery in search of him, +with tidings of some cases where he was especially needed. As they +walked on together Mrs. Duncombe overtook them with a basket on her +arm. She held out her hand with an imploring gesture. + +"Mr. Charnock, it can't be true, can it?--they only say so out of +ignorance--that it was Pettitt's well, I mean?" + +In a few words Julius made it clear what the evil had been and how +it arose. + +She did not dispute it, she merely grew sallower and said: + +"God forgive us! We did it for the best. I planned. I never +thought of that. Oh!" + +"My brother insists that the mischief came of not following the +example you set." + +"And Cecil!" + +"Cecil is too much stupefied to know anything about it." + +"You are helping here? Make me all the use you can. Whatever has +to be done give it to me." + +"Nay, you have your family to consider." + +"My boys are at their grandmother's. My husband is gone abroad. +Give me work. I have brought some wine. Who needs it most?" + +"Wine?" said Herbert. "Here? I was going back for some, but half +an hour may make all the difference to the poor lad in here." + +Mrs. Duncombe was within the door in a moment. + +"There has been an execution in her house," said Herbert, as they +went home. "That fellow went off on Saturday, and left her alone to +face it." + +"I thought she had striven to keep out of debt." + +"What can a woman do when a man chooses to borrow? That horse +brought them to more unexpected smash. They say that after the +ball, where she appeared in all her glory, as if nothing had +happened, she made Bob give her a schedule of his debts, packed his +portmanteau, sent him off to find some cheap hole abroad, and stayed +to pick up the pieces after the wreck." + +"She is a brave woman," said Julius. + +Therewith they plunged into the abodes of misery, where the only +other helper at present was good old Miss Slater, who was going from +one to another, trying to show helpless women how to nurse, but able +only to contribute infinitesimal grains of aid or comfort at immense +cost to herself. Julius insisted on taking home with him his +curate, who had been at work from ten o'clock that morning till six, +when as Julius resigned the pony's reins to him, he begged that they +might go round and inquire at Sirenwood, to which consent was the +more willingly given because poor Frank's few gleams of +consciousness were spent in sending his indefatigable nurse Anne to +ask whether his mother had 'had that letter,' and in his delirium he +was always feeling his watch-chain for that unhappy pebble, and +moaning when he missed it. Mrs. Poynsett's letter had gone on +Friday, and still there was no answer, and this was a vexation, +adding to the fear that the poor fellow's rejection had been final. +Yet she might have missed the letter by being summoned home. Close +to the lodge, they overtook Sir Harry, riding dejectedly homewards, +and, glad to be saved going up to the house, they stopped and +inquired for Lady Tyrrell. + +"Very low and oppressed," he said. "M'Vie does not give us reason +to expect a change just yet. Do they tell you the same? Worth +attends you, I think?" + +"He seems to think it must run on for at least three weeks," said +Julius. + +"You've been to the meeting, eh? Was it that well of Pettitt's? +Really that meddling wife of Duncombe's ought to be prosecuted. I +hope she'll catch the fever and be served out." + +"She tried to prevent it," said Julius. + +"Pshaw! women have no business with such things, they only put their +foot in it. Nobody used to trouble themselves about drains, and one +never heard of fevers." + +Instead of contesting the point, Julius asked whether Miss Vivian +were at home. + +"No; that's the odd thing. I wrote, for M'Vie has no fear of +infection, and poor Camilla is always calling for her, and that +French maid has thought proper to fall ill, and we don't know what +to do. Upper housemaid cut and run in a panic, cook dead drunk last +night, not a servant in the house to be trusted. If it were not for +my man Victor I don't know where I should be. Very odd what that +child is about. Lady Susan can't be keeping it from her. +Unjustifiable!" + +"She is with Lady Susan Strangeways?" + +"Yes. Went with Bee and Conny. I was glad, for we can't afford to +despise a good match, though I _was_ sorry for your brother." + +"Do I understand you that she is engaged to Mr. Strangeways?" + +"No, no; not yet. One always hears those things before they are +true, and you see they are keeping her from us as if she belonged to +them already. I call it unfeeling! I have just been to the post to +see if there's a letter! Can't be anything wrong in the address,-- +Revelrig, Cleveland, Yorkshire." + +"Why don't you telegraph?" + +"I shall, if I don't hear to-morrow morning." + +But the morning's telegrams were baffling. None came in answer to +Sir Harry, though he had bidden his daughter to telegraph back +instantly; and two hospitals replied that they had no nurses to +spare! This was the first thing Julius heard when he came to the +committee-room. The second was that the only parish nurse had been +found asleep under the influence of the port-wine intended for her +patients, the third that there were five more deaths, one being Mrs. +Gadley, of the 'Three Pigeons,' from diphtheria, and fourteen more +cases of fever were reported. Julius had already been with the +schoolmistress, who was not expected to live through the day. He +had found that Mrs. Duncombe had been up all night with one of the +most miserable families, and only when her unpractised hands had +cared for a little corpse, had been forced home by good Miss Slater +for a little rest. He had also seen poor Mr. Fuller, who was too +weak and wretched to say anything more than 'God help us, Charnock: +you will do what you can;' and when Julius asked for his sanction to +sending for Sisters, he answered, "Anything, anything." + +The few members who had come to the committee were reduced to the +same despairing consent, and Julius was allowed to despatch a +telegram to St. Faith's, which had sent Sisters in the emergency at +St. Awdry's. He likewise brought an offer, suggested by Raymond, of +a great old tithe barn, his own property, but always rented by Mrs. +Poynsett, in a solitary field, where the uninfected children might +be placed under good care, and the houses in Water Lane thus +relieved. As to a fever hospital, Raymond had sent his advice to +use the new town-hall itself. A word from him went a great way just +then with the Town Council, and the doctors were delighted with the +proposal. + +Funds and contributions of bedding, clothing, food and wine were +coming in, but hands were the difficulty. The adaptations of the +town-hall and the bringing in of beds were done by one strong +carpenter and Mrs. Duncombe's man Alexander, whom she had brought +with her, and who proved an excellent orderly; and the few who would +consent, or did not resist occupying the beds there, were carried in +by Herbert Bowater and a strapping young doctor who had come down +for this fever pasture. There Mrs. Duncombe and Miss Slater +received them. No other volunteer had come to light willing to +plunge into this perilous and disgusting abyss of misery; and among +the afflicted families the power of nursing was indeed small. + +However, the healthy children were carried away without much +resistance, and established in the great barn under a trustworthy +widow; and before night, two effective-looking Sisters were in +charge at the hospital. + +Still, however, no telegram, no letter, came from Eleonora Vivian. +Mr. M'Vie had found a nurse for Lady Tyrrell, but old Sir Harry rode +in to meet every delivery of the post, and was half distracted at +finding nothing from her; and Frank's murmurs of her name were most +piteous to those who feared that, if he were ever clearly conscious +again, it would only be to know how heavy had been the meed of his +folly. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXVIII +The Retreat + + +What dost thou here, frail wanderer from thy task?--Christian +Year + +Eleonora Vivian was trying to fix her attention on writing out the +meditation she had just heard from Dr. Easterby. + +It had been a strange time. All externally was a great hush. There +was perfect rest from the tumult of society, and from the harassing +state of tacit resistance habitual to her. This was the holy +quietude for which she had longed, yet where was the power to feel +and profit by it? Did not the peace without only make her hear the +storm within all the more? + +A storm had truly been raging within ever since Conny Strangeways +had triumphantly exhibited the prize she had won from Frank Charnock +at the races; and Camilla had taken care that full and undeniable +evidence should prove that this was not all that the young man had +lost upon the Backsworth race-ground. + +Lenore might guess, with her peculiarly painful intuition, who had +been the tempter, but that did not lessen her severity towards the +victim. In her resolution against a betting man, had she not +trusted Frank too implicitly even to warn him of her vow? Nay, had +she not felt him drifting from her all through the season, unjustly +angered, unworthily distrustful, easily led astray? All the +misgivings that had fretted her at intervals and then cleared away +seemed to gather into one conviction--Frank had failed her! + +Eleonora's nature was one to resent before grieving. Her spirit was +too high to break down under the first shock, and she carried her +head proudly to the ball, betraying by no outward sign the stern +despair of her heart, as she listened to the gay chatter of her +companions, and with unflinching severity she carried out that +judicial reply to Frank which she had already prepared, and then +guarded herself among numerous partners against remonstrance or +explanation. It had been all one whirl of bewilderment; Lady +Tyrrell tired, and making the girls' intended journey on the morrow +a plea for early departure; and the Strangeways, though dancing +indefatigably, and laughing at fatigue, coming away as soon as they +saw she really wished it. All said good night and good-bye +together, both to Lady Tyrrell and Sir Harry, and Lenore started at +ten o'clock without having seen either. Her sense of heroism lasted +till after the glimpse of Frank on the road. Her mood was of bitter +disappointment and indignation. Frank was given up, but not less so +were her father, her sister, and the world. Sir Harry had made +Camilla suffice to him, he did not want her. He had been the means +of perverting Frank, and Lenore could not see that she need any +longer be bound for his sake to the life she detested. In a few +weeks she would be of age, and what would then prevent her from +finding a congenial home in the Sisterhood, since such kindred could +have no just claim to her allegiance? It was the hasty +determination of one who had suffered a tacit persecution for three +years, and was now smarting under the cruellest of blows. Her lover +perverted, her conditions broken, her pledge gambled away, and all +this the work of her father and sister! + +Conny and Bee thought her grave and more silent than usual, and when +Lady Susan met them in London there was no time for thought. +Saturday was spent on a harvest festival at a suburban church, after +which the daughters were despatched to their uncle's by a late +train. Sunday was spent in the pursuit of remarkable services; and +on Monday Lady Susan and Eleonora had gone to St. Faith's and the +Retreat began. + +Here was to be the longed-for rest, for which she had thirsted all +the more through those days of hurry and of religious spectacles, as +she felt that, be they what they might to their regular attendants, +to her, as an outsider, they could be but sights, into whose spirit +her sick and wearied soul could not enter. + +Here was no outward disturbance, no claim from the world, no +importunate chatter, only religious services in their quietest, most +unobtrusive form; and Dr. Easterby's low tender tones, leading his +silent listeners to deep heart-searchings, earnest thoughts, and +steadfast resolutions. + +Ah! so no doubt it was with many; but Lena, with book and pen, was +dismayed to find that the one thing she recollected was the +question, "Friend, how camest thou in hither?" After that, she had +only heard her own thoughts. Her mind had lapsed into one vague +apprehension of the effects of having cut off all communication with +home, imaginings of Frank's despair, relentings of pity, all broken +by dismay at her own involuntary hypocrisy in bringing such thoughts +into the Retreat. Had she any right to be there at all? Was not a +thing that should have been for her peace become to her an occasion +of falling? + +It was Thursday evening, and on the morrow there would be the +opportunity of private interviews with Dr. Easterby. She longed for +the moment, chiefly to free herself from the sense of deception that +had all this time seemed to vitiate her religious exercises, deafen +her ears, and blow aside her prayers. There was a touch on her +shoulder, and one of the Sisters who had received the ladies said, +interrogatively, "Miss Vivian? The Mother would be obliged if you +would come to her room." + +The general hush prevented Lenore from manifesting her extreme +agitation, and she moved with as quiet a step as she could command, +though trembling from head to foot. In the room to which she came +stood the Superior and Dr. Easterby, and a yellow telegram-paper lay +on the table. + +"My father?" she asked. + +"No," said the Superior, kindly, "it is your sister, who is ill. +Here is the telegram--" + +"Sister Margaret to the Mother Superior, St. Faith's, Dearport. +Lady Tyrrell has the fever. Miss Vivian much needed. + +"Wils'bro, Sept. 26th, 5.30." + +"The fever!" She looked up bewildered, and the Superior added-- + +"You did not know of a fever at Wil'sbro'? Some of our nursing +Sisters were telegraphed for, and went down yesterday. I was sorry +to send Sister Margaret away just when her mother and you are here; +but she was the only available head, and the need seemed great." + +"I have heard nothing since I left home on Friday," said Eleonora, +hoarsely. "It is my own fault. They think I am at Revelrig." + +"Your family do not know you are here?" said the Superior, gravely. + +"It was very wrong," she said. "This is the punishment. I must go. +Can I?" + +"Surely, as soon as there is a train," said the Superior, beginning +to look for a Bradshaw; while Dr. Easterby gave Lenore a chair, and +bade her sit down. She looked up at his kind face, and asked +whether he had heard of this fever. + +"On Sunday evening, some friends who came out from Backsworth to our +evening service spoke of an outbreak of fever at Wil'sbro', and said +that several of the Charnock family were ill. I have had this card +since from young Mr. Bowater:-- + +"T. F. in severe form. J. C. well, but both his brothers are +down in it, and Lady K.'s brother, also Lady T. and the Vicar. +No one to do anything; we have taken charge of Wil'sbro'. I have +no time to do more than thank you for unspeakable kindness. H. +B." + +"You knew?" exclaimed Lenore, as she saw her sister's initial. + +"I knew Lady Tyrrell was ill, but I do not know who the ladies are +whom I address. I did not guess that you were here," said Dr. +Easterby, gently. + +No one living near Backsworth could fail to know Sir Harry Vivian's +reputation, so that the master of Rood House knew far better than +the Superior of St. Faith's how much excuse Lenore's evasion might +have; but whatever could seem like tampering with young people was +most distressing to the Sisters, and the Mother was more grave than +pitiful. + +There was no train till the mail at night, and there would be two +hours to wait in London; but Lenore would listen to no entreaties to +wait till morning, and as they saw that she had plenty of health and +strength, they did not press her, though the Superior would send a +nurse with her, who, if not needed at Sirenwood, might work in Water +Lane. It was thought best not to distract Lady Susan, and Lenore +was relieved not to have her vehement regret and fussy cares about +her; but there were still two hours to be spent before starting, and +in these Dr. Easterby was the kindest of comforters. + +Had she erred in her concealment? He thought she had, though with +much excuse. A Retreat was not like a sacrament, a necessity of a +Christian's life; and no merely possible spiritual advantage ought +to be weighed against filial obedience. It was a moment of +contrition, and of outpouring for the burthened heart, as Lenore was +able to speak of her long trial, and all the evil it had caused in +hardening and sealing up her better nature. She even told of her +unsanctioned but unforbidden engagement, and of its termination; +yearning to be told that she had been hasty and hard, and to be +bidden to revoke her rejection. + +She found that Dr. Easterby would not judge for her, or give her +decided direction. He showed her, indeed, that she had given way to +pride and temper, and had been unjust in allowing no explanation; +but he would not tell her to unsay her decision, nor say that it +might not be right, even though the manner had been wrong. While +the past was repented, and had its pardon, for the future he would +only bid her wait, and pray for guidance and aid through her trial. + +"My child," he said, "chastening is the very token of pardon, and +therein may you find peace, and see the right course." + +"And you will pray for me--that however it may be, He may forgive +me?" + +"Indeed, I will. We all will pray for you as one in sorrow and +anxiety. And remember this: There is a promise that a great +mountain shall become a plain; and so it does, but to those who +bravely try to climb it in strength not their own, not to those who +try to go round or burrow through." + +"I see," was all she answered, in the meek submissive tone of a +strong nature, bent but not daring to break down. She could not +shed tears, deeply as she felt; she must save all her strength and +bear that gnawing misery which Herbert Bowater's mention of J. C.'s +brothers had inflicted upon her--bear it in utter uncertainty +through the night's journey, until the train stopped at Wil'sbro' at +eleven o'clock, and her father, to whom she had telegraphed, met +her, holding out his arms, and absolutely crying over her for joy. + +"My dear, my dear, I knew you would come; I could trust to my little +Lena. It was all some confounded mistake." + +"It was my fault. How is she?" + +"Does nothing but ask for you. Very low--nasty fever at night. +What's that woman? M'Vie sent a nurse, who is awfully jealous; +can't have her in to Camilla: but there's plenty to do; Anais is +laid up--coachman too, and Joe--half the other servants gone off. I +told Victor I would pay anything to him if he would stay." + +"And--at Compton?" faintly asked Lenore. + +"Bad enough, they say. Serves 'em right; Mrs. Raymond was as +mischievous as Duncombe's wife, but I've not heard for the last two +days; there's been no one to send over, and I've had enough to think +about of my own." + +"Who have it there?" she managed to say. + +"Raymond and his wife, both; and Frank and the young De Lancey, I +heard. I met Julius Charnock the other day very anxious about them. +He's got his tithe barn stuffed with children from Water Lane, as if +he wanted to spread it. All their meddling! But what kept you so +long, little one? Where were you hiding?--or did Lady Susan keep it +from you? I began to think you had eloped with her son. You are +sure you have not?" + +"I was wrong, father; I went to a Retreat with Lady Susan." + +"A what? Some of Lady Susan's little poperies, eh? I can't scold +you, child, now I've got you; only have your letters forwarded +another time," said Sir Harry, placable as usual when alone with +Lenore. + +Fears of infection for her did not occur to him. Mr. M'Vie held the +non-contagion theory, and helpless selfishness excluded all thoughts +of keeping his daughter at a distance. He clung to her as he used +to do in former days, before Camilla had taken possession of him, +and could not bear to have her out of reach. In the sick-room she +was of disappointingly little use. The nurse was a regular +professional, used to despotism, and resenting her having brought +home any one with her, and she never permitted Miss Vivian's +presence, except when the patient's anxiety made it necessary to +bring her in; and when admitted, there was nothing to be done but to +sit by Camilla, and now and then answer the weary disjointed talk, +and, if it grew a little livelier, the warning that Lady Tyrrell was +getting excited was sure to follow. + +Outside there was enough to do, in the disorganized state of the +sick and panic-stricken household, where nobody was effective but +the French valet and one very stupid kitchen-maid. Lena helped the +St. Faith's nurse in her charge of the French maid, but almost all +her time in the morning was spent in domestic cares for the sick and +for her father; and when he was once up, he was half plaintive, half +passionate, if she did not at once respond to his calls. She read +the papers to him, walked up and down the terrace with him while he +smoked, and played bezique with him late into the night, to distract +his thoughts. And where were hers, while each day's bulletin from +Compton Hall was worse than the last? Little Joe Reynolds had been +sent home on being taken ill, and she would fain have gone to see +him, but detentions sprang up around her, and sometimes it would +have been impossible to go so far from the house, so that days had +become weeks, and the month of October was old before she was +walking down the little garden of old Betty's house. The door +opened, and Julius Charnock came out, startling her by the sight of +his worn and haggard looks, as he made a deprecating movement, and +shut the door behind him. Then she saw that the blinds were in the +act of being drawn down. + +"Is it so?" she said. + +"Yes," said Julius, in a quiet tone, as sad and subdued as his +looks. "He slept himself away peacefully a quarter of an hour ago." + +"I suppose I must not go in now. I longed to come before. Poor +boy, he was like a toy flung away." + +"You need not grieve over him," said Julius. "Far from it. You +have done a great deal for him." + +"I--I only caused him to be put into temptation." + +"Nay. Your care woke his spirit up and guarded him. No one could +hear his wanderings without feeling that he owed much to you. There +is a drawing to be given to you that will speak much to you. It is +at the Rectory; it was not safe here. And his mother is here. I +can't but hope her soul has been reached through him. Yes," as +Lenore leant against the gate, her warm tears dropping, "there is no +grief in thinking of him. He had yearnings and conceptions that +could not have been gratified in his former station; and for him an +artist's life would have been more than commonly uphill work--full +of trial. I wish you could have heard the murmured words that +showed what glorious images floated before him--no doubt now +realized." + +"I am glad he was really good," were the only words that would come. + +The hearts of both were so full, that these words on what was a +little further off were almost necessary to them. + +"Take my arm," said Julius, kindly. "Our roads lie together down +the lane. How is your sister? Better, I hope, as I see you here." + +"She has slept more quietly. Mr. M'Vie thinks her a little better." + +"So it is with Terry de Lancey," said Julius; "he is certainly less +feverish to-day;" but there was no corresponding tone of gladness in +the voice, though he added, "Cecil is going on well too." + +"And--" Poor Lenore's heart died within her; she could only press +his arm convulsively, and he had mercy on her. + +"Frank's illness has been different in character from the others," +he said; "the fever has run much higher, and has affected the brain +more, and the throat is in a very distressing state; but Dr. Worth +still does not think there are specially dangerous symptoms, and is +less anxious about him than Raymond." + +"Ah! is it true?" + +"He does not seem as ill as Frank; but there have been bleedings at +the nose, which have brought him very low, and which have hitherto +been the worst symptoms," and here the steady sadness of his voice +quivered a little. + +Lenore uttered a cry of dismay, and murmured, "Your mother?" + +"She is absorbed in him. Happily, she can be with him constantly. +They seem to rest in each other's presence, and not to look +forward." + +"And Cecil?" + +"It has taken the lethargic turn with Cecil. She is almost always +asleep, and is now, I believe, much better; but in truth we have +none of us been allowed to come near her. Her maid, Grindstone, has +taken the sole charge, and shuts us all out, for fear, I believe, of +our telling her how ill Raymond is." + +"Oh, I know Grindstone." + +"Who looks on us all as enemies. However, Raymond has desired us to +write to her father, and he will judge when he comes." + +They were almost at the place of parting. Eleonora kept her hand on +his arm, longing for another word, nay, feeling that without it her +heart would burst. "Who is with Frank?" + +"Anne. She hardly ever leaves him. She is our main-stay at the +Hall." + +"Is he ever sensible?" she faintly asked. + +"He has not been really rational for nearly ten days now." + +"If--if--oh! you know what I mean. Oh! gain his pardon for me!" and +she covered her face with her hand. + +"Poor Frank!--it is of your pardon that he talks. Tell me, +Eleonora, did you ever receive a letter from my mother?" + +"Never. Where was it sent?" she said, starting. + +"To Revelrig. It was written the day after the ball." + +"I never went to Revelrig. Oh! if I could have spoken to you first +I should have been saved from so much that was wrong. No one knew +where I was." + +"No, not till Sister Margaret told Herbert Bowater that her sisters +had been at a ball at the town-hall the week before. Then he saw +she was Miss Strangeways, and asked if she knew where you were." + +"Ah, yes! disobedience--tacit deception--temper. Oh! they have +brought their just punishment. But that letter!" + +"I think it was to explain poor Frank's conduct at the races. +Perhaps, as the servants at Revelrig had no knowledge of you, it may +have been returned, and my mother's letter have been left untouched. +I will see." + +They knew they must not delay one another, and parted; Julius +walking homewards by the Hall, where, alas! there was only one of +the family able to move about the house, and she seldom left her +patient. + +Julius did, however, find her coming down-stairs with Dr. Worth, and +little as he gathered that was reassuring in the physician's words, +there was a wistful moisture about her eyes, a look altogether of +having a bird in her bosom, which made him say, as the doctor +hurried off, "Anne, some one must be better." + +"Cecil is," she said; and he had nearly answered, "_only_ Cecil," +but her eyes brimmed over suddenly, and she said, "I am so +thankful!" + +"Miles!" he exclaimed. + +She handed him a telegram. The Salamanca was at Spithead; Miles +telegraphed to her to join him. + +"Miles come! Thank God! Does mother know?" + +"Hush! no one does," and with a heaving breast she added, "I +answered that I could not, and why, and that he must not come." + +"No, I suppose he must not till he is free of his ship. My poor +Anne!" + +"Oh no! I know he is safe. I am glad! But the knowledge would +tear your mother to pieces." + +"Her soul is in Raymond now, and to be certain of Miles being at +hand would be an unspeakable relief to him. Come and tell them." + +"No, no, I can't!" she cried, with a sudden gush of emotion sweeping +over her features, subdued instantly, but showing what it was to +her. "You do it. Only don't let them bring him here." + +And Anne flew to her fastness in Frank's attic, while Julius +repaired to Raymond's room, and found him as usual lying tranquil, +with his mother's chair so near that she could hand him the cool +fruit or drink, or ring to summon other help. Their time together +seemed to both a rest, and Julius always liked to look at their +peaceful faces, after the numerous painful scenes he had to +encounter. Raymond, too, was clinging to him, to his ministrations +and his talk, as to nothing else save his mother. Raymond had +always been upright and conscientious, but his religion had been +chiefly duty and obligation, and it was only now that comfort or +peace seemed to be growing out of it for him. As he looked up at +his brother, he too saw the involuntary brightness that the tidings +had produced, and said, "Is any one else better, Julius? I know +Terry is; I am so glad for Rose." + +"I asked Anne the same question," said Julius. "Mother, you will be +more glad than tantalized. The Salamanca is come in." + +Raymond made an inarticulate sound of infinite relief. His mother +exclaimed, "He must not come here! But Frankie could not spare Anne +to him. What will she do?" + +"She will stay bravely by Frank," said Julius. "We must all wait +till the ship is paid off." + +"Of course," said Raymond. "If she can rejoice that he is out of +danger, we will; I am content to know him near. It makes all much +easier. And, mother, he will find all ready to own what a priceless +treasure he sent before him in his wife." + +There was the old note of pain in the comparison. Julius's heart +was wrung as he thought of Sirenwood, with the sense that the victim +was dying, the author of the evil recovering. He could only stifle +the thought by turning away, and going to the table in his mother's +adjacent room, where letters had accumulated unopened. 'On Her +Majesty's Service' bore the post-mark which justified him in opening +it, and enclosing the letter it contained to Miss Vivian. + +He did so almost mechanically. He had gone through these weeks only +by never daring to have a self. The only man of his family who +could be effective; the only priest in the two infected parishes; he +had steadfastly braced himself for the work. He ventured only to +act and pray, never to talk, save for the consolation of others. To +Wil'sbro' he daily gave two morning hours, for he never failed to be +wanted either for the last rites, or for some case beyond Herbert's +experience, as well as to see the Vicar, who was sinking fast, in a +devout and resigned frame, which impressed while it perplexed his +brother clergyman, in view of the glaring deficiencies so plain to +others, but which never seemed to trouble his conscience. + +The nursing-staff still consisted of the Sisters, Herbert Bowater, +Mrs. Duncombe and her man-servant. Under their care, the virulence +of the disease was somewhat abating, and the doctors ventured to say +that after the next few days there would be much fewer fatal cases; +but Water Lane was now a strangely silent place,--windows open, +blinds flapping in the wind, no children playing about, and the +'Three Pigeons' remained the only public-house not shut up. It was +like having the red cross on the door. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXIX +A Strange Night + + +Cold, cold with death, came up the tide + In no manner of haste, +Up to her knees, and up to her side, + And up to her wicked waist; +For the hand of the dead, and the heart of the dead, + Are strong hasps they to hold.--G. MACDONALD + +"Rector," said Herbert Bowater, "are you specially at home?" + +"Why?" asked Julius, pausing. + +"There's that man Gadley." + +"Gadley! Is he down?" + +"It seems that he has been ill this fortnight, but in the low, +smouldering form; and he and that hostler of his kept it a secret, +for fear of loss of gain, and hatred of doctors, parsons, Sisters, +and authorities generally, until yesterday, when the hostler made +off with all the money and the silver spoons. This morning early, a +policeman, seeing the door open, went in, and found the poor wretch +in a most frightful state, but quite sensible. I was passing as he +came out to look for help, and I have been there mostly ever since. +He is dying--M'Vie says there's not a doubt of that, and he has got +something on his mind. He says he has been living on Moy's hush- +money all this time, for not bringing to light some embezzlement of +your mother's money, and letting the blame light on that poor cousin +of yours, Douglas." + +Herbert was amazed at the lighting up of his Rector's worn, anxious +face. + +"Douglas! Thank Heaven! Herbert, we must get a magistrate at once +to take the deposition!" + +"What! Do you want to prosecute Moy?" + +"No, but to clear Archie." + +"I thought he was drowned?" + +"No; that was all a mistake. Miles saw him at Natal. Herbert, this +will be life and joy to your sister. What!--you did not know about +Jenny and Archie?" + +"Not I--Jenny!--poor old Joan! So that's what has stood in her way, +and made her the jolliest of old sisters, is it? Poor old Joanie! +What! was she engaged to him?" + +"Yes, much against your father's liking, though he had consented. I +remember he forbade it to be spoken of,--and you were at school." + +"And Joan was away nursing old Aunt Joan for two years. So Archie +went off with this charge on him, and was thought to be lost! Whew! +How did she stand it? I say, does she know he is alive?" + +"No, he forbade Miles to speak. No one knows but Miles and I, and +our wives. Anne put us on the scent. Now, Herbert, I'll go to the +poor man at once, and you had better find a magistrate." + +"Whom can I find?" said Herbert. "There's my father away, and +Raymond ill, and Lipscombe waved me off--wouldn't so much as speak +to me for fear I should be infectious." + +"You must get a town magistrate." + +"Briggs is frantic since he lost his son, and Truelove thinks he has +the fever, though Worth says it is all nonsense. There's nobody but +Whitlock. Dear old Jenny! Well, there always was something +different from other people in her, and I never guessed what it was. +I'd go to the end of the world to make her happy and get that +patient look out of her eyes." + +Herbert had nearly to fulfil this offer, for Mr. Whitlock was gone +to London for the day, and magistrates were indeed scarce; but at +last, after walking two miles out of the town, his vehemence and +determination actually dragged in the unfortunate, timid justice of +the peace who had avoided him in the road, but who could not refuse +when told in strong earnest that the justification of an innocent +man depended on his doing his duty. + +Poor Mr. Lipscombe! The neglected 'Three Pigeons' was just now the +worst place in all Water Lane. The little that had hastily been +done since the morning seemed to have had no effect on the foetid +atmosphere, even to Herbert's well accustomed nostrils; and what +must it have been to a stranger, in spite of the open window and all +the disinfectants? And, alas! the man had sunk into a sleep. +Julius, who still stood by him, had heard all he had to say to +relieve his mind, all quite rationally, and had been trying to show +him the need of making reparation by repeating all to a magistrate, +when the drowsiness had fallen on him; and though the sound of feet +roused him, it was to wander into the habitual defiance of +authority, merging into terror. + +Herbert soothed him better than any one else could do, and he fell +asleep again; but Mr. Lipscombe declared it was of no use to remain-- +nothing but madness; and they could not gainsay him. He left the +two clergymen together, feeling himself to have done a very valiant +and useless thing in the interests of justice, or at the importunity +of a foolishly zealous young curate. + +"Look here," said Herbert, "Whitlock may be trusted. Leave a note +for him explaining. I'll stay here; I'm the best to do so, any way. +If he revives and is sensible, I'll send off at once for Whitlock, +or if there is no time, I'll write it down and let him see me sign +it." + +"And some one else, if possible," said Julius. "The difficulty is +that I never had authority given me to use what he said to me in +private. Rather the contrary, for old instinctive habits of caution +awoke the instant I told him it was his duty to make it known, and +that Archie was alive. I don't like leaving you here, Herbert, but +Raymond was very weak this morning; besides, there's poor Joe's +funeral." + +"Oh, never mind. He'll have his sleep out, and be all right when he +awakes. Think of righting Jenny's young man! How jolly!" + +Julius went across to the town-hall hospital, and told the Sisters, +whose darling his curate was, of the charge he had undertaken, and +they promised to look after him. After which Julius made the best +of his way home, where Rosamond had, as usual, a bright face for +him. Her warm heart and tender tact had shown her that obtrusive +attempts to take care of him would only be harassing, so she only +took care to secure him food and rest in his own house whenever it +was possible, and that however low her own hopes might be, she would +not add to his burden; and now Terry was so much better that she +could well receive him cheerily, and talk of what Terry had that day +eaten, so joyously, as almost to conceal that no one was better at +the Hall. + +"I will come with you," she said; "I might do something for poor +Fanny," as the bell began to toll for little Joshua's funeral. +Fanny Reynolds, hearing some rumour of her boy's illness, had +brought Drake to her home three days before his death. The poor +little fellow's utterances, both conscious and unconscious, had +strangely impressed the man, and what had they not awakened in the +mother? And when the words, so solemn and mysterious, fell on those +unaccustomed ears in the churchyard, and Fanny, in her wild +overpowering grief, threw herself about in an agony of sorrow and +remorse, and sobbed with low screams, it was 'the lady' whom she +viewed as an angel of mercy, who held her and hushed her; and when +all was over, and she was sinking down, faint and hysterical, it was +'the lady' who--a little to the scandal of the more respectable-- +helped Drake to carry her to the Rectory, the man obeying like one +dazed. + +"I must leave the sheep that was lost to you, Rose," said Julius. +"You can do more for them than I as yet, and they have sent for me +to the Hall." + +"You will stay there to-night if they want you; I don't want any +one," said Rosamond at the door. + +He was wanted indeed at his home. Frank was in a wilder and more +raving state than ever, and Raymond so faint and sinking, and with +such a look about him, that Julius felt, more than he had ever done +before, that though the fever had almost passed away, there was no +spirit or strength to rally. He was very passive, and seemed to +have no power to wonder, though he was evidently pleased when Julius +told him both of Archie Douglas's life and the hopes of clearing his +name. "Tell Jenny she was right," he said, and did not seem +inclined to pursue the subject. + +They wheeled Mrs. Poynsett away at her usual hour, when he was +dozing; and as Frank was still tossing and moaning incoherently, and +often required to be held, Julius persuaded Anne to let him take her +place with him, while she became Raymond's watcher. He dozed about +half an hour, and when she next gave him some food, he said, in a +very low feeble tone: + +"You have heard from Miles?" + +"Yes; he says nothing shall stop him the moment they are paid off." + +"That's right. No fear of infection--that's clear," said Raymond. + +"I think not--under God!" and Anne's two hands unseen clasped over +her throbbing, yearning heart. + +"Dear old fellow!" said Raymond. "It is such pleasure to leave +mother to him. If I don't see him, Anne, tell him how glad I am. +I've no charge. I know he will do it all right. And mother will +have you," and he held out his hand to her. Presently he said: +"Anne. One thing--" + +"Yes," she said anxiously. + +"You always act on principle, I know; but don't hang back from +Miles's friends and pleasures. I know the old fellow, Anne. His +nature is sociable, and he wants sympathy in it." + +"I know what you mean, Raymond," said Anne; "I do mean to try to do +right--" + +"I know, I know," said he, getting a little excited, and speaking +eagerly; "but don't let right blind you, Anne, if you censure and +keep from all he likes--if you will be a recluse and not a woman-- +he--don't be offended, Anne; but if you leave him to himself, then +will every effort be made to turn him from you. You don't believe +me." + +"My dear Raymond, don't speak so eagerly," as his cheeks flushed. + +"I must! I can't see his happiness and yours wrecked like mine. Go +with him, Anne. Don't leave him to be poisoned. Mesmerism has its +power over whoever has been under the spell. And he has--he has! +She will try to turn him against you and mother." + +"Hush, Raymond! Indeed I will be on my guard. There's no one +there. What are you looking at?" + +"Camilla!" he said, with eyes evidently seeing something. "Camilla! +Is it not enough to have destroyed _one_ peace?" + +"Raymond, indeed there is no one here." + +But he had half raised himself. "Yes, Camilla, you have had your +revenge. Let it be enough. No--no; I forgive you; but I forbid you +to touch her." + +He grasped Anne's arm with one hand, and stretched the other out as +though to warn some one away. The same moment there was another +outburst of the bleeding. Anne rang for help with one hand, and +held him as best she could. It lasted long; and when it was over he +was manifestly dying. "It is coming," he said; looking up to +Julius. "Pray! Only first--my love to Cecil. I hope she is still +young enough not to have had all her life spoilt. Is her father +coming?" + +"To-morrow," said Anne. + +"That's well. Poor child! she is better free." + +How piteously sad those words of one wedded but a year! How unlike +the look that met his mother's woeful yet tender eyes, as she held +his hand. She would aid him through that last passage as through +all before, only a word of strong and tender love, as he again +looked up to Julius and Anne, as if to put her in their keeping, and +once more murmured something of "Love to sweet Rose! Now, Julius, +pray!" + +An ever dutiful man, there was no wandering in look or tone. He +breathed 'Amen' once or twice, but never moved again, only his eyes +still turned on his mother, and so in its time came the end. + +Old Susan saw at first that the long fluttering gasp had no +successor, and her touch certified Julius. He rose and went towards +his mother. She held out her hands and said. "Take me to my +Frank." + +"We had better," whispered Anne. + +They wheeled her to the foot of the stairs. Julius took her in his +arms, Anne held her feet, and thus they carried her up the stairs, +and along the passage, hearing Frank's husky rapid babble all the +way, and finding him struggling with the fierce strength of delirium +against Jenkins, who looked as if he thought them equally senseless, +when he saw his helpless mistress carried in. + +"Frank, my boy, do lie still," she said, and he took no notice; but +when she laid her hand on his, he turned, looked at her with his +dull eyes, and muttered, "Mother!" + +It was the first recognition for many a day! and, at the smoothing +motion of her hand over him, while she still entreated, "Lie still, +my dear," the mutterings died away; the childish instinct of +obedience stilled the struggles; and there was something more like +repose than had been seen all these weary months. + +"Mother," said Julius, "you can do for us what no one else can. You +will save him." + +She looked up to him, and hope took away the blank misery he had +dreaded to see. "My poor Frankie," she said dreamily, "he has +wanted me, I will not leave him now." + +All was soon still; Frank's face had something like rest on it, as +he lay with his mother's hand on his brow, and she intent only on +him. + +"You can leave them to me, I think," said Anne. "I will send if +there be need; but if not, you had better not come up till you have +been to Wil'sbro'--if you must go." + +"I must, I fear; I promised to come to Fuller if he be still here. +I will speak to Jenkins first." + +Julius was living like a soldier in a campaign, with numbers +dropping beside him, and no time to mourn, scarcely to realize the +loss, and he went on, almost as if he had been a stranger; while the +grief of poor old Jenkins was uncontrollable, both for his lady's +sake and for the young master, who had been his pride and glory. +His sobs brought out Mrs. Grindstone into the gallery, to insist, +with some asperity, that there should be no noise to awaken her +mistress, who was in a sweet sleep. + +"We will take care," said Julius, sadly. "I suppose she had better +hear nothing till Mr. Charnock comes." + +"She must be left to me, sir, or I cannot be answerable for the +consequences," was the stiff reply, wherewith Mrs. Grindstone +retreated into her castle. + +Julius left the hushed and veiled house, in the frosty chill of the +late autumn just before dawn, shivering between grief and cold, and +he walked quickly down the avenue, feeling it strange that the +windows in the face of his own house were glittering back the +reflection of the setting moon. + +Something long and black came from the opposite direction. +"Rector," it said, in a low hoarse voice, "I've got leave from him +to use what he said to you. Sister Margaret and I signed it. Will +that do?" + +"I can't tell now, Herbert, I can't think. My brother is just +gone," said Julius in his inward voice. + +"Raymond! No! Oh, I beg your pardon; I never thought of that; +Raymond--" + +"Go home and go to bed," said Julius, as the young man wrung his +hand. "Rest now--we must think another time." + +Did Rosamond know? was perhaps the foremost of his weary thoughts. +Ah! did she not! Was she not standing with her crimson shawl round +her, and the long black plaits falling on it, to beckon him to the +firelit comfort of his own room? Did she not fall on his neck as he +came heavily up, and cling around him with her warm arms? "Oh, +Julius, what a dear brother he was! What can we do for your +mother?" + +As he told her how Frank's need did more than any support could do +for her, her tears came thicker; but in spite of them, her fond +hands put him into the easy-chair by the fire, and drew off his damp +boots; and while listening to the low sunken voice that told her of +the end, she made ready the cup of cocoa that was waiting, and put +the spoon in his hand in a caressing manner, that made her care, +comfort, not oppression. Fatigue seconded her, for he took the warm +food, faltered and leant back, dozing till the baby's voice awoke +him, and as he saw Rosamond hushing her, he exclaimed: + +"O, Rose! if poor Raymond had ever known one hour like this!" and he +held out his arms for his child. + +"You know I don't let you hold her in that coat. Go into your +dressing-room, have your bath, and put on your dressing-gown, and if +you will lie on the bed, you shall take care of her while I go and +feed Terry. You can't do anything for anybody yet, it is only six +o'clock." + +These precautions, hindering his going jaded and exhausted into +infection, were what Rosamond seemed to live for, though she never +forced them on him, and he was far too physically tired out not to +yield to the soothing effect; so that even two hours on the bed sent +him forth renovated to that brief service in the church, where +Herbert and he daily met and found their strength for the day. They +had not had time to exchange a word after it before there was a +knock at the vestry door, and a servant gave the message to Herbert, +who had opened it: "Lady Tyrrell is taken worse, sir, and Sir Harry +Vivian begged that Mr. Charnock would come immediately." + +A carriage had been sent for him, and he could only hurry home to +tell Rosamond to send on the pony to Sirenwood, to take him to +Wil'sbro', unless he were first wanted at home. She undertook to go +up to the Hall and give Anne a little rest, and he threw himself +into the carriage, not daring to dwell on the pain it gave him to go +from his brother's death bed to confront Camilla. + +At the door Eleonora came to meet him. "Thank you," she said. "We +knew it was no time to disturb you." + +"I can be better spared _now_," answered Julius. + +"You don't mean," she said, with a strange look, which was not quite +surprise. + +"Yes, my dear brother left us at about three o'clock last night. A +change came on at twelve." + +"Twelve!" Eleonora laid her hand on his arm, and spoke in a quick +agitated manner. "Camilla was much better till last night, when at +twelve I heard such a scream that I ran into her room. She was +sitting up with her eyes fixed open, like a clairvoyante, and her +voice seemed pleading--pleading with _him_, as if for pardon, and +she held out her hands and called him. Then, suddenly, she gave a +terrible shriek, and fell back in a kind of fit. Mr. M'Vie can do +nothing, and though she is conscious now, she does nothing but ask +for you and say that he does not want you now." + +Julius grew paler, as he said very low, "Anne said he seemed to be +seeing and answering _her_. Not like delirium, but as if she were +really there." + +"Don't tell any one," entreated Eleonora, in a breathless whisper, +and he signed consent, as both felt how those two spirits must have +been entwined, since these long years had never broken that subtle +link of sympathy which had once bound them. + +Sir Harry's face, dreary, sunken, and terrified, was thrust over the +balusters, as he called, "Don't hinder him, Lena, she asks for him +every moment;" and as they came on, he caught Julius's hand, saying, +"Soothe her, soothe her--'tis the only chance. If she could but +sleep!" + +There lay Camilla Tyrrell, beautiful still, but more than ever like +the weird tragic head with snake-wreathed brows, in the wasted +contour of her regular features and the flush on her hollow cheeks, +while her eyes burned with a strange fire that almost choked back +Julius's salutation of peace, even while he breathed it, for might +not the Son of Peace be with some there? + +The eager glance seemed to dart at him. "Julius Charnock!" she +cried, "come!" and as he would have said some word about her health, +she cut him short: "Never mind that; I must speak while my brain +serves. After that be the priest. He is dead!" + +"My brother? Yes." + +"The only one I ever loved! There's no sin nor scandal in saying so +now. His wife is better? It will never kill her." + +"She does not know." + +"No? There was nothing to make her. He could not give her his +heart, try as he would. Why did he turn the unchangeable to hate! +hate! hate!" + +"Lady Tyrrell, you did not send for me to hear what ought not to be +said at all?" + +"Don't fly off," she said. "I had really something to say. It was +not wholly hate, Julius; I really tried to teach his little idiot of +a wife to win him at last. I meant it to turn out well, and nothing +could, with that mother there." + +"I must leave you, Lady Tyrrell, if you will not control yourself." + +"Don't be hard on me, Julius," and she looked up with a glance of +better days. "You idolize her, like all the rest of you; but she +chilled me and repelled me, and turned me to bitterness, when I was +young and he might have led me. Her power and his idolatry made me +jealous, and what I did in a fit of petulance was so fastened on +that I could not draw back. Why did not he wait a little longer to +encumber himself with that girl! No--that wasn't what I had to say-- +it's all over now. It is the other thing. How is Frank?" + +"Very ill indeed; but quieter just now." + +"Then there shall not be another wreck like ours. Lena, are you +here? You saw that Frank had let Constance Strangeways win your +pebble. It was because I showed him the one Beatrice bought, and he +thought it yours. Yes, I saw nothing else for it. What was to +become of the property if you threw yourself away, and on _her_ +son?" she added, with the malignant look. "Whether he knew of this +little vow of yours, I can't tell, but he had lost his head and did +for himself. It was for your good and papa's; but I shall not be +here to guide the clue, so you must go your own way and be happy in +it, if _she_ will let you. Father, do you hear? Don't think to +please me by hindering the course of true love; and you, Julius, +tell Frank he was 'a dull Moor.' I liked the boy, I was sorry for +him; but he ought to have known his token better;--and there was the +estate to be saved." + +"Estates weigh little now!" + +"Clerical! I suppose now is the time for it? You were all +precision at Compton. It would kill me; I can't live with Mrs. +Poynsett. No, no, Tom, I can't have old Raymond quizzed; I'll get +him out of it when the leading-strings are cut. What right has she-- +?" + +The delirium had returned. Julius's voice kept her still for a few +moments, but she broke out afresh at his first pause, and murmurs +fell thick and fast from her tongue, mixing the names of her brother +and Raymond with railings at Mrs. Poynsett for slights in the days +when the mother was striving to discourage the inclination that +resulted in the engagement. + +Earnestly did Julius beseech for peace, for repentance for the poor +storm-tossed soul; but when the raving grew past control, and the +time was coming for his ministrations to the Vicar of Wil'sbro', he +was forced to leave her. Poor old Sir Harry would have clung to him +as to anything like a support, but Eleonora knew better. "No, dear +papa," she said, "he has given us too much of his time already. He +must go where he can still help. Poor Camilla cannot attend to +him." + +"If she came to herself--" + +"Then send for me. I would come instantly. Send to the town-hall +any time before twelve, after that to Compton. Send without +scruples, Lenore, you have truly the right." + +They did not send, except that a note met him as he returned home, +telling him that suffusion of the brain had set in. Camilla Tyrrell +did not survive Raymond Poynsett twelve hours. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXX +Come Back + + +And are ye sure the news is true? +And are ye sure he's weel?--J. THOMPSON + +Eleonora Vivian was striving to write her sorrowful announcements in +the deepening dusk of that autumn evening, while her father had shut +himself up after his vigil to sleep under Victor's care, when a +message came that Lady Rosamond Charnock earnestly begged to see +her. She stood with a face white and set, looking like a galvanized +corpse, as her lips framed the words, "He is dead!" + +"No!" almost screamed Rosamond, snatching her hand. "No! But no +one can save him but you. Come!" + +Without a word, Eleonora stepped into her own room, and came back in +cloak, hat, and veil. + +"Right," said Rosamond, seizing her arm, and taking her to the pony- +carriage at the door, then explaining while driving rapidly: "He +has left off raving ever since his mother has been with him, but he +lies--not still but weak, not speaking, only moaning now and then. +His throat is so dreadful that it is hard to give him anything, and +he takes no notice of what one says, only if his mother takes the +spoon. He gets weaker, and Dr. Worth says it is only because there +is no impulse to revive him--he is just sinking because he can't be +roused. When I heard that, I thought I knew who could." + +Eleonora's lips once moved, but no sound came from them, and +Rosamond urged her little pony to its best speed through the two +parks from one veiled house to another, fastened it to the garden- +door without calling any one, and led her silent companion up the +stairs. + +Mrs. Poynsett felt a hand on her shoulder, and Rosamond said, "I +have brought our only hope," and Eleonora stood, looking at the +ghastly face. The yellow skin, the inflamed purple lips, the +cavernous look of cheeks and eyes, were a fearful sight, and only +the feeble incessant groping of the skeleton fingers showed life or +action. + +"Put this into his hand," said Rosamond, and Lenore found the pebble +token given to her, and obeyed. At the touch, a quivering trembled +over face and form, the eyelids lifted, the eyes met hers, there was +a catching of the breath, a shudder and convulsive movement. "He is +going," cried his mother, but Anne started forward with drops of +strong stimulant, Rosamond rubbed spirit into his forehead, the +struggle lessened, the light flickered back into his brown eyes, his +fingers closed on hers. "Speak to him," said Mrs. Poynsett. "Do +you see her, Frankie dear?" + +"Frank! dear Frank, here I am." + +The eyes gazed with more meaning, the lips moved, but no sound came +till Anne had given another drop of the stimulant, and the terrible +pain of the swallowing was lessened. Then he looked up, and the +words were heard. + +"Is it true?" + +"It is, my dear boy. It is Lena." + +"Here, Frank," as still the wistful gaze was unsatisfied; she laid +her hands on his, and then he almost smiled and tried to raise it to +his cheeks, but he was too weak; and she obeyed the feeble gesture, +and stroked the wasted face, while a look of content came over it, +the eyes closed, and he slept with his face against her hand, his +mother watching beside with ineffable gratitude and dawning hope. + +Lenore was forgetting everything in this watching, but in another +quarter of an hour Anne was forced again to torture him with her +spoon; but life was evidently gaining ground, for though he put it +from him at first, he submitted at Lena's gesture and word. She +felt the increased warmth and power in his grasp, as he whispered, +"Lena, you are come back," then felt for the token. + +Alas! that she must leave him. They knew she must not stay away +from her father; indeed, Rosamond had told no one of her attempt, +her forlorn hope. Lena tried to give assurances that she only went +because it could not be helped, and the others told him she would +return, but still he held her, and murmured, "Stay." She could not +tear herself away, she let him keep her hand, and again he dozed and +his fingers relaxed. "Go now, my dear," said Mrs. Poynsett, "you +have saved him. This stone will show him that you have been here. +You will come back to-morrow, I may promise him?" + +"Yes, yes. In the morning, or whenever I can be spared," whispered +Lena, who was held for a moment to Mrs. Poynsett's breast, ere +Rosamond took her away again, and brought her once more down-stairs +and to the pony-carriage. There she leant back, weeping quietly but +bitterly over the shock of Frank's terribly reduced state, which +seemed to take from her all the joy of his revival, weeping too at +the cruel need that was taking her away. + +"He will do now! I know he will," said Rosamond, happy in her bold +venture. + +"Oh! if I could stay!" + +"Most likely you would be turned out for fear of excitement. The +stone will be safer for him." + +"Where did that come from?" asked Lenore, struck suddenly with +wonder. + +"I wrote to Miss Strangeways, when I saw how he was always feeling, +feeling, feeling for it, like the Bride of Lammermoor. I told her +there was more than she knew connected with that bit of stone, and +life or death might hang on it. Then when I'd got it, I hardly knew +what to do with it, for if it had soothed the poor boy delirious, +the coming to his right mind might have been all the worse." + +Rosamond kissed her effusively, and she dreamily muttered, "He must +be saved." There was a sort of strange mist round her, as though +she knew not what she was doing, and she longed to be alone. She +would not let Rosamond drive her beyond the Sirenwood gate, but +insisted on walking through the park alone in the darkness, by that +very path where Frank had ten months ago exchanged vows with her. + +Rosamond turned back to the Hall. It was poor Cecil's pony-carriage +that she was driving, and she took it to the stable-yard, where her +entreaty had obtained it from the coachman, whom she rewarded by +saying, "I was right, Brown, I fetched his best doctor," and the old +servant understood, and came as near a smile as any one at Compton +could do on such a day. + +"Is the carriage gone for Mr. Charnock?" + +"Yes, my lady, I sent Alfred with it; I did not seem as if I could +go driving into Wil'sbro' on such a day." + +Rosamond bade a kind farewell to the poor old coachman, and was +walking homewards, when she saw a figure advancing towards her, +strangely familiar, and yet hat and coat forbade her to believe it +her husband, even in the dusk. She could not help exclaiming, +"Miles!" + +"Yes!" he said, coming to a standstill. "Are you Rosamond?" + +"I am;--Anne is quite well and Frank better. Oh! this will do them +good! You know--" + +"Yes--yes, I know," he said hastily, as if he could not bear to let +himself out to one as yet a stranger. "My mother?" + +"Absorbed in Frank too much to feel it yet fully; Anne watches them +both. Oh! Miles, what she has been!" and she clasped his hand +again. "Let me call her." + +And Rosamond opened the hall door just as some instinct, for it +could hardly have been sense of hearing, had brought Anne upon the +stairs, where, as Miles would have hurried up to her, she seemed, in +the light gray dress she still wore, to hover like some spirit +eluding his grasp like the fabled shades. + +"Oh no! you ought not. Infection--I am steeped in it." + +"Nonsense," and she was gathered into the strong grasp that was home +and rest to her, while Miles was weeping uncontrollably as he held +her in his arms. "O, Nannie, Nannie! I did not think it would be +like this. Why did they keep me till he was gone? No, I did not +get the telegram, I only heard at the station. They let me go this +morning, and I did think I should have been in time." He loosed +himself from her, and hung over the balustrade, struggling with a +strong man's anguish, then said in a low voice, "Did he want me?" + +"He knew it was your duty," said Anne. "We all were thankful you +were kept from infection, and he said many little things, but the +chief was that he trusted you too much to leave any special +messages. Hark! that must be Mr. Charnock, Cecil's father! I must +go and receive him. Stay back, Miles, you can't now--you know my +room--" + +He signed acquiescence, but lingered in the dark to look down and +see how, though Rosamond had waited to spare them this reception, +his wife's tall graceful figure came forward, and her kindly +comforting gestures, as the two sisters-in-law took the newcomer +into the drawing-room, and in another minute Anne flitted up to him +again. "That good Rosamond is seeing to Mr. Charnock," she said; +"will you come, Miles? I think it will do your mother good; only +quietly, for Frank knows nothing." + +Mrs. Poynsett still sat by Frank. To Miles's eyes he was a fearful +spectacle, but to Anne there was hourly progress; the sunken +dejected look was gone, and though there was exhaustion, there was +rest; but he was neither sleeping nor waking, and showed no heed +when his brother dropped on one knee by his mother's side, put an +arm round her waist, and after one fervent kiss laid his black head +on her lap, hiding his face there while she fondled his hair, and +said, "Frank, Frankie dear, here's Miles come home." He did not +seem to hear, only his lips murmured something like 'Anne,' and the +tender hand and ready touch of his unwearied nurse at once fulfilled +his need, while his mother whispered, "Miles, she is our blessing!" + +Poor Miles! Never had sailor a stranger, though some may have had +an even sadder, return. He had indeed found his wife, but hers was +the only hand that could make Frank swallow the sustenance that he +needed every half-hour, or who knew how to relieve him. Indeed, +even the being together in the sick-room was not long possible, for +Anne was called to the door. Mr. Charnock was asking to see Mrs. +Poynsett. Would Mrs. Miles come and speak to him? + +Mr. Charnock was a small and restless man with white hair, little +black eyes, looking keener than they were, and a face which had +evidently been the mould of Cecil's. He was very kind, with a full +persuasion that the consolations of his august self must be +infallible; but this was coupled with an inclination to reprove +everybody for the fate that had left his cherished darling a +childless widow at two-and-twenty. To take him to Frank's room was +impossible, and he had to be roundly told so. Neither had he seen +his daughter. She was very weak, but recovering, and Grindstone, +whom he had seen and talked with, was as strenuous in deprecating +any excitement as he was nervous about it. So he could only be +disposed of in his room till dinner-time, when he came down prepared +to comfort the family, but fulfilled his mission rather by doing +such good as a blister, which lessens the force of the malady by +counter-irritation. + +Julius came up to be with Miles, and to help them through the +dinner, the first which had been laid for many a long day. His +enquiry for Cecil was answered: "She is progressing as favourably +as there can be reason to expect, but I have not seen her. I follow +the judgment of her faithful Grindstone." + +"Then she still knows nothing--" + +"Of her bereavement? No. Her state does not yet warrant it. In +fact, I almost wish I had obeyed my original impulse, and brought +down Venn to make the melancholy communication." + +To every one's surprise Anne bristled up, saying, "Why, here is +Julius, Mr. Charnock!" + +Mr. Charnock bowed: "I understand that my Cousin Julius has been +engrossed by his wife's family and by the adjoining parish, the care +of which he has assumed." + +Anne fairly coloured up, and exclaimed, "Julius has been our main- +stay and help in everything--I can't think how he has done it. He +has been here whenever we needed him, as well as at Wil'sbro', where +people have been dying everywhere, the poor Vicar and all--" + +"Far be it from me to discourage philanthropy," said Mr. Charnock, +"only I would have it within due bounds. I am an old-fashioned +squire, of a school, it may be, antiquated, an advocate of the +parochial system; and I cannot help thinking that if this had been +closely adhered to by hot-headed young clergymen, my poor child +might not have been a childless widow at two-and-twenty." + +Julius was too much tired and too sad-hearted to heed greatly what +Mr. Charnock said. It was so strange to have Miles in sight, yet to +feel so unable to be glad, that he scarcely heard anything. But +Anne again took up the cudgels: "Mr. Charnock, you don't suppose +that it was anything Julius did that brought this fever here. It +was going to the town-hall among the drains." + +"My dear Mrs. Miles Charnock, I am sure your husband will agree with +me that sanitary arrangements and all connected with them are beyond +the range of ladies, who are happily exempted from all knowledge of +the subject." + +Anne could not say aloud that she wished Cecil had held this +opinion, but she subsided, while Mr. Charnock prosed on, asking +questions about the arrangements, and seeming shocked to hear that +the funeral must be early the next day, this being one of the prime +injunctions of the doctors, and that the one had been asked to +attend it. It made him sigh again for his poor daughter, as he +handed Anne in to dinner. She did not stay half through it, for it +was again the time for feeding Frank. Miles went half way up-stairs +with her and returned, looking very wistful. Julius smiled at him, +"Your wife is too valuable, Miles; she is every one's property." + +"It must be very gratifying to you," added Mr. Charnock, "to find +how example and superior society have developed the native qualities +your discernment detected in the charming young lady who has just +quitted us. It was a most commendable arrangement to send her to +enjoy the advantages of this place." + +"I sent her to be a comfort to my mother," said Miles, bluntly. + +"And so she has been," said Julius, fervently, but sotto voce. + +"I understand," said Mr. Charnock; "and as I was saying, my dear +Cecil expressed from the first her desire to assist in forming her +stranger sister-in-law, and I am happy to see the excellent effect. +I should scarcely have guessed that she came from a colony." + +"Indeed," Miles answered dryly. + +Mr. Charnock might have it his own way, if he liked to think Anne +had been a Hottentot till Cecil reclaimed her. + +The two brothers did feel something like joy when a message at last +informed Mr. Charnock that his daughter was awake and he might see +her. They drew nearer together, and leant against one another, with +absolute joy in the contact. They were singularly alike in outline, +voice, and manner, in everything but colouring, and had always been +one in spirit, except for the strong passion for adventure which had +taken Miles to sea, to find he had chosen his profession too young +to count the cost, and he held to it rather by duty than taste. +Slight as had been his seniority, poor Raymond had always been on a +sort of paternal pinnacle, sharing the administration with his +mother, while Miles and Julius had paired on an equality. + +"Poor mother!" sighed Miles. "How is she to live without him? +Julius, did he leave any word for me with you?" + +"Above all, that Anne is the daughter for my mother, and so she is." + +"What, when this poor wife of Raymond's was said to be the superior +creature?" + +"You see her adoring father," said Julius. "My Rose has necessarily +her own cares, but Anne has been my mother's silent aid and stay for +months, and what she has been in the present need no words can say. +My mother has had no power to take the direction of anything, her +whole being has been absorbed, first in Raymond, now in Frank; and +not only has Anne been Frank's constant nurse through these five +weeks of the most frightful fever and delirium I have seen at all +here, but she has had thought for all, and managed all the house and +servants. We could do comparatively little, with Rose's brother ill +at home, and the baby so young; besides, there have been eleven +cases in the parish; and there was Wil'sbro'--but Anne has been the +angel in the house." + +"I knew--I knew she would be everything when once the first +strangeness was over; but, poor girl, her heart is in Africa, and it +has been all exile here; I could see it in every letter, though she +tried to make the best of it. If there had but been a child here!" + +"I think you will find sufficient attachment to mother to weigh a +good deal with her. Poor Anne, she did think us all very wicked at +first, and perhaps she does still, but at least this has drawn us +all nearer together." + +And then the brothers lowered their voices, and Miles heard the full +history of Raymond's last illness, with all the details that Julius +could have spoken of to none else, while the sailor's tears slowly +dropped through the hands that veiled his face. It was a great +deprivation to him that he might not look on Raymond's face again, +but the medical edict had been decisive, and he had come home to be +of use and not a burthen. As Julius told Rosamond, he only +thoroughly felt the blessing of Miles's return when he bade good +night and left the Hall, in peace and security that it had a +sufficient aid and stay, and that he was not deserting it. + +Miles had proposed to send his wife to bed and take the night watch, +and he so far prevailed that she lay down in the adjoining room in +her dressing gown while he sat by Frank's side. She lay where she +could feast her eyes upon him, as the lamplight fell on his ruddy +brown cheek, black hair, and steady dark eye, so sad indeed, but so +full of quiet strength and of heedful alacrity even in stillness--a +look that poor Raymond, with all his grave dignity, had never worn. +That sight was all Anne wanted. She did not speak, she did not +sleep; it was enough, more than enough, to have him there. She was +too much tired, body and mind, after five weeks of strain, for more +than the sense that God had given her back what she loved, and this +was 'more than peace and more than rest.' + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXI +Breaking Down + + +Funerals were little attended in these sad days. The living had to +be regarded more than the dead, and Raymond Poynsett was only +followed to the grave by his two brothers, his father-in-law, and +some of the servants. Rosamond, however, weeping her soft profuse +tears, could hear everything from behind the blind at Terry's open +window, on that moist warm autumn day; everything, for no exception +was made to the rule that coffins might not be taken into the church +during this deadly sickness. She did hear a faltering and a +blundering, which caused her to look anxiously at the tall white +figure standing at the head of the grave, and, as she now saw, once +or twice catching at the iron railing that fenced in the Poynsett +tombs. Neither her husband nor his brother seemed to notice what +she observed. Absorbed in the sorrow and in one another, they +turned away after the service was ended and walked towards the Hall. +Rosamond did not speak for a minute or two, then she turned round to +Terry, who was sitting up in bed, with an awe-struck face, listening +as well as he could to the low sounds, and watching her. + +"Terry, dear, shall you mind my going to see after Herbert Bowater? +I am sure they have let him overwork himself. If he is not fit to +take Lady Tyrrell's funeral this afternoon, I _shall_ send to +Duddingstone on my own responsibility. I will not have Julius doing +that!" + +"Do you think he is ill--Bowater, I mean?" asked Terry. + +"I don't like it. He seemed to totter as he went across the +churchyard, and he blundered. I shall go and see." + +"Oh yes, go," said Terry; "I don't want anybody. Don't hurry." + +Rosamond put on her hat and sped away to Mrs. Hornblower's. As +usual, the front door leading to the staircase was open, and, going +up, she knocked at the sitting-room door; but the only response was +such a whining and scratching that she supposed the dogs had been +left prisoners there and forgotten, and so she turned the lock--but +there was an obstruction; so that though Mungo and Tartar darted out +and snuffed round her, only Rollo's paw and head appeared, and there +was a beseeching earnestness in his looks and little moans, as if +entreating her to come in. Another push, vigorously seconded by +Rollo within, showed her that it was Herbert's shoulder that +hindered her, and that he was lying outstretched on the floor, +apparently just recalled to consciousness by the push; for as Rollo +proceeded to his one remedy of licking, there was a faint murmur of +"Who--what--" + +"It is I! What is the matter?" + +"Lady Rose! I'll--I'll try to move--oh!" His voice died away, and +Rosamond thrust in her salts, and called to Mrs. Hornblower for +water, but in vain. However, Herbert managed to move a little to +one side. She squeezed into the doorway, hastily brought water from +his bedroom within, and, kneeling down by him, bathed his face, so +that he revived to say, in the same faint voice, "I'm so sorry I +made such mulls. I couldn't see. I thought I knew it by heart." + +"Never mind, never mind, dear Herbert! You are better. Couldn't +you let me help you to the sofa?" + +"Oh, presently;" and as she took his head on her lap, "Thank you; I +did mean to hold out till after this day's work; but it is all right +now Bindon is come." + +"Come!--is he?" she joyfully exclaimed. + +"Yes, I saw him from the window. I was getting up to hail him when +the room turned upside down with me." + +"There's his step!" now exclaimed Rosamond. "Squeeze in, Mr. +Bindon; you are a very welcome sight." + +Mr. Bindon did make his way in, and stood dismayed at the black mass +on the floor. Rosamond and Rollo, one on each side of Herbert's +great figure, in his cassock, and the rosy face deadly white, while +Mungo and Tartar, who hated Mr. Bindon, both began to bark, and thus +did the most for their master, whose call of 'Quiet! you brutes,' +seemed to give him sudden strength. He took a grip of Rollo's curly +back, and, supported by Mr. Bindon, dragged himself to the sofa and +fell heavily back on it. + +"Give him some brandy," said Mr. Bindon, hastily. + +"There's not a drop of anything," muttered Herbert; "it's all gone-- +" + +"To Wil'sbro'," explained Rosamond; then seeing the scared face of +Dilemma at the door, she hastily gave a message, and sent her flying +to the Rectory, while Mr. Bindon was explaining. + +"I wish I had known. I never will go out of the reach of letters +again. I saw in the Times, at Innspruck, a mention of typhoid fever +here, and I came back as fast as trains would bring me; but too +late, I fear." + +"You are welcome, indeed," repeated Rosamond. "Herbert has broken +down at last, after doing more than man could do, and I am most +thankful that my husband should be saved the funerals at Wil'sbro'." + +Mr. Bindon, whose face showed how shocked he was, made a few +inquiries. He had learnt the main facts on his way, but had been +seeking his junior to hear the details, and he looked, like the +warrior who had missed Thermopylae, ashamed and grieved at his +holiday. + +The bottle Rosamond had sent for arrived, and there was enough +vigour restored to make her say, "Here's a first service, Mr. +Bindon, to help this poor fellow into bed." + +"No, no!" exclaimed Herbert. + +"You are not going to say there's nothing the matter with you?" said +Rosamond, as a flush passed over the pale face. + +"No," he said; "but I want to go home. I should have taken a fly at +Wil'sbro'. Cranky will see to me without bothering anybody else. +If you would send for one--" + +"I don't think I can till I know whether you are fit to move," said +Rosamond. "I desired Dilemma to tell them to send Dr. Worth here +when he comes to Terry. Besides, is it quite right to carry _this_ +into another place?" + +"I never thought of that," said Herbert. "But they would shut me +up; nobody come near me but Cranky." But there a shivering fit +caught him, so that the sofa shook with him, and Rosamond covered +him with rugs, and again told him bed was the only place for him, +and he consented at last, holding his head as he rose, dizzy with +the ache. + +"Look here, Lady Rose," he said, falling back into a sitting posture +at the first attempt, "where's my writing-case? If I go off my +head, will you give this to the Rector, and ask him if it will be +any good in the matter he knows of?" and he handed her an envelope. +"And this keep," he added, giving her one addressed to his father. +"Don't let him have it till it's all over. You know." Then he took +up a pen and a sheet of paper, and got as far, with a shaking hand, +as 'Dear Crank--' but there he broke down, and laid his head on the +table, groaning. + +"I'll do it. What shall I say, dear Herbert?" + +"Only tell her to come to me," he gasped. "Cranstoun--our old +nurse. Then I'll be no trouble." + +While Mr. Bindon helped Herbert into his room, Rosamond sped home to +send for Mrs. Cranstoun, arrange for the care of the new patient in +the intervening hours, and fetch some of those alleviations of which +experience had taught the use. Mr. Bindon came to meet her on her +return, carefully shutting the door, and saying, "Lady Rosamond, can +he be delirious already? He is talking of being plucked for his +Ordination." + +"Too true," said Rosamond. "I thought it a great shame to be so +hard on a man with _that_ in him; but I believe you expected it?" + +"No; I may have said he would fail, but I never expected it." + +"Fail, indeed! Fancy a man being turned back who has worked night +and day--night and day--doing all the very hardest services--never +resting! Very likely killing himself!" cried Rosamond hotly. "May +I come back to him? Terry can spare me, and if you will go to +Wil'sbro' I'll stay till my husband comes, or the doctor. The +Sisters will tell you what to do." + +Herbert was, however, so much more comfortable for being in bed, +that he was able to give Mr. Bindon directions as to the immediate +cares at Wil'sbro'; but he was distressed at occupying Lady Rose, +his great object being to be no trouble to anybody, though he had +seen so much of the disease as to have been fully aware that it had +been setting in for the last two days, yet his resolution to spare +his Rector had kept him afoot till he had seen other help arrive. +He declared that he wanted nobody but Rollo, who could fetch and +carry, and call any one, if only the doors were open, and really the +creature's wistful eyes and gentle movements justified the +commendation. + +"Only," said Herbert anxiously, "I suppose this is not catching for +dogs. You'll make a home for him Lady Rose?" he added. "I should +like you to have him, and he'll be happier with you than with any +one else." + +"Herbert, I can't have you talk of that." + +"Very well," he said, quietly. "Only you will keep my dear old +fellow--I've had him from a puppy--and he is but three years old +now." + +Rosamond gave all promises, from her full heart, as she fondled the +soft, wise black head. + +Herbert was unhappy too about Mrs. Hornblower's trouble. Harry had +been one of the slighter cases, and was still in his room, a good +deal subdued by the illness, and by the attention the lodger had +shown him; for Herbert had spent many hours, when he had been +supposed to be resting, in relieving Mrs. Hornblower, and she was +now in a flood of gratitude, only longing to do everything for him +herself. Had he not, as she declared, saved her son, body and soul? + +The most welcome sight was Julius, who came down in dismay as soon +as he could leave the Hall. "I am so glad," said the patient; "I +want to talk things over while my head is clearer than it ever may +be again." + +"Don't begin by desponding. These fevers are much less severe now +than six weeks ago." + +"Yes; but they always go the hardest with the great big strong young +fellows. I've buried twelve young men out of the whole forty-five." + +"Poor lads, I doubt if their life had been such a preparation as +yours." + +"Don't talk of my life. A stewardship I never set myself to +contemplate, and so utterly failed in. I've got nothing to carry to +my God but broken vows and a wasted year." + +"Nothing can be brought but repentance." + +"Yes, but look at others who have tried, felt their duties, and +cared for souls; while I thought only of my vows as a restraint, and +tried how much pleasure I could get in spite of them. A pretty +story of all the ministry I shall ever have." + +"These last weeks!" + +"Common humanity--nonsense! I should always have done as much; +besides, I was crippled everywhere, not merely by want of power as a +priest, but by having made myself such a shallow, thoughtless ass. +But that was not what I wanted to say. It was about Gadley and his +confession." + +"O, Herbert! I am afraid I was very unkind that night. I did not +think of anything but our own trouble, nor see how much it had cost +you." + +"Of course not--nonsense. You had enough to think of yourself, and +I was only ashamed of having bored you." + +"And when I think of the state of that room, I am afraid it was then +you took in the poison." + +"Don't say _afraid_. If it was for Jenny, I shall have done some +good in the world. But the thing is--is it good? Will it clear +Douglas? I suppose what he said to you was under seal of +confession?" + +"Scarcely so, technically; but when a man unburthens himself on his +death-bed, and then, so far from consenting, shows terror and dismay +at the notion of his words being taken down as evidence, it seems to +me hardly right or honourable to make use of them--though it would +right a great wrong. But what did you get from him?" + +"I gave Lady Rose the paper. He raved most horribly for an hour or +two, as if all the foul talk of his pot-house had got into his +brain," said Herbert, with a shudder. "Rector, Rector, pray for me, +that I mayn't come out with _that_ at any rate. It has haunted me +ever since. Well, at last he slept, and woke up sinking but +conscious, knew me, and began to ask if this was death, and was +frightened, clutching at me, and asking to be held, and what he +could do. I told him at least he could undo a wrong, if he would +only authorize us to use what he said to clear Douglas; and then, as +Sister Margaret had come across, I wrote as well as I could: +"George Gadley authorizes what he said to the Rev. Julius Charnock +to be used as evidence;" and I suppose he saw us sign it, if he +could see at all, for his sight was nearly gone." + +Julius drew a long breath. + +"And now, what was it?" said Herbert. + +"Well, the trio--Moy, young Proudfoot, and Tom Vivian--detained a +letter of my mother's, with a cheque in it, and threw the blame of +it on Archie Douglas. They thought no one was in the office but +themselves; but Gadley was a clerk there, and was in the outer room, +where he heard all. He came to Moy afterwards, and has been preying +on him for hush-money ever since." + +"And this will set things straight?" + +"Yes. How to set about the public justification I do not yet see; +but with your father, and all the rest, Archie's innocence will be +as plain as it always has been to us." + +"Where is he?" + +"On an ostrich farm at Natal." + +"Whew!--we must have him home. Jenny can't be spared. Poor Jenny, +when she hears that, it will make all other things light to her." + +"What is their address?" + +"No, don't write. Mamma has had a fresh cold, and neither my father +nor Jenny could leave her. Let them have a little peace till it +gets worse. There will be plenty of time, if it is to be a twenty- +eight days business like the others. Poor mamma!" and he rolled his +head away; then, after some minutes of tossing and shivering, he +asked for a prayer out of the little book in his pocket. "I should +know it, but my memory is muddled, I think." + +The book--a manual for sick-rooms--was one which Julius had given +him new five weeks back. It showed wear already, having been used +as often in that time as in six ordinary years of parish work. By +the time the hard-pressed doctor came, it was plain that the fever +was setting in severely, aggravated no doubt by the dreadful night +at the 'Three Pigeons,' and the unrelaxed exertions ever since; for +he was made to allow that he had come home in the chill morning air, +cold, sickened, and exhausted; had not chosen to disturb anybody, +and had found no refreshment but a raw apple--the last drop of wine +having been bestowed on the sick; had lain down for a short sleep +worse than waking, and had neither eaten nor slept since, but worked +on by sheer strength of will and muscle. When Julius thought of the +cherishing care that he had received himself, he shuddered, with a +sort of self-reproach for his neglect; and the doctor, though good- +humouredly telling Herbert not to think he knew anything about his +own symptoms, did not conceal from Julius that enough harm had been +done in these few days to give the fine Bowater constitution a hard +struggle. + +"Grown careless," he said. "Regular throwing away of his life." + +Careless Herbert might have been, but Julius wondered whether this +might not be losing of the life to find it. + +Cranstoun or Cranky arrived, a charming old nurse, much gratified in +the midst of her grief, and inclination to scold. She summarily +sent off Mungo and Tartar by the conveyance that brought her, and +would have sent Rollo away, but that Herbert protested against it, +and no power short of an order from him would have taken the dog +from his bedside. + +And Mr. Bindon returned from Wil'sbro' in unspeakable surprise. +"The heroes of the occasion," he said, "were Bowater and Mrs. +Duncombe! Every sick person I visited, and there were fourteen in +all stages, had something to say of one or other. Poor things, how +their faces fell when they saw me instead of his bright, honest +face! 'Cheering the very heart of one!' as a poor woman said; +'That's what I calls a true shepherd,' said an old man. You don't +really mean he was rejected at the Ordination?'" + +"Yes, and it will make him the still truer shepherd, if he is only +spared!" + +"The Sisters can't say enough of him. They thought him very ill +yesterday, and implored him to take care of himself; but he declared +he could not leave these two funerals to you. But, after all, he is +less amazing to me than Mrs. Duncombe. She has actually been living +at the hospital with the Sisters. I should not have known her." + +"Great revolutions have happened in your absence. Much that has +drawn out her sterling worth, poor woman." + +"I shall never speak harshly again, I hope. It seems to be a +judgment on me that I should have been idling on the mountains, +while those two were thus devoting themselves to my Master in His +poor." + +"We are thankful enough to have you coming in fresh, instead of +breaking down now. Have you a sermon? You will have to take +Wil'sbro' to-morrow. Driver won't come. He wrote to the +churchwardens that he had a cold, and that his agreement was with +poor Fuller." + +"And you undertook the Sunday?" + +"Yes. They would naturally have no Celebration, and I thought +Herbert's preaching in the midst of his work would be good for them. +You never heard such an apology and confession as the boy made to +our people the first Sunday here, begging them to bear with him." + +"Then I can't spare you anything here?" + +"Yes, much care and anxiety. The visitation has done its worst in +our house. We have got into the lull after the storm, and you need +not be anxious about me. There is peace in what I have to do now. +It is gathering the salvage after the wreck." + +Then Julius went into his own house, where he found Terry alone, +and, as usual, ravenously hungry. + +"Is Bowater really ill?" he asked. + +"I am afraid there is no believing otherwise, Terry," said Julius. +"You will have to spare Rose to him sometimes, till some one comes +to nurse him." + +"I would spare anything to him," said Terry, fervently. "Julius, it +is finer than going into battle!" + +"I thought you did not care much for battles, Terry." + +"If it was battles, I should not mind," said the boy; "it is +peaceful soldiering that I have seen too much of. But don't you +bother my father, Julius, I won't grumble any more; I made up my +mind to that." + +"I know you did, my boy; but you did so much futile arithmetic, and +so often told us that a+b-c equalled Peter the Great, that Dr. Worth +said you must not be put to mathematics for months to come, and I +have told your father that if he cannot send you to Oxford, we will +manage it." + +A flush of joy lighted up the boy's face. "Julius, you are a brick +of a brother!" he said. "I'll do my best to get a scholarship." + +"And the best towards that you can do now is to get well as soon as +possible." + +"Yes. And you lie down on the sofa there, Julius, and sleep--Rose +would say you must. Only I want to say one thing more, please. If +I do get to Oxford, and you are so good, I've made up my mind to one +thing. It's not only for the learning that I'll go; but I'll try to +be a soldier in your army and Bowater's. That's all that seems to +me worth the doing now." + +So Julius dropped asleep, with a thankworthy augury in his ears. It +is not triumph, but danger and death that lead generous spirits each +to step where his comrade stood! + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXII +The Salvage + + +Frank was certainly better. Ever since that sight of Eleonora he +had been mending. If he muttered her name, or looked distressed, it +was enough to guide his hand to her token, he smiled and slept +again; and on the Sunday morning his throat and mouth were so much +better, that he could both speak and swallow without nearly so much +pain; but one of his earliest sayings was, "Louder, please, I can't +hear. When does she come?" + +Mrs. Poynsett raised her voice, Anne tried; but he frowned and +sighed, and only when Miles uttered a sea-captain's call close to +his ear, did he smile comprehension, adding, "Were you shouting?" a +fact only too evident to those around. + +"Then I'm deaf," he said. And Anne wrote and set before him, "We +hope it will pass as you get better." He looked grateful, but there +was little more communication, for his eyes and head were still +weak, and signs and looks were the chief currency; however, Julius +met Eleonora after morning service, to beg her to renew her visit, +after having first prepared her for what she would find. Eleonora +was much distressed; then paused a minute, and said, "It does him +good to see me?" + +"It seems to be the one thing that keeps him up," said Julius, +surprised at the question. + +"O, yes! I can't--I could not stay away," she said. "It is all so +wrong together; yet this last time cannot hurt!" + +"Last time?" + +"Yes; did you not know that papa has set his heart on going to +London to-morrow? Yes, early to-morrow. And it will be for ever. +We shall never see Sirenwood again." + +She stood still, almost bent with the agony of suppressed grief. + +"I am very sorry; but I do not wonder he wishes for change." + +"He has been in an agony to go these three days. It was all I could +do to get him to stay to-day. You don't think it will do Frank +harm? Then I would stay, if I took lodgings in the village; but +otherwise--poor papa--I think it is my duty--and he can't do without +me." + +"I think Frank is quite capable of understanding that you are forced +to go, and that he need not be the worse for it." + +"And then," she lowered her voice, "it does a little reconcile me +that I don't think we ought to go further into it till we can +understand. I did make that dreadful vow. I know I ought not now; +but still I did, in so many words." + +"You mean against a gambler?" + +"If it had only been against a gambler; but I was stung, and wanted +to guard myself, and made it against any one who had ever betted! +If I go on, I must break it, you see, and if I do might it not bring +mischief on him? I don't even feel as if it were _true_ to have +come to him on Friday, and now--yet they said it was the only chance +for his life." + +"Yes, I think it saved him then, and to disappoint him now might +quite possibly bring a relapse," said Julius. "It seems to me that +you can only act as seems right at the moment. When he is his own +man again, you will better have the power of judging about this vow, +and if it ought to bind you. And so, it may really be well you do +not see more of him, and that his weakness does not lead you further +than you mean." + +A tottering step, and an almost agonized, though very short sob +under the crape veil, proved to Julius that his counsel, though +chiming in with her stronger, sterner judgment, was terrible to her, +nor would he have given it, if he had not had reason to fear that +while she had grown up, Frank had grown down; and that, after this +illness, it would have to be proved whether he were indeed worthy of +the high-minded girl whom he had himself almost thrown over in a +passion. + +But there was no room for such misgivings when the electric shock of +actual presence was felt--the thin hollow-cheeked face shone with +welcome, the liquid brown eyes smiled with thankful sweetness, the +fingers, fleshless, but cool and gentle, were held out; and the +faint voice said, "My darling! Once try to make me hear." + +And when, with all her efforts, she could only make him give a sort +of smile of disappointment, she would have been stonyhearted indeed +if she had not let him fondle her hand as he would, while she +listened to his mother's report of his improvement. With those eyes +fixed in such content on her face, it seemed absolutely barbarous to +falter forth that she could come no more, for her father was taking +her away. + +"My dear, you must be left with us," cried Mrs. Poynsett. "He +cannot spare you." + +"Ah! but my poor father. He is lost without me. And I came of age +on Tuesday, and there are papers to sign." + +"What is it?" murmured Frank, watching their faces. + +Mrs. Poynsett gave her the pen, saying, "You must tell him, if it is +to be." + +She wrote: "My father takes me to London to-morrow, to meet the +lawyers." + +His face fell; but he asked, "Coming back--when?" + +She shook her head, and her eyes filled with tears, as she wrote: +"Sirenwood is to be put up to auction." + +"Your sister?" began Frank, and then his eye fell on her crape +trimmings. He touched her sleeve, and made a low wail. "Oh! is +every one dead?" + +It was the first perception he had shown of any death, though +mourning had been worn in his room. His mother leant down to kiss +him, bidding Lena tell him the truth; and she wrote: + +"I am left alone with poor papa. Let me go--now you can do without +me." + +"Can I?" he asked, again grasping her hand. + +She pointed to his mother and Anne; but he repeated, "You--you!" + +"When you are better we will see how it is to be," she wrote. + +He looked sadly wistful. "No, I can't now. Something was very +wrong; but it won't come back. By and by. If you wouldn't go--" + +But his voice was now more weak and weary, tired by the effort, and +a little kneeling by him, allowing his tender touch, soothed him, +enough to say submissively, "Good-bye, then--I'll come for you"-- +wherewith he faltered into slumber. + +Rosamond had just seen her off in the pony carriage, and was on the +way up-stairs, when she stumbled on a little council, consisting of +Dr. Worth, Mr. Charnock, and Grindstone, all in the gallery. "A +widow in her twenty-second year. Good heavens!" was the echo she +heard; and Grindstone was crying and saying, "She did it for the +best, and she could not do it, poor lamb, not if you killed her for +it;" and Dr. Worth said, "Perhaps Lady Rosamond can. You see, Lady +Rosamond, Mrs. Grindstone, whose care I must say has been devoted, +has hitherto staved off the sad question from poor young Mrs. +Poynsett, until now it is no longer possible, and she is becoming so +excited, that--" + +Cecil's bell rang sharply. + +"I cannot--I cannot! In her twenty-second year!" cried her father, +wringing his hands. + +Grindstone's face was all tears and contortions; and Rosamond, +recollecting her last words with poor Cecil, sprang forward, both +men opening a way for her. + +Cecil was sitting up in bed, very thin, but with eager eyes and +flushed cheeks, as she held out her hands. "Rosamond! Oh! But +aren't you afraid?" + +"No, indeed, I'm always in it now," said Rosamond, kissing her, and +laying her down; "it has been everywhere." + +"Ah! then they sent him away--Raymond?" then clutching Rosamond's +hand, and looking at her with searching eyes, "Tell me, has his +mother any right! Would you bear it if she kept _you_ apart?" + +"Ah! Cecil, it was not her doing." + +"You don't mean it was his own? Papa is not afraid. You are not +afraid. If it had been he, I wouldn't have feared anything. I +would have nursed him day and night till--till I made him care for +me." + +"Hush, dear Cecil," said Rosamond, with great difficulty. "I know +you would, and so would he have done for you, only the cruel fever +kept you apart." + +"The fever! He had it?" + +"Yes, he _had_ it." + +"But he is better. I am better. Let me be taken to him. His +mother is not there now. I heard them say she was in Frank's room. +Call papa. He will carry me." + +"Oh! poor, poor Cecil. His mother only went to Frank when he did +not need her any more." And Rosamond hid her face on the bed, +afraid to look. + +Cecil lay back so white, that Grindstone approached with some drops, +but this made her spring up, crying, "No, no, don't come near me! +You never told me! You deceived me!" + +"Don't, don't, ma'am--my dear Miss Charnock--now. It was all for +the best. You would not have been here now." + +"And then I should be with him. Rosamond, send her away, I can't +bear her. She sent him away from me that night. I heard her." + +"My dear Cecil, this will not do. You are making your father +dreadfully unhappy. Dear Raymond stayed with you till he really +could not sit up any longer, and then he kissed you." + +"Kissed me! Oh, where? Did you see? No, don't ask Grindstone. +She made me think he had left me, and fancy--oh, Rosamond! such-- +such things! And all the time--" + +The moaning became an anguish of distress, unable to weep, like +terrible pain, as the poor young thing writhed in Rosamond's arms. +It was well that this one sister understood what had been in Cecil's +heart, and did believe in her love for Raymond. Rosamond, too, had +caressing power beyond any other of the family, and thus she could +better deal with the sufferer, striving, above all, to bring tears +by what she whispered to her as she held her to her bosom. They +were a terrible storm at last, but Cecil clung to Rosamond through +all, absolutely screaming when Grindstone came near; poor Grindstone +who had been so devoted, though mistaken. Weakness, however, after +the first violent agitation was soothed, favoured a kind of stunned +torpor, and Cecil lay still, except when her maid tried to do +anything for her, and then the passion returned. When old Susan +Alston came with a message, she was at once recognized and +monopolized, and became the only servant whom she would suffer about +her. + +The inconvenience was great, but relapse was such an imminent +danger, that it was needful to give up everything to her; and Mr. +Charnock, regarding his daughter's sufferings as the only ones worth +consideration, seemed to pursue Rosamond the instant she had sat +down by the still feeble, weary, convalescent Terry, imploring her +to return to Cecil with the irresistible force of tearful eyes and +piteous descriptions; and as Terry had a week's start in recovery, +and was not a widow under twenty-two, he had to submit, and lie as +contentedly as he could in his solitude. + +Susan could be better spared to Cecil's morbid fancy of being waited +on by her who had attended her husband, for Miles and Anne were +sufficient for Mrs. Poynsett and Frank. The long-sundered husband +and wife scarcely saw each other, except over Frank's bed, and Mr. +Charnock was on the Captain's hands whenever he came beyond it. On +the Wednesday, however, Julius, who had only once spoken to his +brother alone, came up to the breakfast-table where he and Mr. +Charnock were sitting, and hurt the feelings of the latter by first +asking for Frank. "He had slept all night, and only half woke when +Miles and Anne changed watch and gave him beef-tea. Cecil, very +moaning and restless--more fever about her, poor dear. When would +Lady Rosamond come up?--she was asking for her." When she had seen +to a few things at home, given her brother his breakfast, and seen +to poor Herbert; he had had a dreadful night, and that Cranstoun +_would_ shut the window unless some one defended him. Mr. Charnock +began to resume his daughter's symptoms, when Julius, at the first +pause, said: + +"Have you finished, Miles? Could you speak to me in the library a +minute? I beg your pardon, Mr. Charnock, but my time is short." + +"I hope--I quite understand. Do not let me be in your way." And +the brothers repaired to the library, where Julius's first words +were, "Miles, you must make up your mind. They are getting up a +requisition to you to stand for Wil'sbro'." + +"To me?" + +"You are the most obvious person, and the feeling for dear Raymond +is so strong as to prevent any contest. Whitlock told Bindon +yesterday that you should have no trouble." + +"I can't. It is absurd. I know nothing about it. My poor mother +bred up Raymond for nothing else. Don't you remember how she made +him read history, volumes upon volumes, while I was learning nothing +but the ropes? I declare, Julius, there he goes." + +"Who?" + +"Why, that old ass, down to hunt up poor Rosamond; I don't believe +he thinks there's any one in the world but his daughter. I declare +I'll hail him and stop him." + +"No, no, Miles, Rosamond can take care of herself. She won't come +till she has seen to her patients down there; and, after all, +Cecil's is the saddest case, poor thing. To return. If you don't +take to politics in the end, I think you should let them put you in +now, if only as a stop-gap, or we shall get some one whom it may not +be easy to get rid of." + +"There's something in that, but I can't accept without knowing my +position, and I would not utter a word to disturb my mother till it +occurs to her of herself." + +"Now that Frank is better?" + +"No. It will all come on her soon enough." + +"Would you stand if she made it right for you?" + +"I can't tell. There would be no punishment so great to my poor +Anne as to be dragged into society, and I don't know how she would +bear it, even if she had no scruples. We never thought of anything +but settling in Glen Fraser, only I wanted her to know you all. If +that poor Cecil only had a child we could be free to go back. Poor +Anne!" + +"Do you think she is still as homesick as at first?" + +"Well, not quite, perhaps; but I never can get to talk to her, and I +know it is a terrible sacrifice to her to live here at all, and I +won't have her forced into a style of thing against her conscience. +If they come to me, I shall tell them to take Mr. Bowater." + +"Poor Mr. Bowater! He will have little heart." + +"Who else is there? That fellow Moy would like it, I suppose." + +"That fellow Moy may have to change his note," said Julius. "I +think we have the means of clearing Archie, when we can see how to +use them." + +Miles gave a sort of leap as he stood by the fire. "Tell me. +Archie! I had no heart to write to him, poor fellow." + +"Write to him by all means, but say nothing here." And Julius +briefly repeated what Gadley had said. + +"I don't see that the scoundrel Moy deserves any consideration." + +"I don't know whether he does; but he has a good wife, ailing and +sickly, and a daughter. He has lived in good report these many +years, and I think it is due to him and to old Proudfoot not to +spread the report before giving him warning. In fact, I am not sure +whether we could proceed against him as things stand." + +"It is just what Raymond would have known," said Miles, with a sigh; +"but you are right, Julius, one ought to give him fair play. Ah! +what's that, Jenkins?--Note from Lord Belfort? Wait for an answer. +Can't they give one any peace?" + +While Miles was reluctantly answering his note, Julius, resolving to +act before he was forbidden, mounted to Frank's room, requested to +speak with his mother, and propelled her into the outer room, +leaving Anne on guard. + +"Now then, my dear," she said, "I have known a talk must soon come. +You have all been very good to me to leave it so long." + +"I am come now without poor Miles's knowledge or consent," said +Julius, "because it is necessary for him to know what to do." + +"He will give up the navy," said his mother. "O, Julius! does he +require to be told that he--?" and she laid her head on her son's +shoulder. + +"It is what he cannot bear to be told; but what drives me on is that +Whitlock tells me that the Wil'sbro' people want to bring him in at +once, as the strongest proof of their feeling for Raymond." + +"Yes," she raised her head proudly, "of course he must come forward. +He need have no doubt. Send him to me, Julius, I will tell him to +open letters, and put matters in train. Perhaps you will write to +Graves for me, if he does not like it, poor boy." + +She had roused herself into the woman of business, and when Miles, +after some indignation at her having been disturbed, obeyed the +summons, she held out her arms, and became the consoler. + +"Come, my boy," she said, "we must face it sooner or later. You +must stand foremost and take up his work for him." + +"Oh, mother! mother! you know how little I am able," said Miles, +covering his face with his hands. + +"You do not bring his burthened heart to the task," she said. "If +you had watched and felt with him, as perhaps only his mother could, +you would know that I can be content that the long heartache should +have ceased, where the weary are at rest. Yes, Miles, I feel as if +I had put him to sleep after a long day of pain, as when he was a +little child." + +They hardened themselves to the discussion, Mrs. Poynsett explaining +what she thought the due of her eldest son, only that Cecil's +jointure would diminish the amount at her disposal. Indeed, when +she was once aroused, she attended the most fully; but when Miles +found her apologizing for only affording him the little house in the +village, he cried out with consternation. + +"My dear," she said, "it is best so; I will not be a burthen on you +young ones. I see the mistake." + +"I know," stammered Miles, "my poor Anne is not up to your mark--not +clever like you or Jenny--but I thought you did like her pretty +handy ways." + +"I feel them and love them with all my heart; but I cannot have her +happiness and yours sacrificed to me. Yes, you boys love the old +nest; but even Julius and Rose rejoice in their own, and you must +see what she really wishes, not what she thinks her duty. Take her +out walking, you both need it badly enough." + +They ventured to comply, and eluding Mr. Charnock, went into the +park, silvery with the unstanched dews, and the leaves floating down +one by one like golden rain. "Not much like the Bush," said Miles. + +"No," was all Anne durst say. + +"Poor Nan, how dreary it must have looked to you last year!" + +"I am afraid I wrote very complaining letters!" + +"Not complaining, but a direful little effort at content, showing +the more piteously, because involuntarily, what a mistake I had +made." + +"No, no mistake. Indeed, Miles, it was not. Nothing else would +have cured me of the dreadful uncharitableness which was the chief +cause of my unhappiness, and if I had not been so forlorn, I should +never have seen how good and patient your mother was with me. Yes, +I mean it. I read over my old diary and saw how tiresome and +presumptuous I was, and how wonderfully she bore with me, and so did +Julius and Rosamond, while all the time I fancied them--no +Christians." + +"Ah! you child! You know I would never have done it if I had known +you were to be swamped among brides. At any rate, this poor old +place doesn't look so woefully dismal and hateful to you now." + +"It could not, where you are, and where I have so many to know and +love." + +"You can bear the downfall of our Bush schemes?" + +"Your duty is here now." + +"Are you grieved, little one?" + +"I don't know. I should like to have seen mamma; but she does not +need me now as your mother does." + +"Then you are willing to be her daughter?" + +"I have tried hard, and she is very kind; but I am far too dull and +ignorant for her. I can only wait upon her; but when she has you +and Julius to talk to, my stupidity will not matter." + +"Would you be content to devote yourself to her, instead of making a +home of our own?" + +"She can't be left alone in that great house." + +"The question is, can you be happy in it? or do you wish for a house +to ourselves?" + +"You don't, Miles, it is your own home." + +"That's not the question." + +"Miles, why do you look at me so?" + +"I was told to ascertain your wishes." + +"I don't wish anything--now I have you--but to be a comfort to your +mother. That is my first earthly wish just now." + +"If that be earthly, it has a touch of the heavenly," muttered Miles +to himself. "You will make it clear to mother then that you like to +go on with her?" + +"If she does not mind having me." + +"And Julius says it really cheered our dear Raymond to think you +would be the one to look after her! But that's not all, Nanny, I've +only till to-morrow to decide whether I am to be Member for +Wil'sbro'." + +"Is that a duty?" + +"Not such a duty as to bind me if it were altogether repugnant to +you. I was not brought up for it, and may be a mere stop-gap, but +it is every man's duty to come to the front when he is called for, +and do his utmost for his country in Parliament, I suppose, as much +as in action." + +"I see; but it would be leaving your mother alone a great deal." + +"Not necessarily. You could stay here part of the time, and I go +backwards and forwards, as Raymond did before his marriage." + +"It would be better than your being at sea." + +"But remember," he added, "there is much that can't be shirked. I +don't mean currying popularity, but if one is in that position, +there's no shutting oneself up. It becomes a duty to keep society +going, and give it the sort of tone that a nice woman can do. Do +you see?" + +"I think I do. Julius said so once." + +"So if we are to have such tears and despair as there were about the +ball in the Chimaera, then--" + +"I was wrong then," said Anne. "I did not behave at all well to you +all that time, dear Miles; I have been sorry for it ever since I +understood." + +"It was not you, little one, it was Mr. Pilgrim." + +"No, it was not Mr. Pilgrim who made me cross." + +"Yes, it was. He exacted pledges that he had no right to lay on +your conscience, and your poor little conscience was in terrible +straits, and I was too angry to feel for it. Never mind all that; +you have done with the fellow, and understand better now." + +"He thought he was right, and that only such abstinence could guard +me. And, Miles, a promise is a promise, and I do not think I ought +to dance or play at cards. It is not that I think them wrong for +others, but I cannot break my word. Except those--I will do +whatever is fitting for your wife." + +"Spoken like a heroine!" + +"I don't think I could ever give a tone. Rosamond could, if she +tried, but I have no readiness and no training; but I do see that +there is more good in being friendly like Jenny Bowater, than in +avoiding everything, and as long as one does it because it is right +and loving, it can't be the world or worldliness." + +It was not lucidly expressed, but it satisfied the Captain. + +"All right, my bonnie Nance, I'll promise on my side never to ask +you to go against your real conscience, and if you must have a Pope, +I had rather it were Pope Julius than Pope Pilgrim." + +"Don't, Miles. Popes are all wrong, and I don't know whether Mr. +Pilgrim would give the right hand of fellowship to Julius." + +Miles chuckled. "You may think yourself lucky you have not to +adjust that question, Madame Nan." + +"There's the quarter chiming, Frank will want his beef-tea." + +Presently after Miles laid his hand on his mother's shoulder, and +said, "Mother, here's a daughter who thinks you want to turn us out +because she is too slow and stupid for your home child." And he +drew Anne up blushing as if she were his freshly-won bride. + +"My dear, are you sure you don't want to go away from the old woman? +Should you not be happier with him all to yourself?" + +"I could not be happy if you were left," said Anne. "May I go on as +we did last winter? I will try to do better now I have him to help +me." + +"My own dear child!" + +That was the way Anne forgot her own people and her father's house. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIII +Herbert's Victory + + +And of our scholars let us learn +Our own forgotten lore.--KEBLE + +"Joan, Jenny, dearest old Joanie!" It was eagerly spoken, though +the voice was strangely altered that came from behind the flowered +curtain of that big bed, while the fingers drew it back, and Rollo +raised his black muzzle near at hand. "Oh, Jenny! have you come to +me?" + +"My dear, dear, poor boy!" + +"No kissing--it's not safe," and he burrowed under the sheet. + +"As if I did not mean to do more for you than that! Besides, it is +not catching." + +"So I said, till it caught me. What a jolly cold hand! You've not +come in cold and hungry though?" + +"No, indeed, Rosamond forced me to sit down to a whole spread. As +if one could eat with a knot in one's throat." + +"Mind you do, Jenny--it was what did for me. The Rector ordered me +never to go about unfed; but one could not always--and there was +something I have to tell you that drove all the rest out--" + +"Dear Herbs! Papa can't talk of what you have done without tears. +He longed to come, but we could not leave mamma without one of us, +and he thought I could do the most for you. I have a note for you." + +"Forgiving me?" + +"I should _think_ so. It is in my bag--" + +"No, not this moment; I like to know it. And mammy--poor mammy--" + +"She is as comforted as she can be that you have Cranky and me; and +then papa's being proud of you has cheered her--oh! so much." + +"I'm glad they can comfort themselves--" + +"But, Herbert, dear, you must be much better; I did not expect to +see you so well." + +"I am not so bad between whiles," said Herbert, wearily. "And, +while I can, I've got something to tell you that will make it up to +you, and a great deal more." + +"Make it up?" said Jenny, looking with bewildered eyes at the dear +face. + +"Yes, I made Gadley consent. The Rector has it in writing, and it +will do quite as well if I die. O, Jenny, woman, think of my never +knowing what you had gone through!" + +"Is it about Archie?" said Jenny, beginning to tremble. + +"Yes. It will clear him." + +"I always knew he was clear." + +"Yes, but he can come back now all right. Eh! what an ass I am! +I've begun at the wrong end. He wasn't drowned--it was all a +mistake; Miles saw him in Africa--Cranky, I say, come to her." + +"Yes, Master Herbert, you've been talking a great deal too much for +your sister just off a journey. You'll get the fever on again. +Miss Joanna, you ought to know better than to let him run on; I +sha'n't be able to let you do nothing for him if this is the way." + +"Was it too sudden, Joan?" said Herbert, wistfully, as she bent to +kiss his brow with trembling lips. "I couldn't let any one tell you +but myself, while I could; but I don't seem able to go on. Is the +Rector there, Cranky?" + +"Yes, sir, waiting in the parlour." + +"Rector," and Julius hurried in at once, "take her and tell her. I +can't do it after all." + +"Is he alive?" whispered Jenny, so much overcome that Julius had to +hold her up for a moment as he led her into the other room. + +"Really! She thinks me delirious," said Herbert, rather amused. +"Tell her all, Rector." + +"Really, Joan," said Julius, putting her into the great chair, and +holding her trembling hand. "Miles has seen him, has had him in his +ship." + +"And you never told me!" + +"He made Miles promise not to tell." + +"But he told you!" + +"Yes, because it was Anne who gave the clue which led to his +discovery; but when he found we all thought him dead, he laid Miles +under the strictest charge to say nothing. He is on an ostrich farm +in Natal, Jenny, well, and all that he ever was, and more too. He +took your photograph from Miles's book." + +"And I never knew," moaned Jenny, quite overcome. + +"He would not be persuaded that it was not more for your peace not +to know of his life, and when Miles was put on honour, what could we +do? But now it is all changed. Since Herbert's discovery he need +not be a banished man any more." And Julius told Jenny the manner +of the discovery. She listened, evidently gathering all in, and +then she asked: "And what have you done?" + +"Nothing as yet." + +"Nothing! while there is this blot on Archie's name, and he is +living in exile, and that Moy is revelling in prosperity. Nothing! +Why don't you publish it to every one?" + +"My dear Jenny, I have only known it a week, and I have not been +able to find out where Mr. Moy is." + +"What, to have him taken up?" + +"Taken up, no; I don't imagine he could be prosecuted after this +length of time and on this kind of evidence. No, to give him +warning." + +"Warning? To flee away, and never clear Archie! What are you +about, Julius? He ought to be exposed at once, if he cannot be made +to suffer otherwise." + +"Nay, Jenny, that would be hard measure." + +"Hard measure!" she interrupted; "what has my innocent Archie had?" + +"Think of the old man, his wife and daughter, Jenny." + +"She's a Proudfoot.--And that girl the scandal of the country! You +want to sacrifice Archie to them, Julius?" + +"You are tired and shaken, Jenny, or you would see that all I want +to do is to act with common consideration and honour." + +She interrupted again. "What honour do you mean? You are not +making it a secret of the confessional?" + +"You are misunderstanding me, Joanna," Julius gently said. +"Herbert's vigil spared me from that difficulty, but--" + +"Then you would have sacrificed Archie to this imaginary--" + +"Hush, Jenny! I fear he is wandering again. Alas! it is the sad +old refrain!" + +As they came to the door together, Herbert's voice, under that +strange change which wandering brings, was heard muttering, "Give an +account of thy stewardship, for thou mayest be no longer steward." +And Mrs. Cranstoun received them, with her head shaking, and tearful +eyes. "It has come on again, sir; I was afraid it would be too much +for him." + +Herbert's prayer had been granted, inasmuch as the horrible ravings +that he feared repeating never passed his lips. If he had gone down +to the smoke of Tartarus to restore his sister's lover, none of its +blacks were cleaning to him; but whether conscious or wandering, the +one thought of his wasted year seemed to be crushing him. It was a +curious contrast between poor Mr. Fuller's absence of regret for a +quarter of a century's supineness, and this lad's repentance for +twelve months' idleness. That his follies had been guileless in +themselves might be the very cause that his spirit had such power of +repentance. His admiration of Lady Tyrrell had been burnt out, and +had been fancy, not heart, and no word of it passed his lips, far +less of the mirth with the Strangeways. Habit sometimes brought the +phrases of the cricket-field, but these generally ended in a shudder +of self-recollection and prayer. + +The delirium only came with the accesses of fever, and when +sensible, he was very quiet and patient, but always as one weighed +down by sense of failure in a trust. He never seemed to entertain a +hope of surviving. He had watched too many cases not to be aware +that his symptoms were those that had been almost uniformly fatal, +and he noted them as a matter of course. Dr. Easterby came to see +him, and was greatly touched; Herbert was responsive, but it was not +the ordinary form of comfort that he needed, for his sorrow was +neither terror nor despair. His heart was too warm and loving not +to believe that his heavenly Father forgave him as freely as did his +earthly father; but that very hope made him the more grieved and +ashamed of his slurred task, nor did he view his six weeks at +Wil'sbro' as any atonement, knowing it was no outcome of repentance, +but of mere kindliness, and aware, as no one else could be, how his +past negligence had hindered his full usefulness, so that he only +saw his failures. As to his young life, he viewed it as a mortally +wounded soldier does, as a mere casualty of the war, which he was +pledged to disregard. He _did_ perhaps like to think that the fatal +night with Gadley might bring Archie back, and yet Jenny did not +give him the full peace in her happiness which he had promised +himself. + +Joanna had suffered terribly, far more than any one knew, and her +mind did not take the revulsion as might have been expected. Her +lighthouse was shining again when she thought it extinguished for +ever, but her spirits could not bear the uncertainty of the spark. +She could not enter into what Miles and Julius both alike told her, +of the impossibility of their mother beginning a prosecution for +money embezzled ten years back, when no living witness existed, +nothing but the scrap of paper written by Herbert, and signed by him +and Margaret Strangeways, authorizing Julius Charnock to use what +had been said by the dying, half-delirious man. What would a jury +say to such evidence? And when Julius said it only freed himself +morally from the secrecy, poor Jenny was bitter against his +scruples, even though he had never said more than that he should +have been perplexed. The most bitter anti-ritualist could hardly +have uttered stronger things than she thought, and sometimes said, +against what seemed to her to be keeping Archie in banishment; while +the brothers' reluctance to expose Mr. Moy, and blast his reputation +and that of his family, was in her present frame of mind an +incomprehensible weakness. People must bear the penalty of their +misdeeds, families and all, and Mrs. and Miss Moy did not deserve +consideration: the pretensions of the mother had always been half +scorn, half thorn, to the old county families, and the fast airs of +the daughter had been offensive enough to destroy all pity for her. +If an action in a Court of Justice were, as Miles and Julius told +her, impossible,--and she would not believe it, except on the word +of a lawyer,--public exposure was the only alternative for righting +Archie, and she could not, or would not, understand that they would +have undergone an action for libel rather than not do their best to +clear their cousin, but that they thought it due to Mr. Moy to give +him the opportunity of doing the thing himself; she thought it +folly, and only giving him time and chance for baffling them. + +The strange thing was, that not only when she argued with the two +brothers, but when she brooded and gave way to these thoughts as she +kept her watch, it probably made her less calm--for an access of +restlessness and fever never failed to come on--with Herbert. +Probably she was less calm externally, and the fret of face and +manner communicated itself to him, for the consequences were so +invariable that Cranstoun thought they proved additionally what she +of course believed, that Miss Joan could not be trusted with her +brother. At last Jenny, in her distress and unwillingness to +abandon Herbert to Cranky's closed windows, traced cause and effect, +and made a strong resolution to banish the all-pervading thought, +and indeed his ever-increasing weakness and danger filled her mind +so as to make this easier and easier, so that she might no longer +have to confess to herself that Rollo was a safer companion, since +Herbert, with a hand on that black head, certainly only derived +soothing influences from those longing sympathetic eyes. And he +could not but like the testimony of strong affection that came to +him. The whole parish was in consternation, and inquiries, and very +odd gifts, which he was supposed to 'fancy,' came from all over +Compton as well as from Strawyers, and were continually showering +upon his nurses, so that Mrs. Hornblower and Dilemma spent their +lives in mournful replies over the counter, and fifty times a day he +was pronounced to be 'as bad as he could be to be alive.' Old +servants and keepers made progresses from Strawyers, to see Master +Herbert, and were terribly aggrieved because Miss Bowater kept them +out of his room, as much for their sake as his; and Mrs. Cranstoun +pointed to the open lattice which she believed to be killing him, as +surely as it gave aches to her rheumatic shoulder. + +Julius thought almost as much as Jenny could do of the means of +recalling Archie; but it was necessary to wait until he could +communicate with Mr. Moy, and his hands were still over-full, for +though much less fatal, the fever smouldered on, both in Wil'sbro' +and Compton, and as St. Nicholas was a college living which had +hitherto been viewed as a trump card, it might be a long time going +the round of the senior fellows. + +Julius had just been at poor Mrs. Fuller's, trying to help her to +put her complicated affairs in order, so as to be ready for a move +as soon as one daughter, who had the fever slightly, could be taken +away, and he was driving home again, when he overtook Mrs. Duncombe +and offered her a lift, for her step was weary. She was indeed +altered, pale, with cheek-bones showing, and all the lustre and +sparkle gone out of her, while her hat was as rigidly dowdy as Miss +Slater's. + +She roused herself to ask feebly after the remaining patients. + +"Cecil is really getting better at last," he said. "Her father +wants to take her to Portishead next week." + +"And young Bowater?" + +"No change. His strength seems to be going." + +"I wouldn't pity him," sighed Bessie Duncombe; "he has only seen the +best end of life, and has laid it down for something worth! I'm +sure he and your brother are the enviable ones." + +"Nay, Mrs. Duncombe, you have much to work for and love in this +life." + +"And I must go away from everything just as I had learnt to value +it. Bob has taken a house at Monaco, and writes to me to bring the +children to join him there!" + +"At Monaco?" + +"At Monaco! Yes, and I know that it is all my own fault. I might +have done anything with him if I had known how. But what could you +expect? I never saw my mother; I never knew a home; I was bred up +at a French school, where if one was not a Roman Catholic there was +not a shred of religion going. I married after my first ball. +Nobody taught me anything; but I could not help having brains, so I +read and caught the tone of the day, and made my own line, while he +went on his." + +"And now there is a greater work for you to do, since you have +learnt to do it." + +"Ah! learnt too late. When habits are confirmed, and home station +forfeited--What is there left for him or my poor boys to do?" + +"A colony perhaps--" + +"Damaged goods," she said, smiling sadly. + +"Then are you going?" + +"As soon as I have seen this fever out, and can dispose of the +things here. I have just been to Moy's office to see about getting +rid of the lease." + +"Is Mr. Moy come home?" + +"Yes. Have you not heard?" + +"What?--Not the fever?" + +"No. Worse I should say. Gussie has gone off and got married to +Harry Simmonds." + +"The man at the training stables?" + +"Yes. They put up their banns at the Union at Brighton, and were +married by the Registrar, then went off to Paris. They say it will +kill her mother. The man is a scoundrel, who played Bob false, and +won largely by that mare. And the girl has had the cheek to write +to me," said Mrs. Duncombe, warming into her old phraseology--"to +_me_!--to thank me for opportunities of meeting, and to tell me she +has followed up the teaching of last year." + +"What--the rights of women?" + +"Ay. This is a civil marriage--not mocking her with antiquated +servile vows," she says. "Ah, well, it was my doing, I suppose. +Clio Tallboys held forth in private, I believe, to poor Gussie, on +theories that were mere talk in her, but which this poor girl has +taken in earnest." + +"Very sad earnest she may find it, I fear. Can I do anything for +you?" as they reached the gate of Aucuba Villa. + +"No, thank you, unless to get the house off my hands." + +"You are alone. Will you not come and spend the evening with us?" + +"That is very kind, but I have too much to do, and besides, Sister +Margaret is coming to spend the night with me." + +"I am glad to hear it." + +"Yes, Mr. Charnock, I trust I have learnt something in this spell of +work. I've not been for nothing in such scenes with those Sisters +and young Bowater. I'm more ignorant than half the poor things that +I've heard talk of their faith and hope; but I see it is not the +decorous humbug it once looked like. And now that I would have +learnt, here I go to Monaco." + +"You will learn. You have a work before you that will teach you." + +"My boys are young enough to start with on a different tack," she +said. "You will tell me--no--I'll not hinder you now. I shall see +you again." + +Julius was too anxious to get home to refuse to be released, much as +he felt for this brave woman. The day before, Herbert had been +frightfully faint and exhausted by the morning's attack of fever, +but had been so still ever since that there was a shade of hope that +the recurrence might not take place; and this hope grew stronger, +when Jenny came into the outer room to say that the usual time for +the fever was passing so quietly in a sort of sleep that Dr. Worth +seemed to think rally possible, if only there was no fresh access. + +They stood over the fire, and Julius asked, "Can't you lie on the +sofa, Jenny? I can stay." + +"No," said Jenny, restlessly. "No, I can't. I know you have +something to tell me." + +"Moy has come home, Jenny. He is in terrible trouble. His daughter +has eloped with young Simmonds at the training stables." + +"The most appropriate end of her bringing up," said Jenny, in the +hard tone it was so difficult to answer--it was so unlike herself-- +and her thought was that weak pity and forbearance would hinder +exertions in Archie's cause. "Generous at other folks' expense," +said she to herself. "Sparing the guilty and leaving the innocent +to exile!" + +But a moaning murmur, and Cranstoun's movement at once summoned them +both to the bedside. + +Alas! here was the attack that the doctor had evidently apprehended +as likely to be fatal. Hour after hour did sister, nurse, and +friend stand watching, and doing their best, their piteously little +best, while consciousness, if there was any, was far out of their +reach. + +Late into the night it went on, and then followed the collapse, with +locked teeth, which could hardly be drawn asunder to put the +stimulus hopelessly between them, and thus came the tardy December +dawn, when the church-bell made Jenny bid Julius not stay, but only +first read the commendatory prayer. + +"I thought there was a little more revival just now," he said; "his +hands are warmer, and he really did swallow." + +The old nurse shook her head. "That's the way before they go," said +she. "Don't ye wish him, poor lamb, it makes it the harder for +him." + +Julius prayed the prayer, and as he tenderly laid his hand on the +brow, he wondered whether he should find the half-closed eyes shut +for ever on his return. + +But as he went, there was a quiver of lip and flicker of eyelid, the +lightening, as Cranky called it, was evidently gaining ground. +Herbert's faint whisper was heard again--"Jenny!" + +"Dearest!" + +"The Lord's Prayer!" + +She began,--his fingers tightened on hers. "Pray it for old Moy," +he said; and as she paused, scarce hearing or understanding, "He--he +wants it," gasped Herbert. "No! One can't pray it, without--" +another pause. "Help me, Jenny. Say it--O Lord, who savedst us-- +forgive us. Help us to forgive from our hearts that man his +trespasses. Amen." + +Jenny said it. Herbert's voice sank in the Amen. He lay breathing +in long gasps; but he thus breathed still when Julius came back, and +Jenny told him that a few words had passed, adding-- + +"Julius, I will say nothing bitter again. God help me not to think +it." + +Did Herbert hear? Was that the reason of the calm which made the +white wasted face so beautiful, and the strange soft cool hush +throughout the room? + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXIV +Silver Hair + + +And how should I your true love know +From another man?--Friar of Orders Gray + +"Please God, I can try again." + +Those were the words with which Herbert Bowater looked into his +Rector's face on awaking in the evening of that same December day +from one of a series of sleeps, each sweeter and longer than the +last, and which had borne him over the dreaded hours, without fever, +and with strengthening pulse. + +Julius had not ventured to leave the sick-room that whole day, and +when at last he went home and sank into the chair opposite Terry, +for the first time through all these weeks of trouble and tension, +he burst into a flood of tears. + +He had hardly made the startled lad understand that life, not death, +had thus overcome him, when the door flew open, and in rushed +Rosamond, crying, "Julius, Julius, come! It is he or his ghost!" + +"Who? What?" + +"It is your hair! At Mrs. Douglas's grave! He'll be gone! Make +haste--make haste!" + +He started up, letting her drag him along, but under protest. "My +dear, men _do_ come to have hair like mine." + +"I tell you it was at our graves--our own--I touched him. I had +this wreath for Raymond, and there he was, with his hat off, at the +railing close to Mrs. Douglas's. I thought his back was yours, and +called your name, and he started, and I saw--he had a white beard, +but he was not old. He just bowed, and then went off very fast by +the other gate, towards Wil'sbro'. I did call, 'Wait, wait,' but he +didn't seem to hear. Oh, go, go, Julius! Make haste!" + +Infected by the wild hope, Julius hurried on the road where his wife +had turned his face, almost deriding himself for obeying her, when +he would probably only overtake some old family retainer; but as, +under the arch of trees that overhung the road, he saw a figure in +the moonlight, a thrill of recognition came over him as he marked +the vigorous tread of the prime of life, and the white hair visible +in the moonlight, together with something utterly indescribable, but +which made him call out, "Archie! Archie Douglas! wait for me!" + +The figure turned. "Julius!" came in response; the two cousins' +hands clasped, and there was a sob on either side as they kissed one +another as brothers. + +"Archie! How could you!--Come back!" was all that Julius could say, +leaning breathlessly against him and holding him tight. + +"No! Do not know that I have been here. I was sent to London on +business. I could not help running home in the dark. No one must +know it. I am dead to them." + +"No, Archie, you are not. Gadley has confessed and cleared you. +Come home!" + +"Cleared me!" The two arms were stretched up to the sky, and there +was the sound of a mighty sob, as though the whole man, body, soul, +and spirit, were relieved from an unspeakable burthen. "Say it +again, Julius!" + +"Gadley, on his death-bed, has confessed that Moy and Proudfoot took +that money, incited by Tom Vivian." + +Archie Douglas could not speak, but he turned his face towards +Compton again, strode swiftly into the churchyard, and fell on his +knees by his mother's grave. When at last he rose, he pointed to +the new and as yet unmarked mound, and said, "Your mother's?" + +"Oh no! Raymond's! We have had a terrible fever here--almost a +pestilence--and we are scarcely breathing after it." + +"Ah! some one in the train spoke of sickness at Wil'sbro', but I +would ask no questions, for I saw faces I knew, and I would lead to +no recognition. I could not stay away from getting one sight of the +old place. Miles made it all burn within me; but here's my return- +ticket for the mail-train." + +"Never mind return-tickets. Come home with me." + +"I shall startle your mother." + +"I meant my home--the Rectory. It was my wife who saw you in the +churchyard, and sent me after you. She is watching for you." + +Archie, still bewildered, as if spell-bound by his ticket, muttered, +"I thought I should have time to walk over and look at Strawyers." + +"Joanna is here." + +"Julius! It is too much. You are sure I am awake? This is not the +old dream!" cried the exile, grasping his cousin's arm quite +gainfully. + +"I am a waking man, and I trust you are," said Julius. "Come into +the light. No, that is not Jenny on the step. It is my Rose. Yes, +here he is!" + +And as they came into the stream of light from the porch, Irish +Rosamond, forgetting that Archie was not a brother, caught him by +both hands, and kissed him in overpowering welcome, exclaiming, "Oh, +I am so glad! Come in--come in!" + +There he stood, blinking in the lamplight, a tall, powerful, broad- +chested figure, but hardly a hero of romance to suit Terry's fancy, +after a rapid summary of the history from Rosamond. His hair and +beard were as white as Julius's, and the whole face was tanned to +uniform red, but no one could mistake the dazed yet intense gladness +of the look. He sank into a chair, clasped his hands over his face +for a moment, then surveyed them all one by one, and said, "You told +me she was here." + +"She is with her brother Herbert, at Mrs. Hornblower's lodgings. +No, you must wait, Archie; he has barely in the last few hours, by +God's great mercy, taken a turn for the better in this fever, and I +don't see how she can leave him." + +"But she must hear it," cried Rosamond. "I'm going to make her or +Cranky get some rest; but you ought to be the one to tell her, +Julius, you that have stood by her through all." + +"And aren't you burning to do so, Rosey, woman? and I think you had +better, rather than that I should startle Herbert by returning; but +stay, mind your own rules--eat and drink before you go, and give the +same to Archie. I shall send up a note to Miles. How is Cecil?" + +"Very silent and broken, poor thing. She is to see your mother to- +morrow. How well it was that she kept me so late over her wreath of +camellias!" + +Archie submitted to wait for food and fuller information,--indeed +the lady of the house manifested more impatience than he did, as she +flitted about making preparations, and he sat with hands locked +together over his knee, gazing fixedly at Julius, scarcely speaking, +though eagerly listening; and when the meal was brought in, he could +not eat, only eagerly drank off a cup of scalding tea, and watched +Rosamond, as if jealous of any delay over her cutlet. She did not +abuse his patience. + +"Now then?" she said, rising. "You shall hear something of her +before long." + +"Let me come to her door," entreated Archie. + +And as the light shone from the window of the sick-room, Rosamond +said, "Stand under that tree in the moonlight, and I will make her +look out." + +All was intensely quiet; Cranky fast asleep in the arm-chair in the +outer-room, and Jenny sitting by the bed, watching the smooth quiet +breath. + +"You are to lie down on the sofa and sleep," said Rosamond, kissing +her, and she shook her head, "You must. People want strength for +joy as well as grief. Trust him to me, for there is some one for +you to see to-morrow." + +"Not papa!" said Jenny, startled. "No, nor Phil! Tell me, +Rosamond. There is only one you could look at me like that for!" + +"Look out at the window." + +Trembling all over, Jenny went and put her face to the lattice. The +figure under the tree came nearer. Archie must have been able +clearly to see her face in the moonlight. He stretched up his arms +to her, then folded them together on his breast, and let himself be +led away by Julius, while Jenny slid down on her knees, with her +face buried, and the suppressed choking sobs made Herbert look up at +Rosamond, and whisper, "It is?" + +"It is," repeated Rosamond, who had thought him asleep, or entirely +absorbed in the trouble of living. + +"Go to her," he added. + +Rosamond put her arm round her, and supported her into the next +room; for, after the month of hopeless watching, the long +sleeplessness and the struggle of this silent day to force her +spirit to the forgiveness she had promised, and then the sudden +reaction, had overpowered her, and the suppression and silence were +beyond endurance. She did not even know that Herbert was awake when +Rosamond brought her out into Mrs. Hornblower's room, and said, +"Have it out now, my dear, no one will hear. Scream comfortably. +It will do you good." + +But Jenny could not even scream. She was in the excited agony when +the mind is far too much for the body, and joy, unrealized, is like +grief. If her brother had that day passed away, and if nothing had +been heard of her lover, she would have been all calmness and +resignation; but the revulsion had overcome her, and at the moment +she was more conscious of strangulation than of anything else. +Rosamond tended her for full half an hour, and then she seemed +almost asleep, though she resisted the attempt to undress her, with +the words, "I must go to Herbert." + +"I will take care of Herbert," and Jenny was too much spent not to +acquiesce, and fell asleep almost before she was laid down on the +bed their landlady had given up to the watchers. + +Rosamond's task was a comfortable one, for every hour of sleep, +every mouthful of food seemed to do its work of restoration on the +sound, healthy frame, and a smile and word of thanks met her +whenever she roused her patient with the inevitable spoon. + +When he awoke towards morning, he asked what day it was, and when +she told him, answered, "So I thought. Then I have not lost count +of time." + +"No, you have been wonderfully clear-headed." + +"I can't see how there can have been time to write," he said. "It +is true that he is come, is it not?" + +"Quite true; but he came independently on business," and Rosamond +told of Julius's chase, bringing a look of amusement on his face. + +Jenny came in with the rising sun, pale indeed, but another creature +after her rest and in the sight of the restful countenance that +greeted her with a smile. The moaning, hoarse voice was gone too, +it was a faint shadow of Herbert's own tones that said, "Is not this +good, Jenny? I didn't think to have seen it." + +"My Herbert, you have given him back! You have given me the heart +to be glad!" + +"You must go and see him," said Herbert. + +Jenny looked wistful and undecided; but Julius entered to say that +she must come at once, for Archie must go back to London by the ten +o'clock train to an appointment, and could not return for two days. + +Herbert smiled her away, for he was still in a state where it was +not possible to bear any engrossing of his head-nurse, and the +lover's absence was, even to his unselfishness, good news. + +Rosamond could not refrain from the pleasure of peeping down the +little dark stair as Archie and his Jenny met in the doorway, and +she walked demurely in their rear, wondering whether other eyes saw +as much as she did in the manner in which Jenny hung on his arm. +She left them to their dewy walk in the Rectory garden to the last +minute at which breakfast could be swallowed, and told Jenny that +she was to drive him in the pony-carriage to Hazlett's Gate; she +would take care of Herbert. + +"You ought to be asleep, you know," said Jenny. + +"My dear, I couldn't sleep! There's a great deal better than sleep! +Is not Herbert going to get well? and aren't you jolly again and +Archie back again? Sleep!--why I want to have wings and clap them-- +and more than all, is not Mr. Charnock off and away to-morrow? +Sleep indeed!--I should like to see myself so stupid." + +"Mr. Charnock?" interrogatively said Archie. + +"The head of the family--the original Charnock of Dunstone," said +Rosamond, who was in wild spirits, coming on a worn-out body and +mind, and therefore perfectly unguarded. "Don't shake your head at +me, Jenny, Archie is one of the family, and that makes you so, and I +must tell you of his last performance. You know he is absolutely +certain that his dear daughter is more infallible than all the +Popes, even since the Council, or than anybody but himself, and that +whatever goes wrong here is the consequence of Julius's faith in Dr. +Easterby. So, when poor Cecil, uneasy in her mind, began asking +about the illness at Wil'sbro', he enlivened her with a prose about +misjudging, through well-intentioned efforts of clerical +philanthropy to interfere with the sanitary condition of the town-- +so that wells grew tainted, &c., all from ignorant interference. +Poor man he heard a little sob, and looked round, and there was +Cecil in a dead faint. He set all the bells ringing, and sent an +express for me." + +"But wasn't he furious with Anne for mentioning drains at all?" + +"My dear Joan, don't you know how many old women there are of both +sorts, who won't let other people look over the wall at what they +gloat on in private? However, he had his punishment, for he really +thought that the subject had been too much for her delicacy, and +simply upset her nerves." + +"When was this?" + +"Four or five days ago. She is better, but has said not a word more +about it. She is nothing like strong enough, even for so short a +journey as to Portishead; but they say change will be the best thing +for her, and the coming down into the family would be too sad." + +"Poor thing! Yes indeed," said Jenny; and feeling universally +benevolent, she added, "give her my love," a thing which so sincere +a person could hardly have said a few weeks ago. + +Reserve was part of Cecil's nature, and besides, her father was +almost always with her; but when she had been for the first time +dressed in crape up to her waist, with the tiniest of caps perched +toy-like on the top of her passive head, the sight upset him +completely, and muttering, "Good heavens!--a widow at twenty-two!" +he hid himself from the sight over some business transactions with +Mrs. Poynsett and Miles. + +Rosamond seized the opportunity of bringing Julius in to pay his +farewell visit, and presently Cecil said, "Julius, I should be much +obliged if you would tell me the real facts about this illness." + +"Do," said Rosamond. "Her half knowledge is most wearing." + +He gently told her what science had pronounced. + +"Then it was Pettitt's well?" she said. + +"They tell us that this was the immediate cause of the outbreak; but +there would probably have been quite as much fatal illness the first +time any infectious disease came in. The whole place was in a +shameful state, and you were the only people who tried to mitigate +it." + +"And did worse harm, because we would not listen to advice," said +Cecil. "Julius, I have a great deal of money; can't I do anything +now? My father wants me to give a donation to the church as a +memorial of _him_, but, somehow, I don't feel as if I deserved to do +that." + +"I see what you mean, Cecil, but the town is being rated to set the +drainage to rights, and it will thus be done in the most permanent +and effectual way. There are some orphans who might be saved from +the Union, about whom I thought of asking you to help." + +Cecil asked the details of the orphans, and the consultation over +them seemed to be prolonged by her because, even now, she could not +resolve to go below the surface. It lasted until her father came to +ask whether she were ready to go with him to Mrs. Poynsett's +sitting-room. She looked very fragile and childish as she stood up, +clinging to his arm to help her wavering, uncertain step, holding +out her hand to Julius and saying, "I shall see you again." + +He was a little disappointed to see her no older, and no warmer; +having gone thus far, it seemed as if she might have gone further +and opened more. Perhaps he did not understand how feelings, +naturally slow, were rendered slower by the languor of illness, +which made them more oppressive than acute. As Mr. Charnock and his +daughter knocked, the door was opened by Miles, who merely gave his +hand, and went down. Frank, who had been reading in a low easy- +chair by the fire, drew it close to his mother for her, and +retreated to another seat, and the mother and daughter-in-law +exchanged a grave kiss. Cecil attempted some civility about the +chair, to which poor Frank replied, "I'm afraid it is of no use to +speak to me, Cecil, Miles can only just make me hear." + +Regret for his misfortune, and inquiry as to the chance of +restoration, were a possible topic. Mr. Charnock gave much advice +about aurists, and examples of their success or non-success; and +thence he diverged to the invalid-carriage he had secured, and his +future plans for expediting his daughter's recovery. Meanwhile Mrs. +Poynsett and Cecil sat grave, dry-eyed, and constrained, each +feeling that in Mr. Charnock's presence the interview was a nullity, +yet neither of them able to get rid of him, nor quite sure that she +would have done so if she could. + +He, meanwhile, perfectly satisfied with his own considerate tact, +talked away the allotted half-hour, and then pronounced his daughter +pale and tired. She let him help her to rise, but held Mrs. +Poynsett's hand wistfully, as if she wished to say something but +could not; and all Mrs. Poynsett could bring out was a hope of +hearing how she bore the journey. It was as if they were both +frozen up. Yet the next moment Cecil was holding Frank's hand in a +convulsive clasp, and fairly pulling him down to exchange a kiss, +when he found her tears upon his cheek. Were they to his +misfortune, or to his much-increased resemblance to his brother? + +Mr. Charnock kept guard over her, so that her other farewells were +almost as much restrained as these, and though she hung on +Rosamond's neck, and seemed ready to burst forth with some fervent +exclamation, he hovered by, saying, "My dear child, don't, don't +give way to agitation. It does you honour, but it cannot be +permitted at such a moment. Lady Rosamond, I appeal to your +unfailing good sense to restrain her emotion." + +"I haven't any good sense, and I think it only hurts her to restrain +her emotion," said Rosamond, with one of her little stamps, pressing +Cecil in her arms. "There, there, my dear, cry,--never mind, if it +will comfort your poor heart." + +"Lady Rosamond! This is--Cecil, my dear child! Your resolution-- +your resignation. And the boxes are packed, and we shall be late +for the train!" + +Mr. Charnock was a little jealous of Lady Rosamond as a comforter +preferred to himself, and he spoke in a tone which Cecil had never +resisted. She withdrew herself from Rosamond, still tearless, +though her chest heaved as if there were a great spasm in it; she +gave her hand to Miles, and let him lead her to the carriage; and so +Raymond's widowed bride left Compton Poynsett enfolded in that +strange silence which some called sullenness and pride; others, more +merciful, stunned grief. + +Poor Cecil! there was less pity to be spared to her because of the +intense relief it was to be free from her father, and to be able to +stand in a knot consulting on the steps, without his coming out to +find out what they were talking about, and to favour them with some +Dunstone counsel. + +The consultation was about Mr. Moy. It was determined that since +Archie was in England, it would be better not to wait till Herbert +was recovered, but that Miles and Julius should go together at once +to see what effect they could produce on him. + +They drove together to his office. He was a tall man, a few years +over forty, and had hitherto been portly and well-preserved, with a +certain serene air of complacent prosperity about him, that had +always been an irritation to the county families, with whom he tried +to assert an equality; but as he rose to greet the brothers, there +was a bent and shrunken look about him: the hair on his temples had +visibly whitened, his cheeks seemed to have sunk in, and there were +deep furrows on them. Altogether he had grown full twenty years +older in appearance since he had stood proposing a popular toast at +the dinner at the town-hall. There was something nervous and +startled in his gray eye, as he saw them enter, though he tried to +assume his usual half-bland, half-easy, manner. + +"Good morning, Captain Charnock Poynsett. Good morning, Mr. +Charnock, I hope I see you well?" the words faltering a little, as +neither sailor nor clergyman took notice of his proffered hand; but +he continued his inquiries after the convalescents, though neither +inquired in return after Mrs. Moy, feeling, perhaps, that they would +rather not hear a very sad account of her state just before letting +their inevitable Nemesis descend; also, not feeling inclined for +reciprocal familiarity, and wanting to discourage the idea that +Miles came for political purposes. + +"It has been a terrible visitation," said Moy, when he had been +reduced to replying to himself. + +"It has," said Julius. "Perhaps you have heard that your tenant, +Gadley, is dead?" + +"Yes, I did hear it. A very melancholy thing--the whole family +swept-away," said Mr. Moy, his eye again betraying some uneasiness, +which Julius increased by saying-- + +"We thought it right that you should hear that he made a disclosure +on his death-bed." + +"Indeed!" Mr. Moy sat erect--the hard, keen, watchful lawyer. + +"A disclosure that nearly affects the character of Mr. Archibald +Douglas," proceeded Julius. + +"May I ask what this may be?" + +"Mr. Gadley then informed me that he had been in the outer room, +behind his desk, at the time when Mr. Douglas brought in the letter +from my mother, containing the missing cheque, and that after +Douglas was gone, he heard Mr. Vivian propose to those within to +appropriate the amount to their own debts." + +"Pardon me, Mr. Charnock, this is a very serious charge to bring on +the authority of a man in a raving fever. Was any deposition taken +before a magistrate?" + +"No," said Julius. "Mr. Lipscombe was fetched, but he was unable to +speak at the time. However, on reviving, he spoke as is thus +attested," and he showed Herbert Bowater's slip of paper. + +"Mr. Charnock," said Mr. Moy, "without the slightest imputation on +the intentions of yourself or of young Mr. Bowater, I put it to +yourself and Captain Charnock Poynsett, whether you could go before +a jury with no fuller attestation than you have in your hand. We +know what Mr. Charnock and Mr. Bowater are. To a jury they would +simply appear--pardon me--a young clergyman, his still more youthful +curate, and a sister of mercy, attaching importance to the words of +a delirious man; and juries have become very incredulous in such +cases." + +"We shall see that," said Miles sharply. + +"The more cautious," added Mr. Moy, "when it is the raking up of a +matter eleven years old, where the witnesses are mostly dead, and +where the characters of two gentlemen, also deceased, would be +implicated. Believe me, sir, this firm--I speak as its present +head--will be rejoiced to make any compensation to Mrs. Poynsett for +what went astray while coming to their hands. It has been our +desire to do so from the very first, as letters of which I have +copies testify; but our advances were met in a spirit of enmity, +which may perhaps be laid aside now." + +"No so-called compensation can be accepted, but the clearing of +Douglas's character," said Miles. + +"It is a generous feeling," said Mr. Moy, speaking apparently most +dispassionately, though Julius saw his hands trembling below the +table; "but even if the word of this delirious man were sufficient, +have you reflected, Captain Charnock Poynsett, on the unequal +benefit of justifying--allowing that you could justify--a young man +who has been dead and forgotten these eleven years, and has no +relation living nearer than yourself, at the expense of those also +gone, but who have left relations who could ill bear to suffer from +such a revelation?" + +"Justice is justice, whether a man be dead or alive," said Miles; +"and Douglas is alive to demand his right." + +"Alive!" cried Mr. Moy, starting violently. "Alive! Archie Douglas +alive!" + +"Alive, and in England," said Julius. "He slept in my house the +night before last. He never was in the Hippolyta, at all, but has +been living in Africa all these years of exile." + +Mr. Moy's self-command and readiness were all gone. He sank back in +his chair, with his hands over his face. The brothers looked at one +another, fearing he might have a stroke; but he revived in a moment, +yet with a totally different expression on his countenance. The +keen, defensive look was gone, there was only something piteously +worn and supplicating in the face, as he said-- + +"Then, gentlemen, I cannot resent anything you may do. Believe me, +but for the assurance of his death, I should have acted very +differently long ago. I will assist you in any way you desire in +reinstating Mr. Douglas in public opinion, only, if it be possible, +let my wife be spared. She has recently had the heaviest possible +blow; she can bear no more." + +"Mr. Moy, we will do nothing vindictive. We can answer for my +mother and Douglas," began Julius; but Miles, more sternly, would +not let his brother hold out his hand, and said-- + +"You allow, then, the truth of Gadley's confession?" + +"What has he confessed?" said Moy, still too much the lawyer not to +see that his own complicity had never yet been stated. + +Julius laid before him his own written record of Gadley's words, not +only involving Moy in the original fraud, but showing how he had +bribed the only witness to silence ever since. The unhappy man read +it over, and said-- + +"Yes, Mr. Charnock, it is all true. I cannot battle it further. I +am at your mercy. I would leave you to proclaim the whole to the +world; if it were not for my poor wife and her father, I would be +glad to do so. Heaven knows how this has hung upon me for years." + +"I can well believe it," said Julius, not to be hindered now from +grasping Mr. Moy's hand. + +It seemed to be a comfort now to tell the whole story in detail. +Moy, the favoured and trusted articled clerk at first, then the +partner, the lover and husband of the daughter, had been a model of +steadiness and success so early, that when some men's youthful +follies are wearing off, he had begun to weary of the monotony of +the office, and after beginning as Mentor to his young brother-in- +law, George Proudfoot, had gradually been carried along by the +fascination of Tom Vivian's society to share in the same perilous +pursuits, until both had incurred a debt to him far beyond their +powers, while he was likewise so deeply involved, that no bonds of +George Proudfoot would avail him. + +Then came the temptation of Mrs. Poynsett's cheque, suggested, +perhaps in jest, by Vivian, but growing on them as the feasibility +of using it became clear. It was so easy to make it appear to +Archie Douglas that the letter was simply an inquiry for the lost +one. Mr. Proudfoot, the father, was out of reach; Mrs. Poynsett +would continue to think the cheque lost in the post; and Tom Vivian +undertook to get it presented for payment through persons who would +guard against its being tracked. The sum exceeded the debt, but he +would return the overplus to them, and they both cherished the hope +of returning it with interest. Indeed, it had been but a half +consent on the part of either, elicited only by the dire alternative +of exposure; the envelope and letter were destroyed, and Vivian +carried off the cheque to some of the Jews with whom he had had only +too many transactions, and they never met him again. + +Moy's part all along had been half cowardice, half ambition. The +sense of that act and of its consequences had gnawed at his heart +through all his success; but to cast himself down from his position +as partner and son-in-law of Mr. Proudfoot, the keen, clever, +trusted, confidential agent of half the families around--to let his +wife know his shame and that of her brother, and to degrade his +daughter into the daughter of a felon--was more than he could bear; +and he had gone on trying to drown the sense of that one lapse in +the prosperity of his career and his efforts to place his daughter +in the first ranks of society. No doubt the having done an injury +to the Poynsett family had been the true secret of that enmity, more +than political, which he had always shown to Raymond; and after +thinking Gadley safer out of that office, and having yielded to his +solicitations and set him up at the Three Pigeons, he had been +almost compelled to bid for popularity by using his position as a +magistrate to protect the blackguardism of the town. He had been +meant for better things, and had been dragged on against his +conscience and judgment by the exigencies of his unhappy secret; and +when the daughter, for whose sake he had sacrificed his better self, +had only been led by her position into the follies and extravagances +of the worst part of the society into which she had been introduced, +and threw herself into the hands of a dissipated gambler, to whom +her fortune made her a desirable prey--truly his sin had found him +out. + +His fight at first had been partly force of habit, but he was so +entirely crushed that they could only have pity on him when he put +himself so entirely in their hands, only begging for forbearance to +his wife and her aged father, and entreating that principal, +interest, and compound interest might at once be tendered to Mrs. +Poynsett. + +The brothers could answer for nothing. Archie must decide for +himself what he would accept as restoration of his character, and +Mrs. Poynsett could alone answer as to whether she would accept the +compensation. But neither of them could be hard on one so stricken +and sorrowful, and they did not expect hardness from their mother +and cousin, especially so far as old Mr. Proudfoot and his daughter +were concerned. + +That the confession was made, and that Archie should be cleared, was +enough for Julius to carry to Herbert's room, while Miles repaired +to his mother. It was known in the sick-room where the brothers had +been, and Julius was watched as he crossed the street by Jenny's +eager eye, and she met him at the door of the outer room with a face +of welcome. + +"Come in and tell us all," she said. "I see it is good news." +Herbert was quite well enough to bear good news in full detail as he +lay, not saying much, but smiling his welcome, and listening with +ears almost as eager as his sister's. And as Julius told of the +crushed and broken man, Jenny's tears rose to her eyes, and she +pressed her brother's hand and whispered, "Thanks, dear boy!" + +"Small thanks to me." + +"Yes, I can enjoy it now," said Jenny; "thanks to you for forcing +the bitterness out of me." + +"Can you bear a little more good news, Herbert?" said Julius. "Who +do you think is to have St. Nicholas?" + +"Not William Easterby? That's too good to be true." + +"But so it is. All the Senior Fellows dropped it like a red-hot +coal." + +"I thought Dwight wanted to marry?" + +"Yes, but the lady's friends won't hear of his taking her there; so +it has come down to young Easterby. He can't be inducted of course +yet; but he has written to say he will come down on Saturday and +take matters in hand." + +"The services on Sunday? Oh!" said Herbert, with as great a gasp of +relief as if he had been responsible for them; and, indeed, Rosamond +declared that both her husband and Mr. Bindon looked like new men +since Wil'sbro' was off their backs. Archie was coming back that +evening. Jenny much longed to show her two treasures to each other, +for it was a useless risk for the healthy man, and the sick one was +too weak and tired to wish for a new face, or the trouble of +speaking; nay, he could not easily bring himself to cheerful +acquiescence in even his favourite Lady Rose taking his sister's +place to set her free for an evening with Archie at the Hall. + +Mrs. Poynsett was in the drawing-room. She had taken courage to +encounter the down-stair associations, saying she would make it no +sadder for the dear boy than she could help, and so Miles had +carried her down to meet one who had been always as one of her own +sons. + +And thus it was that she gathered him into her embrace, while the +great strong man, only then fully realizing all the changes, sobbed +uncontrollably beside her. + +"My boy, my poor Archie," she said, "you are come at last. Did you +not know you still had a mother to trust to?" + +"I ought to have known it," said Archie, in a choked voice. "Oh +that I had seen Jenny in London!" + +For indeed it had become plain that it had been his flight that had +given opportunity and substance to the accusation. If he had +remained, backed by the confidence of such a family as the +Poynsetts, Gadley would have seen that testimony in his favour would +be the safer and more profitable speculation; and Moy himself, as he +had said, would have testified to the innocence of a living man on +the spot, though he had let the blame rest on one whom he thought in +the depths of the sea. Archie's want of moral courage had been his +ruin. It had led him to the scene of temptation rather than resist +his companions, and had thus given colour to the accusation, and in +the absence of both Joanna and of his cousins, it had prevented him +from facing the danger. + +This sense made him the more willing to be forbearing, when, after +dinner, the whole council sat round to hear in full the history of +the interview with Mr. Moy; Anne taking up her position beside +Frank, with whom, between her pencil and the finger-alphabet, she +had established such a language as to make her his best interpreter +of whatever was passing in the room. + +"One could not help being sorry for Moy," said Miles, as he +concluded; "he turns out to be but half the villain after all, made +so rather by acquiescence than by his own free will." + +"But reaping the profit," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"Yes, though in ignorance of the injury he was doing, and thus +climbing to a height that makes his fall the worse. I am sorry for +old Proudfoot too," added Julius. "I believe they have not ventured +to tell him of his granddaughter's marriage." + +"I do not think the gain to me would be at all equal to the loss to +them," said Archie. "Exposure would be ruin and heartbreak there, +and I don't see what it would do for me." + +"My dear Archie!" exclaimed both Mrs. Poynsett and Joanna, in +amazement. + +"So long as you and Mr. Bowater are satisfied, I care for little +else," said Archie. + +"But your position, my dear," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"We don't care much about a man's antecedents, within a few years, +out in the colonies, dear Aunt Julia," said Archie, smiling. + +"You aren't going back?" + +"That depends," said Archie, his eyes seeking Joanna's; "but I don't +see what there is for me to do here. I'm spoilt for a solicitor +anyway--" + +"We could find an agency, Miles, couldn't we?--or a farm--" + +"Thank you, dear aunt," said Archie; "I don't definitely answer, +because Mr. Bowater must be consulted; but I have a business out +there that I can do, and where I can make a competence that I can +fairly offer to Jenny here. If I came home, as I am now, I should +only prey on you in some polite form, and I don't think Jenny would +wish for that alternative. I must go back any way, as I have told +her, and whether to save for her, or to make a home for her there, +it must be for her to decide." + +They looked at Jenny. She was evidently prepared; for though her +colour rose a little, her frank eyes looked at him with a confiding +smile. + +"But we must have justice done to you, my dear boy, whether you stay +with us or not," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"That might have been done if I had not been fool enough to run +away," said Archie; "having done so, the mass of people will only +remember that there has been something against me, in spite of any +justification. It is not worth while to blast Moy's character, and +show poor old Proudfoot what a swindler his son was, just for that. +The old man was good to me. I should like to let it rest while he +lives. If Moy would sign such an exculpation of me as could be +shown to Mr. Bowater, and any other whom it might concern, I should +be quite willing to have nothing told publicly, at least as long as +the old gentleman lives." + +"I think Archie is right," said Miles, in the pause, with a great +effort. + +"Yes, right in the highest sense of the word," said Julius. + +"It is Christian," Anne breathed across to her husband. + +"I don't like it," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"Let that scoundrel go unhung!" burst from Frank, who had failed to +catch the spirit of his interpreter. + +"I don't like it in the abstract, mother," said Miles; "but you and +Frank have not seen the scoundrel in his beaten down state, and, as +Archie says, it is hard to blacken the memory of either poor George +Proudfoot or Tom Vivian, who have fathers to feel it for them." + +"Poor Tom Vivian's can hardly be made much blacker," said Mrs. +Poynsett, "nor are Sir Harry's feelings very acute; but perhaps poor +old Proudfoot ought to be spared, and there are considerations as to +the Vivian family. Still, I don't see how to consent to Archie +going into exile again with this stigma upon him. I am sure Raymond +would not, and I do not think Mr. Bowater will." + +"Dear Aunt Julia," said Archie, affectionately, coming across to +her, "it was indeed exile before, when I was dead to all of you; but +can it be so now the communication is open, and when I am making or +winning my home?" and his eyes brought Jenny to him by her side. + +"Yes, dear Mrs. Poynsett," she said, holding her hand, "I am sure he +is right, and that it would spoil all our own happiness to break +that poor old father's heart, and bring him and his wife to disgrace +and misery. When I think of the change in everything since two days +back--dear Herbert wrung a sort of forgiveness out of me--I can't +bear to think of anybody being made miserable." + +"And what will your papa say, child?" + +"I think he will feel a good deal for old Proudfoot," said Jenny. +"He rather likes the old man, and has laughed at our hatred of Miss +Moy's pretensions." + +"Then it is settled," said Archie; "I will write to Moy, for I +suppose he had rather not see me, that I will say nothing about it +publicly while Mr. Proudfoot lives, and will not show this +confession of his, unless it should be absolutely necessary to my +character. Nor after old Proudfoot's death, will I take any step +without notice to him." + +"Much more than he ought to expect," said Mrs. Poynsett. + +"I don't know," said Archie. "If he had refused, it would not have +been easy to bring him to the point, I suppose I must have +surrendered to take my trial, but after so many years, and with so +many deaths, it would have been awkward." + +"And the money, mother," said Miles, producing a cheque. "Poor Moy, +that was a relief to him. He said he had kept it ready for years." +Mrs. Poynsett waved it off as if she did not like to touch it. + +"I don't want it! Take it, Archie. Set up housekeeping on it," she +said. "You are not really going back to that place?" + +"Yes, indeed I am; I sail on Tuesday. Dear good Aunt Julia, how +comfortable it is to feel any one caring for me again; but I am +afraid even this magnificent present, were it ten times as much, +could not keep me; I must go back to fulfil my word to my partner +out there, even if I returned at once." + +"And you let him go, Jenny?" + +"I must!" said Jenny. "And only think how different it is now! For +the rest, whether he comes back for me at once, or some years hence, +must depend on papa and mamma." + +She spoke with grave content beaming in her eyes, just like herself. +The restoration was still swallowing up everything else. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXV +Herbert's Christmas + + +And when the self-abhorring thrill + Is past--as pass it must, +When tasks of life thy spirit fill, +Then be the self-renouncing will + The seal of thy calm trust.--Lyra Apostolica + +By Christmas Day Archie Douglas was in the Bay of Biscay; but even +to Joanna it was not a sorrowful day, for did not Herbert on that +day crawl back into his sitting-room, full dressed for the first +time, holding tight by her shoulder, and by every piece of furniture +on his way to the sofa, Rollo attending in almost pathetic delight, +gazing at him from time to time, and thumping the floor with his +tail? He had various visitors after his arrival--the first being +his Rector, who came on his way back from church to give his +congratulations, mention the number of convalescents who had there +appeared, and speak of the wedding he had celebrated that morning, +that of Fanny Reynolds and her Drake, who were going forth the next +day to try whether they could accomplish a hawker's career free from +what the man, at least, had only of late learnt to be sins. It was +a great risk, but there had been a penitence about both that Julius +trusted was genuine. A print of the Guardian Angel, which had been +her boy's treasure, had been hung by Fanny in her odd little +bedroom, and she had protested with tears that it would seem like +her boy calling her back if she were tempted again. + +"Not that I trust much to that," said Julius. "Poor Fanny is soft, +and likes to produce an effect; but I believe there is sterling +stuff in Drake." + +"And he never had a chance before," said Herbert. + +"No. Which makes a great difference--all indeed between the +Publicans, or the Heathens, and the Pharisees. He can't read, and I +doubt whether he said the words rightly after me; but I am sure he +meant them." + +"I suppose all this has done great good?" said Jenny. + +"It will be our fault if it do not do permanent good. It ought," +said Julius, gravely. "No, no, Herbert, I did not mean to load you +with the thought. Getting well is your business for the present-- +not improving the occasion to others." + +To which all that Herbert answered was, "Harry Hornblower!" as if +that name spoke volumes of oppression of mind. + +That discussion, however, was hindered by Mrs. Hornblower's own +arrival with one of her lodger's numerous meals, and Julius went off +to luncheon. The next step on the stairs made Herbert start and +exclaim, "That's the dragoon! Come in, Phil." + +And there did indeed stand the eldest brother, who had obtained a +few days' leave, as he told them, and had ridden over from Strawyers +after church. He came in with elaborate caution in his great muddy +boots, and looked at Herbert like a sort of natural curiosity, +exclaiming that he only wanted a black cap and a pair of bands to be +exactly like Bishop Bowater, a Caroline divine, with a meek, oval, +spiritual face, and a great display of delicate attenuated fingers, +the length of which had always been a doubt and marvel to his sturdy +descendants. + +"Hands and all," quoth Philip; "and what are you doing with them?" +as he spied a Greek Testament in the fingers, and something far too +ponderous for them within reach. "Jenny, how dare you?" he +remonstrated, poising the bigger book as if to heave it at her head. +"That's what comes of your encouraging followers, eh?" + +"Ah!" said Jenny, pretending to dodge the missile, while Rollo +exercised great forbearance in stifling a bark, "Greek is not quite +so severe to some folks as dragoon captains think." + +"Severe or not he might let it alone," said Phil, looking much +disposed to wrest away the little book, which Herbert thrust under +his pillow, saying-- + +"It was only the Lesson." + +"Why can't you read the Lesson like a sensible man in its native +English? Don't laugh, children, you know what I mean. There's no +good in this fellow working his brain. He can't go up again before +September, and according to the Bishop's letter to my father, he is +safe to pass, if he could not construe a line, after what he did at +Wil'sbro'. The Bishop and Co. found they had made considerable +donkeys of themselves. Yes, 'tis the ticket for you to be shocked; +but it is just like badgering a fellow for his commission by asking +him how many facets go to a dragon-fly's eye, instead of how he can +stand up to a battery." + +"So I thought," said Herbert; "but I know now what it is to be in +the teeth of the battery without having done my best to get my +weapons about me." + +"Come now! Would any of those poor creatures have been the better +for your knowing + +"How many notes a sackbut has, +Or whether shawms have strings," + +or the Greek particles, which I believe were what sacked you?" + +"They would have been the better if I had ever learnt to think what +men's souls are, or my own either," said Herbert, with a heavy sigh. + +"Ah! well, you have had a sharp campaign," said Phil; "but you'll +soon get the better of it when you are at Nice with the old folks. +Jolly place--lots of nice girls--something always going on. I'll +try and get leave to take you out; but you'll cut us all out! +Ladies won't look at a fellow when there's an interesting young +parson to the fore." + +Herbert made an action of negation, and his sister said-- + +"The doctors say Nice will not do after such an illness as this. +Papa asked the doctor there, and he said he could not advise it." + +"Indeed! Then I'll tell you what, Herbs, you shall come into +lodgings at York, and I'll look after you there. You shall ride +Pimento, and dine at the mess." + +"Thank you, Phil," said Herbert, to whom a few months ago this +proposal would have been most seducing, "but I am going home, and +that's all the change I shall want." + +"Home! Yes, Ellen is getting ready for you. Not your room--oh, no! +but the state bedroom! When will you come? My leave is only till +Tuesday." + +"Oh! I don't know how to think of the drive," sighed Herbert +wearily. + +"We must wait for a fine day, when he feels strong enough," said +Jenny. + +"All right," said Phil; "but ten days or a fortnight there will be +quite enough, and then you'll come. There are some friends of +yours, that only looked at me, I can tell you, for the sake of your +name--eh, Master Herbs?" + +Herbert did not rise to the bait; but Jenny said, "The Miss +Strangeways?" + +"Yes. Wouldn't he be flattered to hear of the stunning excitement +when they heard of Captain Bowater, and how the old lady, their +mother, talked by the yard about him? You'll get a welcome indeed +when you come, old fellow. When shall it be?" + +"No, thank you, Phil," said Herbert, gravely. "I shall come back +here as soon as I am well enough. But there is one thing I wish you +would do for me." + +"Well, what? I'll speak about having any horse you please taken up +for you to ride; I came over on Brown Ben, but he would shake you +too much." + +"No, no, it's about a young fellow. If you could take him back to +York to enlist--" + +"My dear Herbert, I ain't a recruiting-sergeant." + +"No, but it might be the saving of him," said Herbert, raising +himself and speaking with more animation. "It is Harry Hornblower." + +"Why, that's the chap that bagged your athletic prizes! Whew! +Rather strong, ain't it, Joan!" + +"He did no such thing," said Herbert, rather petulantly; "never +dreamt of it. He only was rather a fool in talking of them-- +vaunting of me, I believe, as not such a bad fellow for a parson; so +his friends got out of him where to find them. But they knew better +than to take him with them. Tell him, Jenny; he won't believe me." + +"It is quite true, Phil," said Jenny, "the poor fellow did get into +bad company at the races, but that was all. He did not come home +that night, but he was stupefied with drink and the beginning of the +fever, and it was proved--perfectly proved--that he was fast asleep +at a house at Backsworth when the robbery was committed, and he was +as much shocked about it as any one--more, I am sure, than Herbert, +who was so relieved on finding him clear of it, that he troubled +himself very little about the things. And now he has had the fever-- +not very badly--and he is quite well now, but he can't get anything +to do. Truelove turned him off before the races for hanging about +at the Three Pigeons, and nobody will employ him. I do think it is +true what they say--his mother, and Julius, and Herbert, and all-- +that he has had a lesson, and wants to turn over a new leaf, but the +people here won't let him. Julius and Herbert want him to enlist, +and I believe he would, but his mother--as they all do--thinks that +the last degradation; but she might listen if Captain Bowater came +and told her about his own regiment--cavalry too--and the style of +men in it--and it is the only chance for him." + +Philip made a wry face. + +"You see I took him up and let him down," said Herbert, sadly and +earnestly. + +"I really do believe," said Jenny, clenching the matter, "that +Herbert would get well much faster if Harry Hornblower were off his +mind." + +Phil growled, and his younger brother and sister knew that they +would do their cause no good by another word. There was an odd +shyness about them all. The elder brother had not yet said anything +about Jenny's prospects, and only asked after the party at the Hall. + +"All nearly well, except Frank's deafness," said Jenny. "In a day +or two he is going up to London to consult an aurist, and see +whether he can keep his clerkship. Miles is going with him, and +Rosamond takes Terry up to see his brother in London, and then, I +believe, she is going on to get rooms at Rockpier, while Miles comes +home to fetch his mother there." + +"Mrs. Poynsett!" with infinite wonder. + +"Oh yes, all this has really brought out much more power of activity +in her. You know it was said that there was more damage to the +nervous system than anything else, and the shock has done her good. +Besides, Miles is so much less timid about her than dear Raymond, +who always handled her like a cracked teapot, and never having known +much of any other woman, did not understand what was good for her." + +"Miles has more pith in him than ever poor old Raymond had," said +Phil. "Poor old Poynsett, I used to think he wanted to be spoony on +you, Joan, if he had only known his own mind. If he had, I suppose +he would have been alive now!" + +"What a pleasing situation for Jenny!" Herbert could not help +muttering. + +"Much better than running after ostriches in the wilderness," quoth +Philip. "You ride them double, don't you?" + +"Two little negro boys at a time," replied Jenny, "according to the +nursery-book. Will you come and try, Phil?" + +"You don't mean to go out?" + +"I don't know," said Jenny; "it depends on how mamma is, and how +Edith gets on." + +Philip gave a long whistle of dismay. Herbert looked at him +wistfully, longing to hear him utter some word of congratulation or +sympathy with his sister; but none was forthcoming. Philip had +disliked the engagement originally--never had cared for Archie +Douglas, and was not melted now that Jenny was more valuable than +ever. She knew him too well to expect it of him, and did not want +to leave him to vex Herbert by any expression of his opinion on the +matter, and on this account, as well as on that of the fatigue she +saw on her patient's features, she refused his kind offer of keeping +guard while she went in the afternoon to church, adding that Herbert +must rest, as Mrs. Duncombe was coming afterwards to take leave of +him. + +Philip shrugged his shoulders in horror, and declared that he should +not return again till _that_ was over; but he should look in again +before he went home to settle about Herbert's coming to York. + +"York!" said Herbert, with a gasp, as Jenny brought his jelly, and +arranged his pillows for a rest, while the dragoon's boots resounded +on the stairs. "Please tell him to say no more about it. I want +them all to understand that I'm not going in for that sort of thing +any more." + +"My dear, I think you had better not say things hotly and rashly; +you may feel so very differently by and by." + +"I know that," said Herbert; "but after all it is only what my +ordination vows mean, though I did not see it then. And this year +must be a penance year; I had made up my mind to that before I fell +ill." + +"Only you must get well," said Jenny. + +"That takes care of itself when one is sound to begin with," said +Herbert. "And now that I have been brought back again, and had my +eyes opened, and have got another trial given me, it would be double +shame to throw it away." + +"I don't think you will do that." + +"I only pray that all that seems burnt out of me by what I have +seen, and heard, and felt, may not come back with my strength." + +"I could hardly pray that for you, Herbert," said Jenny. "Spirits +are wanted to bear a clergyman through his work, and though you are +quite right not to _go in_ for those things, I should be sorry if +you never enjoyed what came in your way." + +"If I never was tempted." + +"It need not be temptation. It would not be if your mind were full +of your work--it would only be refreshment. I don't want my boy to +turn stern, and dry, and ungenial. That would not be like your +Rector." + +"My Rector did not make such a bad start, and can trust himself +better," said Herbert. "Come, Jenny, don't look at me in that way. +You can't wish me to go to York, and meet those rattling girls +again?" + +"No, certainly not, though Sister Margaret told Rosamond they had +never had such a sobering lesson in their lives as their share in +the mischief to you." + +"It was not their fault," said Herbert. "It was deeper down than +that. And they were good girls after all, if one only had had +sense." + +"Oh!--" + +"Nonsense, Jenny," with a little smile, as he read her face, "I'm +not bitten--no--but they, and poor Lady Tyrrell, and all are proof +enough that it is easy to turn my head, and that I am one who ought +to keep out of that style of thing for the future. So do silence +Phil, for you know when he gets a thing into his head how he goes +on, and I do not think I can bear it now." + +"I am sure you can't," said Jenny, emphatically, "and I'll do my +best. Only, Herbie, dear, do one thing for me, don't bind yourself +by any regular renunciations of moderate things now your mind is +excited, and you are weak. I am sure Julius or Dr. Easterby would +say so." + +"I'll think," said Herbert. "But if I am forgiven for this year, +nothing seems to me too much to give up to the Great Shepherd to +show my sorrow. 'Feed My sheep' was the way He bade St. Peter prove +his love." + +Jenny longed to say it was feeding the sheep rather than self- +privation, but she was not sure of her ground, and Herbert's low, +quiet, soft voice went to her heart. There were two great tears on +his cheeks, he shut his eyes as if to keep back any more, and turned +his face inwards on the sofa, his lips still murmuring over 'Feed My +sheep.' She looked at him, feeling as if, while her heart had +wakened to new glad hopes of earth, her brother, in her fulfilled +prayer, had soared beyond her. They were both quite still till Mrs. +Duncombe came to the door. + +She was at the Rectory, her house being dismantled, and she, having +stayed till the last case of fever was convalescent, and the Sisters +recalled, was to go the next day to her mother-in-law's. She was +almost as much altered as Herbert himself. Her jaunty air had given +way to something equally energetic, but she looked wiry and worn, +and her gold pheasant's crest had become little more than a sandy +wisp, as she came quietly in and took the hand that Herbert held out +to her, saying how glad she was to see him on the mend. + +He asked after some of the people whom they had attended together, +and listened to the details, asking specially after one or two +families, where one or both parents had been taken away. "Poor +Cecil Poynsett is undertaking them," was the answer in each case. +Some had been already sent to orphanages; others were boarded out +till places could be found for them; and the Sisters had taken +charge of two. + +Then one widow was to 'do for' the Vicar, who had taken solitary +possession of the Vicarage, but would soon be joined there by one or +more curates. He had been inducted into the ruinous chancel of the +poor old church, had paid the architect of the Rat-house fifty +pounds (a sum just equalling the proceeds of the bazaar) to be rid +of his plans; had brought down a first-rate architect; and in the +meantime was working the little iron church vigorously. + +"Everything seems to be beginning there just as I go into exile!" +said Mrs. Duncombe. "It seems odd that I should have to go from +what I have only just learnt to prize. But you have taught mo a +good deal--" + +"Every one must have learnt a good deal," said Herbert wearily. "If +one only has!" + +"I meant you yourself, and that is what I came to thank you for. +Yes, I did; even if you don't like to hear it, your sister does, and +I must have it out. I shall recollect you again and again standing +over all those beds, and shrinking from nothing, and I shall hold up +the example to my boys." + +"Do hold up something better!" + +"Can you write?" she said abruptly. + +"I have written a few lines to my mother." + +"Do you remember what you said that night, when you had to hold that +poor man in his delirium, and his wife was so wild with fright that +she could not help?" + +"I am not sure what you mean." + +"You said it three or four times. It was only--" + +"I remember," said Herbert, as she paused; "it was the only thing I +could recollect in the turmoil." + +"Would it tire you very much to write it for me in the flyleaf of +this Prayer-Book that Mr. Charnock has given me?" + +Herbert pulled himself into a sitting posture, and signed to his +sister to give him the ink. + +"I shall spoil your book," he said, as his hand shook. + +"Never mind," she said, eagerly, "the words come back to me whenever +I think of the life I have to face, and I want them written; they +soothe me, as they soothed that frightened woman and raving man." + +And Herbert wrote. It was only--'The Lord is a very present help in +trouble.' + +"Yes," she said; "thank you. Put your initials, pray. There--thank +you. No, you can never tell what it was to me to hear those words, +so quietly, and gravely, and strongly, in that deadly struggle. It +seemed to me, for the first time in all my life, that God is a real +Presence and an actual Help. There! I see Miss Bowater wants me +gone; so I am off. I shall hear of you." + +Herbert was exhausted with the exertion, and only exchanged a close +pressure of the hand, and when Jenny came back, after seeing the +lady to the door, she thought there were tears on his cheek, and +bent down to kiss him. + +"That was just the way, Jenny," his low, tired voice said. "I never +could recollect what I wanted to say. Only just those few Psalms +that you did manage to teach me before I went to school, they came +back and back." + +Jenny had no time to answer, for the feet of Philip were on the +stairs. He had been visiting Mrs. Hornblower, and persuading her +that to make a dragoon of her son was the very best thing for him-- +great promotion, and quite removed from the ordinary vulgar +enlistment in the line--till he had wiled consent out of her. And +though Philip declared it was blarney, and was inclined to think it +infra dig. to have thus exerted his eloquence, it was certain that +Mrs. Hornblower would console herself by mentioning to her +neighbours that her son was gone in compliment to Captain Bowater, +who had taken a fancy to him. + +The relief to Herbert was infinite; but he was by this time too much +tired to do anything but murmur his thanks, and wish himself safe +back in his bed, and Philip's strong-armed aid in reaching that +haven was not a little appreciated. + +Julius looked in with his mother's entreaty that Philip, and if +possible his sister, should come up to eat their Christmas dinner at +the Hall; and Herbert, wearily declaring that sleep was all he +needed, and that Cranky would be more than sufficient for him, +insisted on their accepting the invitation; and Jenny was not sorry, +for she did not want a tete-a-tete with Philip so close to her +patient's room, that whatever he chose to hear, he might. + +She had quite enough of it in the walk to the Hall. Phil, with the +persistency of a person bent on doing a kind thing, returned to his +York plan, viewing it as excellent relaxation for a depressed, over- +worked man, and certain it would be a great treat to 'little Herb.' +He still looked on the tall young man as the small brother to be +patronized, and protected, and dragged out of home-petting; so he +pooh-poohed all Jenny's gentler hints as to Herbert's need of care +and desire to return to his work, until she was obliged to say +plainly that he had entreated her to beg it might not be argued with +him again, as he was resolved against amusement for the present. + +Then Phil grew very angry both with Herbert and Jenny. + +"Did they suppose he wanted the boy to do anything unclerical?" + +"No; but you know it was by nothing positively unclerical that he +was led aside before." + +Phil broke out into a tirade against the folly of Jenny's speech. +In his view, Herbert's conduct at Wil'sbro' had confuted the +Bishop's censure, and for his own part, he only wished to amuse the +boy, and give him rest, and if he did take him to a ball, or even +out with the hounds, he would be on leave, and in another diocese, +where the Bishop had nothing to do with him. + +Jenny tried to make him understand that dread of the Bishop was the +last thing in Herbert's mind. It was rather that he did not think +it right to dissipate away a serious impression. + +That was worse than before. She was threatened with the most +serious displeasure of her father and mother, if she encouraged +Herbert in the morbid ascetic notions ascribed to Dr. Easterby. + +"It was always the way with the women--they never knew where to +stop." + +"No," said Jenny, "I did not know there was anywhere to stop in the +way of Heaven." + +"As if there were no way to Heaven without making a fool of +oneself." + +This answer made Jenny sorry for her own, as needlessly vexatious, +and yet she recollected St. Paul's Christian paradoxes, and felt +that poor Herbert might have laid hold of the true theory of the +ministry. At any rate, she was glad that they were at that moment +hailed and overtaken by the party from the Rectory, and that Phil +pounced at once on Julius, to obtain his sanction to giving Herbert +a little diversion at York. + +Julius answered more warily, "Does he wish it?" + +"No; but he is too weak yet, and is hipped and morbid." + +"Well, Phil, I would not put it into his head. No doubt you would +take very good care of him, but I doubt whether your father would +like the Bishop to hear of him--under the circumstances--going to +disport himself at the dragoon mess. Besides, I don't think he will +be well enough before Lent, and then of course he could not." + +This outer argument in a man's voice pacified Phil, as Julius knew +it would, much better than the deeper one, and he contented himself +with muttering that he should write to his father about it, which +every one knew he was most likely not to do. + +Who could have foretold last Christmas who would be the party at +that dinner? Mrs. Poynsett at the head of her own table, and Miles +in the master's place, and the three waifs from absent families +would have seemed equally unlikely guests; while of last year's +party--Charlie was in India, Tom De Lancey with the aunts in +Ireland, Cecil at Dunstone. Mrs. Duncombe was perfectly quiet, not +only from the subduing influence of all she had undergone, but +because she felt herself there like an intruder, and would have +refused, but that to leave her at home would have distressed her +hostess. Mrs. Poynsett had never seen her before, and after all she +had heard about her, was quite amazed at the sight of such an +insignificant little person as she was without her dash and sparkle, +and in a dress which, when no longer coquettish, verged upon the +slovenly. + +Poor thing, she was waiting till the Christmas visit of the elder +Mrs. Duncombe's own daughter was over, so that there might be room +for her, and she was thankful for the reprieve, which left her able +to spend Christmas among the privileges she had only learnt to value +just as she was deprived of them. She looked at Mrs. Poynsett, half +in curiosity, half in compunction, as she remembered how she had +helped to set Cecil against her. + +"But then," as she said to Rosamond, in going home, "I had +prejudices about the genus belle-mere. And mine always knew and +said I should ruin her son, in which, alas! she was quite right!" + +"She will be pleased now," said Rosamond. + +"No, indeed, I believe she had rather I were rapidity personified +than owe the change to any one of your Rector's sort. I have had a +letter or two, warning me against the Sisters, or thinking there is +any merit in works of mercy. Ah, well! I'll try to think her a +good old woman! But if she had only not strained the cord till it +snapped, how much happier Bob and I should have been!" + +What a difference there is between straining the cord for one's self +and for other people! So Julius could not help feeling when +Herbert, in spite of all that could be said to him, about morbid +haste in renunciation, sent for the village captain of the cricket- +club, and delivered over to him the bat, which had hitherto been as +a knightly sword to him, resigning his place in the Compton Poynsett +Eleven, and replying to the dismayed entreaties and assurances of +the young farmer that he would reconsider his decision, and that he +would soon be quite strong again, that he had spent too much time +over cricket, and liked it too well to trust himself at it again. + +That was the last thing before on a New Year's Day, which was like +an April day, Herbert came into church once more, and then was +carried off in the Strawyers carriage, lying back half ashamed, half +astonished, at the shower of strange tears which the ecstatic shouts +and cheers of the village boys had called forth. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVI +Rockpier + + +For Love himself took part against himself + To warn us off.--TENNYSON + +Rosamond was to have a taste of her old vocation, and go campaigning +for lodgings, the searching for which she declared to be her +strongest point. Rockpier was to be the destination of the family; +Eleonora Vivian, whose letters had been far fewer than had been +expected of her, was known to be there with her father, and this was +lure sufficient for Frank. Frank's welfare again was the lure to +Mrs. Poynsett; and the benefit Rosamond was to derive from sea air, +after all she had gone through, made Julius willing to give himself +the holiday that everybody insisted on his having until Lent. + +First, however, was sent off an advanced guard, consisting of +Rosamond and Terry, who went up to London with Frank, that he might +there consult an aurist, and likewise present himself to his chief, +and see whether he could keep his clerkship. All this turned out +well, his duties did not depend on his ears, and a month's longer +leave of absence was granted to him; moreover, his deafness was +pronounced to be likely to yield to treatment, and a tube restored +him to somewhat easier intercourse with mankind, and he was in high +spirits, when, after an evening spent with Rosamond's friends, the +M'Kinnons, the trio took an early train for Rockpier, where Rosamond +could not detain Frank even to come to the hotel with them and have +luncheon before hurrying off to Verdure Point, the villa inhabited +by Sir Harry. All he had done all the way down was to impress upon +her, in the fulness of his knowledge of the place, that the only +habitable houses in Rockpier were in that direction--the nearer to +Verdure Point the more perfect! + +Terry listened with smiling eyes, sometimes viewing the lover as a +bore, sometimes as a curious study, confirming practical statements. +Terry was thoroughly well, only with an insatiable appetite, and he +viewed his fellow convalescent's love with double wonder when he +found it caused oblivion of hunger, especially as Frank still looked +gaunt and sallow, and was avowedly not returned to his usual health. + +Rosamond set forth house-hunting, dropping Terry ere long at the +Library, where she went to make inquiries, and find the sine qua +non. When she reached the sitting-room at the hotel, she found +Frank cowering over the fire in an arm-chair, the picture of +despondency. Of course, he did not hear her entrance, and she +darted up to him, and put her hand on his shoulder. He looked up to +her with an attempt at indifference. + +"Well, Frank!" + +"Well, Rose! How have you sped?" + +"I have got a house; but it is in Marine Terrace. I don't know what +you'll say to me." + +"I don't know that it signifies." + +"You are shivering! What's the matter?" + +"Only, it is very cold!" + +(Aside. "Ring the bell, Terry, he is as cold as ice.") "Did you +see her?" + +"Oh yes. Did you have any luncheon?" ("Some port-wine and hot +water directly, please.") + +"Yes, I believe so. You are not ordering anything for me? There's +nothing amiss--only it is so cold." + +"It is cold, and you are not to be cold; nor are we to be cold, sir. +You must go to bed early in the evening, Terry," said Rosamond, at +last. "I shall make nothing of him while you are by, and an hour's +more sleep will not be lost on you." + +"Will you come and tell me then, Rosey? I deserve something." + +"What, for sleeping there instead of here, when you've nothing to +do?" + +"Indeed, but I have. I want to make out this little Chaucer. I +shall go down to the coffee-room and do it." + +"Well, if you like poking out your eyes with the gas in the coffee- +room, I have no objection, since you are too proud to go to bed. +Wish him good night first, and do it naturally." + +"Nature would be thrown away on him, poor fellow," said Terry, as he +roused Frank with difficulty to have 'Good night' roared into his +ear, and give a listless hand. He was about to deal with Rosamond +in the same way, but she said-- + +"No, I am not going yet," and settled herself opposite to him, with +her half-knitted baby's shoe in her hands, and her feet on the +fender, her crape drawn up from the fire, disposed for conversation. +Frank, on the other hand, fell back into the old position, looking +so wretched that she could bear it no longer, picked up the tube, +forced it on him, and said, "Do tell me, dear Frank. You used to +tell me long ago." + +He shook his head. "That's all over. You are very good, Rosamond, +but you should not have forced her to come to me." + +"Not!" + +"My life was not worth saving." + +"She has not gone back from you again?--the horrible girl!" (this +last aside). + +"It is not that she has gone back. She has never changed. It is I +who have forfeited her." + +"You!--You!--She has not cast you off?" + +"You know how it was, and the resolution by which she had bound +herself, and how I was maddened." + +"That! I thought it was all forgiven and forgotten!" cried +Rosamond. + +"It is not a matter of forgiveness. She put it to me whether it was +possible to begin on a broken word." + +"Worse and worse! Why, when you've spoken a foolish word, it is the +foolishest thing in the world to hold to it." + +"If it were a foolish word!" said poor Frank. "I think I could have +atoned for that day, if she could have tried me; but when she left +me to judge, and those eyes of sweet, sorrowful--" + +"Sweet! Sorrowful, indeed! About as sweet and sorrowful as the +butcher to the lamb. Left you to judge! A refinement of cruelty! +She had better have stayed away when I told her it was the only +chance to save your life." + +"Would that she had!" sighed Frank. "But that was your doing, +Rosamond, and what she did in mere humanity can't be cast back again +to bind her against her conscience." + +"Plague on her conscience!" was my Lady's imprecation. "I wonder if +it is all coquetry!" + +"She deserves no blame," said Frank, understanding the manner, +though the words were under Rosamond's breath. "Her very troubles +in her own family have been the cause of her erecting a standard of +what alone she could trust. Once in better days she fancied I came +up to it, and when I know how far I have fallen short of it--" + +"Nonsense. She had no business to make the condition without +warning you." + +"She knows more of me than only that," muttered poor Frank. "I was +an ass in town last summer. It was the hope of seeing her that drew +me; but if I had kept out of that set, all this would never have +been." + +"It was all for her sake." (A substratum of 'Ungrateful, ungenerous +girl.') + +"For her sake, I thought--not her true sake." Then there was a +silence, broken by his exclaiming, "Rose, I must get away from +here!" + +"You can't," she called back. "Here's your mother coming. She +would be perfectly miserable to find you gone." + +"It is impossible I should stay here." + +"Don't be so chicken-hearted, Frank. If she has a heart worth +speaking of, she'll come round, if you only press hard enough. If +not, you are well quit of her." + +He cried out at this, and Rosamond saw that what she called +faintness of heart was really reverence and sense of his own +failings; but none the less did she scorn such misplaced adoration, +as it seemed to her, and scold him in her own fashion, for not +rushing on to conquer irresistibly; or else being cool and easy as +to his rejection. He would accept neither alternative, was +depressed beyond the power of comfort, bodily weariness adding to +his other ills, and went off at last to bed, without retracting his +intention of going away. + +"Well, Terry, it is a new phase, and a most perplexing one!" said +Rosamond, when her brother came back with arch curiosity in his +brown eyes. "The girl has gone and turned him over, and there he +lies on his back prostrate, just like Ponto, when he knows he +deserves it!" + +"Turned him over--you don't mean that she is off? I thought she was +a perfect angel of loveliness and goodness." + +"Goodness! It is enough to make one hate goodness, unless this is +all mere pretence on her part. But what I am afraid of is his +setting off, no one knows where, before any one is up, and leaving +us to confront his mother, while he falls ill in some dog-hole of a +place. He is not fit to go about by himself, and I trust to you to +watch him, Terry." + +"Shall I lie on the mat outside his door?" said Terry, half meaning +it, and somewhat elated by the romantic situation. + +"No, we are not come to quite such extremities. You need not even +turn his key by mistake; only keep your ears open. He is next to +you, is he not?--and go in on pretext of inquiry--if you hear him up +to mischief." + +Nothing was heard but the ordinary summons of Boots; and it turned +out in the morning that the chill had exasperated his throat, and +reduced him to a condition which took away all inclination to move, +besides deafening him completely. + +Rosamond had to rush about all day, providing plenishing for the +lodging. Once she saw Sir Harry and his daughter in the distance, +and dashed into a shop to avoid them, muttering, "I don't believe +she cared for him one bit. I dare say she has taken up with Lorimer +Strangeways after all! Rather worse than her sister, I declare, for +she never pretended to be too _good_ for Raymond," and then as a +curate in a cassock passed--"Ah! some of them have been working on +her, and persuading her that he is not good enough for her. +Impertinent prig! He looks just capable of it!" + +Frank was no better as to cold and deafness, though somewhat less +uncomfortable the next day in the lodging, and Rosamond went up +without him to the station to meet the rest of the party, and +arrange for Mrs. Poynsett's conveyance. They had accomplished the +journey much better than had been, hoped, but it was late and dark +enough to make it expedient that Mrs. Poynsett should be carried to +bed at once, after her most unwonted fatigue, and only have one +glimpse and embrace of Frank, so as to stave off the knowledge of +his troubles till after her night's rest. He seconded this desire, +and indeed Miles and Anne only saw that he had a bad cold; but +Rosamond no sooner had her husband to herself, than she raved over +his wrongs to her heart's content, and implored Julius to redress +them, though how, she did not well know, since she by turns declared +that Frank was well quit of Lenore, and that he would never get over +the loss. + +Julius demurred a good deal to her wish of sending him on a mission +to Eleonora. All Charnocks naturally swung back to distrust of the +Vivians, and he did not like to plead with a girl who seemed only to +be making an excuse to reject his brother; while, on the other hand, +he knew that Raymond had not been satisfied with Frank's London +habits, nor had he himself been at ease as to his religious +practices, which certainly had been the minimum required to suit his +mother's notions. He had been a communicant on Christmas Day, but +he was so entirely out of reach that there was no knowing what +difference his illness might have made in him; Eleonora might know +more than his own family did, and have good and conscientious +reasons for breaking with him; and, aware that his own authority had +weight with her, Julius felt it almost too much responsibility to +interfere till the next day, when his mother, with tears in her +eyes, entreated him to go to Miss Vivian, to find out what was this +dreadful misunderstanding, which perhaps might only be from his want +of hearing, and implore her, in the name of an old woman, not to +break her boy's heart and darken his life, as it had been with his +brother. + +Mrs. Poynsett was tremulous and agitated, and grief had evidently +told on her high spirit, so that Julius could make no objection, but +promised to do his best. + +By the time it was possible to Julius to call, Sir Harry and Miss +Vivian were out riding, and he had no further chance till at the +gaslit Friday evening lecture, to which he had hurried after dinner. +A lady became faint in the heated atmosphere, two rows of chairs +before him, and as she turned to make her way out, he saw that it +was Eleonora, and was appalled by seeing not only the whiteness of +the present faintness, but that thinness and general alteration +which had changed the beautiful face so much that he asked himself +for a moment whether she could have escaped the fever. In that +moment he had moved forward to her support; and she, seeming to have +no one belonging to her, clung to the friendly arm, and was +presently in the porch, where the cool night air revived her at +once, and she begged him to return, saying nothing ailed her but +gas. + +"No, I shall see you home, Lena." + +"Indeed, there is no need," said the trembling voice, in which he +detected a sob very near at hand. + +"I shall use my own judgment as to that," said Julius, kindly. + +She made no more resistance, but rose from the seat in the porch, +and accepted his arm. He soon felt that her steps were growing +firmer, and he ventured to say, "I had been looking for you to-day." + +"Yes, I saw your card." + +"I had a message to you from my mother." Lenore trembled again, but +did not dare to relax her hold on him. "I think you can guess what +it is. She thinks poor Frank must have mistaken what you said." + +"No--I wrote it," said Lena, very low. + +"And you really meant that the resolution made last year is to stand +between you and Frank? I am not blaming you, I do not know whether +you may not be acting rightly and wisely, and whether you may not +have more reason than I know of to shrink from intrusting yourself +to Frank; but my mother cannot understand it, and when she sees him +heartbroken, and too unwell to act for himself--" + +"Oh! is he ill?" + +"He has a very bad cold, and could not get up till the afternoon, +and he is deafer than ever." + +Lena moaned. + +He proceeded: "So as he cannot act for himself, my mother begged me +to come to an understanding." + +"I told him to judge," said Lena faintly, but turning Julius so as +to walk back along the parade instead of to her abode. + +"Was not that making him his own executioner?" said Julius. + +"A promise is binding," she added. + +"Yet, is it quite fair?" said Julius, sure now which way her heart +went, and thinking she was really longing to be absolved from a +superstitious feeling; "is it fair to expect another person to be +bound by a vow of which you have not told him?" + +"I never thought he could," sighed she. + +"And you know he was entrapped!" said Julius, roused to defend his +brother. + +"And by whom?" she said in accents of deep pain. + +"I should have thought it just--both by your poor sister and by him-- +to undo the wrong then wrought," said Julius, "unless, indeed, you +have some further cause for distrusting him?" + +"No! no!" cried she. "Oh, Julius! I do it for his own good. Your +mother knows not what she wishes, in trying to entangle him again +with me." + +"Lenore, will you tell me if anything in him besides that unhappy +slip makes you distrust him?" + +"I must tell the whole truth," gasped the poor girl, as they walked +along in the sound of the sea, the dark path here and there +brightened by the gas-lights, "or you will think it is his fault! +Julius, I know more about my poor father than ever I did before. I +was a child when I lived here before, and then Camilla took all the +management. When we came to London, two months ago, I soon saw the +kind of people he got round him for his comforters. I knew how he +spent his evenings. It is second nature to him--he can't get put of +it, I believe! I persuaded him to come down here, thinking it a +haven of peace and safety. Alas! I little knew what old habits +there were to resume, nor what was the real reason Camilla brought +us away after paying our debts. I was a happy child _then_, when I +only knew that papa was gone to his club. Now I know that it is a +billiard-room--and that it is doing all the more harm because he is +there--and I see him with people whom he does not like me to speak +to. I don't know whether I could get him away, and it would be as +bad anywhere else. I don't think he can help it. And he is often +unwell; he can't do without me when he has the gout, and I ought not +to leave him to himself. And then, if--if we did marry and he lived +with us in London, think what it would be for Frank to have such a +set brought about him. I don't see how he could keep them off. Or +even an engagement bringing him down here--or anywhere, among papa's +friends would be very bad for him. I saw it in London, even with +Camilla to keep things in check." She was almost choked with +suppressed agony. + +"I see," said Julius, gravely and pitifully, "it would take a man of +more age and weight than poor Frank to deal with the habits of a +lifetime. The risk is great." + +"And when I saw it," added Eleonora, "I felt I must never, never +bring him into it. And how could I tell him? Your mother does not +know, or she could not wish it!" + +"It is plain that in the present state of things you ought not to +marry, and so far you are judging nobly," said Julius; "but next +comes the question--how far it is well to make that day at the races +the pretext?" + +"Don't call it a pretext," said Lenore, quickly. "I meant what I +said a year ago, with all my soul. Perhaps it was hasty, when poor +Camilla drove me into saying I did not mean only an habitual +gambler, but one who had ever betted. And now, well as I know how +cruelly she used that presumptuous vow of mine, and how she repented +of it at last, still I feel that to fly in its face might be so +wrong, that I should have no right to expect not to drag Frank +down." + +"Perhaps I am too much interested to judge fairly," said Julius. "I +should like you to consult some one--say Dr. Easterby--but it seems +to me that it is just such a vow as you may well be absolved from." + +"But is it not Frank's protection?" + +"Put yourself in that poor fellow's place, Lena, and see what it is +to him to be cast off for such a reason. He did the wrong, I know. +He knew he ought not, apart from your resolution, and he did thus +prove his weakness and unfitness--" + +"Oh no, no--it was not his fault." + +Julius laughed a little, and added, "I am not saying he deserves +you--hush!--or that it would be well to take him now, only that I +think to find himself utterly rejected for so insufficient a reason, +and when he was really deceived, would not only half kill him now, +but do his whole nature cruel harm." + +"What is to be done then?" sighed Eleonora. + +"I should say, and I think my mother would put him on some probation +if you like, even before you call it an engagement; but give him +hope. Let him know that your attachment is as true and unselfish as +ever, and do not let him brood in misery, enhanced by his deafness." + +"I can't marry while poor papa is like what he is," said she, as if +trying to keep hold of her purpose. + +"But you can be Frank's light and hope--the prize for which he can +work." + +"If--your mother will have it so--then," said Eleonora, and the sigh +that followed was one to relieve, not exhaust. + +"May I tell her then?" + +"You must, I suppose," said the poor girl; "but she can never wish +it to go on!" + +Julius left her at her own door and went home. + +As Mrs. Poynsett said, she could expect nothing better of him. "It +is quite clear," she said, "that poor Lena is right, that Frank must +not set up housekeeping with him. Even if he were certain to be +proof against temptation, it would be as bad a connection as could +be. I never thought of his being with them; but I suppose there is +nothing else to be done with him." + +"Frank ought not to be exposed to the trial. The old man has a +certain influence over him." + +"Though I should have thought such a hoary old wreck was nothing but +a warning. It has been a most unhappy affair from first to last; +but Lena is a good, unselfish girl, and nothing else will give Frank +a chance of happiness. Waiting will do them no harm, they are young +enough, and have no great sum to marry upon, so if you can bring her +to me to-morrow, Julius, I will ask her to grant my poor boy leave +to wait till she can see her way to marrying." + +Julius ventured to write down, 'Hope on!' + +To this Frank replied with rather a fiery look, "Mind, I will not +have her persuaded or worked on. It must be all her own doing. +Yes," answering a look of his brother, "I see what you are about. +You want to tell her it is a superstition about her vow and not +using me fairly. So it may be in some points of view; but the fact +remains. She thought she might trust to my good sense and +principle, and it proved that she was wrong. After that it is not +right to force myself on her. I don't dare to do it, Julius. I +have not been shut up with myself all these weeks for nothing. I +know now how unworthy I ever was to think of her as mine. If I can +ever prove my repentance she might in time forgive me; but for her +to be driven to take me out of either supposed justice or mercy, I +will not stand! A wretched deaf being like me! It is not fitting, +and I _will_ not have it done!" + +Julius wrote--"She is suffering greatly. She nearly fainted at +church, and I had to take her out." + +Frank's face worked, and he put his hand over it as he said, "You +are all torturing her; I shall write a letter and settle it myself." + +Frank did write the letter that very night, and when Julius next saw +Eleonora her eyes were swollen with weeping, and she said-- + +"Take me to him! I must comfort him!" + +"You have heard from him?" + +"Yes. Such a beautiful letter. But he must not think it _that_." + +She did show the letter, reserved though she was. She was right +about it; Julius was struck with the humble sweetness, which made +him think more highly of poor Frank than ever he had done before. +He had decided against himself, feeling how much his fall at the +race-ground had been the effect of the manner in which he had +allowed himself to be led during the previous season in London, and +owning how far his whole aim in life fell short of what it ought to +be, asking nothing for himself, not even hope nor patience, though +he could not refrain from expressing his own undying love, and his +one desire that if she had not attached herself to one more worthy, +he might in time be thought to have proved his repentance. In the +meantime she would and could be only his beacon star. + +Julius could not but take her home, and leave her with Frank, though +his mother was a little annoyed not to have first seen her; but when +Frank himself brought her to Mrs. Poynsett's arms, it turned out +that the two ladies were quite of one mind as to the inexpediency of +Sir Harry living with Frank. They said it very covertly, but each +understood the other, and Eleonora went home wonderfully happier, +and looking as if her fresh beauty would soon return. + +There was quite enough to dazzle Miles, whose first opinion was that +they were hard on Sir Harry, and that two ladies and a clergyman +might be making a great deal too much of an old man's form of +loitering, especially in a female paradise of ritualism, as he was +pleased to call Rockpier, where all the male population seemed to be +invalids. + +However, it was not long before he came round to their view. He +found that Sir Harry, in spite of his gentlemanly speech and +bearing, was a battered old roue, who was never happy but when +gambling, and whose air and title were baits to victims of a lower +class than himself; young clerks and medical students who were +flattered by his condescension. He did not actually fleece them +himself, he had too little worldly wisdom for that; but he was the +decoy of a coterie of Nyms, Pistols, and Bardolphs, who gathered up +the spoil of these and any unwary youth who came to Rockpier in the +wake of an invalid, or to 'see life' at a fashionable watering- +place. Miles thought the old man was probably reduced to a worse +style of company by the very fact of the religious atmosphere of the +place, where he himself found so little to do that he longed for the +opening of the Session; but he was strongly impressed with the +impracticability of a menage for Frank, with the baronet as father- +in-law. + +Not so, Sir Harry. He was rather fond of Frank, and had been glad +to be no longer bound to oppose the match, and he had benignantly +made up his mind to the great sacrifice of living in his house in +London, surrounding himself with all his friends, and making the +young couple supply him with pocket-money whenever he had a run of +ill-luck. They would grant it more easily than Camilla, and would +never presume to keep him under regulation as she had done. They +would be too grateful to him. + +So, after a day or two, he demanded of Eleonora whether her young +man had given her up, or what he meant by his coolness in not +calling? Lena answered the last count by explaining how unwell he +had been, and how his hearing might be lost by a renewal of his +cold. She was however further pressed, and obliged to say how +matters stood, namely, that they were engaged, but meant to wait. + +Whereupon, Sir Harry, quite sincerely, poor old man, grew +compassionate and grandly benignant. The young people were prudent, +but he would come to their aid. His pittance added to theirs--even +now would set all things straight. He would never stand in the way +of their happiness! + +Mrs. Poynsett had bidden Lena cast the whole on her shoulders. The +girl was too truthful and generous to do this, fond as she still was +of her father. + +"No, dear papa," she said, "it is very kind in you," for she knew +that so he meant it, "but I am afraid it will not quite do. You see +Frank must be very careful in his situation--and I don't think so +quiet a way of life would suit you." + +"Nonsense, child; I'm an old man, and I want no racketing. Just +house-room for myself and Victor. That fellow is worth two women in +a house. You'll keep a good cook. I'll never ask for more than a +few old friends to dinner, when I don't feel disposed to have them +at the club." + +Old friends! Yes, Lenore knew them, and her flesh crept to think of +Frank's chief hearing of them constantly at his house. + +"I don't think we should afford it, dear papa," she said. "We have +agreed that I had better stay with you for the present, and let +Frank make his way." + +Then a thought occurred to Sir Harry. "Is this the Poynsetts' +doing?" + +"No," said Eleonora, stoutly. "It is mine. I know that--oh! papa, +forgive me!--the things and people you like would not be good for +Frank, and I will not leave you nor bring him into them. Never!" + +Sir Harry swore--almost for the first time before her--that this was +that old hag Mrs. Poynsett's doing, and that she would make his +child abandon him in his old age. He would not have his daughter +dragged into a long engagement. Wait--he knew what waiting meant-- +wait for his death; but they should have her now or not at all; and +he flung away from her and her entreaties to announce his +determination to the suitor's family. + +He did not find this very easy to accomplish. Frank's ears were +quite impervious to all his storming, and if he was to reduce his +words to paper, they came less easily. Miles, to whom he tried to +speak as a man of the world, would only repeat that his mother would +never consent to the marriage, unless the young couple were to live +alone; nay, he said, with a grain of justice, he thought that had +been Sir Harry's own view in a former case. Would he like to see +Mrs. Poynsett? she is quite ready. + +Again Sir Harry quailed at the notion of encountering Mrs. Poynsett; +but Miles, who had a great idea that his mother could deal with +everybody, and was the better for doing so, would not let him off, +and ushered him in, then stood behind her chair, and thoroughly +enjoyed the grand and yet courteous way in which she reduced to +nothing Sir Harry's grand beneficence in eking out the young folks' +income with his own. She knew very well that even when the estate +was sold, at the highest estimate, Eleonora would have the barest +maintenance, and that he could hardly expect what the creditors now +allowed him, and she made him understand that she knew this, and +that she had a right to make conditions, since Frank, like her other +sons, could not enter into possession of his share of his father's +fortune unless he married with her consent. + +And when he spoke of breaking off the engagement, she was callous, +and said that he must do as he pleased, though after young people +were grown up, she thought the matter ought to rest with themselves. +She did not wish her son to marry till his character was more +confirmed. + +He went home very angry, and yet crest-fallen, sought out Eleonora, +and informed her of his command, that her engagement should be +broken off. + +"I do not know how that can be done, papa," said Eleonora. "We have +never exactly made an engagement; we do not want to marry at once, +and we could not help loving each other if we tried." + +"Humph! And if I laid my commands on you never to marry into that +family?" + +"I do not think you will do that, papa, after your promise to +Camilla." + +She had conquered. No further objection was made to her being as +much as she pleased with the Charnocks as long as they remained at +Rockpier, nor to her correspondence with Frank when he went away, +not to solitary lodgings as before, but to the London house, which +Miles and Anne only consented to keep on upon condition of their +mother sharing it with them. + + + + + +CHAPTER XXXVII +The Third Autumn + + +A good man ther was of religion, +That was a poure Persone of a toune; +But rich he was of holy thought and work, +He also was a learned man a clerk.--CHAUCER + +Autumn came round again, and brought with it a very different +September from the last. + +Willansborough was in a state of commotion. That new Vicar had not +only filled the place with curates, multiplied services in the iron +church, and carried on the building of St. Nicholas in a style of +beauty that was quite affronting to those who were never asked to +contribute to it, but he gave people no peace in their easy +conventional sins, pricked them in their hearts with personal +individual stings, and, worse than all, protested against the races, +as conducted at Wil'sbro'. + +And their Member was just as bad! Captain Charnock Poynsett, +instead of subscribing, as part of his duty to his constituents, had +replied by sending his brother Raymond's half-finished letter to the +club, with an equally strong and resolute one of his own, and had +published both in all the local papers. + +Great was the fury and indignation of Wil'sbro', Backsworth, and all +the squires around. Of course it was a delirious fancy of poor +Raymond Poynsett, and Miles had been worked upon by his puritanical +wife and ritualistic brother to publish it. Newspapers teemed with +abuse of superstition and pharisaism, and praise of this wholesome, +moral, and 'truly English' sport. Gentlemen, and ladies too, took +the remonstrance as a personal offence, and threatened to visit no +more at Compton; the electors bade him look to his seat, and held +meetings to invite 'Mr. Simmonds Proudfoot,' as he now called +himself, to represent them; and the last week, before the races, the +roughs mobbed him in Water Lane. He rode quietly through them, with +his sailor face set as if against a storm, but when he was out of +the place, he stopped his horse at Herbert Bowater's lodgings, that +his black eye might be washed, and the streams of rotten egg removed +from his coat before he presented himself at home. Not that he had +much fear of startling his wife and mother. It was more from the +Englishman's hatred of showing himself a hero, for Anne was +perfectly happy in the persecution he had brought on himself, for +she never had been so sure before that he was not of the world, +worldly. + +The races were exceptionally brilliant, and fully attended, but the +triumph of the roughs had made them more outrageously disgraceful in +their conduct than ever; and when Miles went to the quarter- +sessions, rather doubting whether he should not find himself landed +in Coventry, not only did the calendar of offences speak for itself, +but sundry country gentlemen shook him by the hand, lamenting that +railways and rowdyism had entirely altered races from what they used +to be, that he was in the right, and what they had seen so recently +proved that the only thing to be done was to withdraw from what +respectable people could no longer keep within bounds. Such +withdrawal will not prevent them, but it will hinder the +demoralization from being so extensive as formerly, since no one of +much character to lose will attend them. + +Mr. Bowater rejoiced in Miles's triumph. None of that family had +been at these same races. They had all been much too anxious about +Herbert not to view Ember Week in a very different light from that +in which they had thought of it before. + +Lent had brought the junior curate back from Strawyers, not much +more than a convalescent, but with his sister to look after him, and +both Rector and senior anxious to spare him; he had gone on well +till the family returned and resumed Jenny, when he was left to his +own devices, namely, 'all work and no play.' He was as fixed as +ever in his resolution of making this a penance year, and believed +himself so entirety recovered as to be able to do without +relaxations. Cricket, riding, dinners, and garden-parties alike he +had given up, and divided his time entirely between church and +parish work and study. Hard reading had never been congenial, and +took a great deal out of him, and in fact, all his theological study +had hitherto been little more than task-work, into which he had +never fully entered, whereas these subjects had now assumed such a +force, depth, and importance, that he did in truth feel constrained +to go to the very foundation, and work through everything again, +moved and affected by them in every fibre of his soul, which +vibrated now at what it had merely acquiesced in before. It was a +phase that had come suddenly on him, when his mind was in full +vigour of development, and his frame and nerves below par, and the +effect could not but be severe. He was wrapped up in these great +realities, and seemed to care for no talk, except discussing them +with Julius or the senior curate, and often treated things of common +life like the dream that they really are. + +Julius laid as little parish work on him as possible, only, indeed, +what seemed actually beneficial by taking him out; but it may be +feared, that in his present fervid state he was not nearly so +winning to his young clients as when he was less 'terribly in +earnest,' although the old women were perhaps more devoted to him, +from the tender conviction 'that the poor dear young gentleman would +not be here long.' + +For indeed it was true that he had never advanced in strength or +looks since his return, but rather lost ground, and thus every +change of weather, or extra exertion, told on him, till in August he +was caught in a thunder-storm, and the cold that ensued ran on into +a feverish attack, which barely left him in time for the Ordination, +and then with a depressed system, and nerves morbidly sensitive. + +So sensible (or more than sensible) was he of his deficiencies, that +he would willingly have held back, and he was hardly well enough to +do himself justice; but there was no doubt that he would pass, and +it was plain that three more months of the strain of preparation +might leave permanent effects on his health. + +As it was, the examining chaplain did not recognize the lean, pale, +anxious man, for the round-faced, rosy, overgrown boy of a year ago. +His scholarship and critical knowledge were fairly above the mark, +in spite of a racking headache; and his written sermon, together +with all that was elicited from him, revealed, all unconsciously to +himself, what treasures he had brought back from the deep waters +which had so nearly closed over him. + +So superior had he shown himself, that he was appointed to read the +Gospel, a choice that almost shocked him, knowing that what had made +him excel had been an experience that the younger men had happily +missed. But the mark of approval was compensation to his parents +and sisters for the disappointment of the last year, and the only +drawback was fear of the effect of the long ceremonial, so deeply +felt. + +He met them afterwards, very white-faced, with head aching, and +weary almost beyond speech, but with a wonderfully calm, restful +look on his face, such as reminded Jenny of those first hours of his +recovery. + +They took him home and put him to bed, and there he lay, hardly +speaking, and generally sleeping. There he still was on the Monday, +when Julius came to inquire after him, and was taken up-stairs at +once by Jenny, with the greeting, "So the son and heir is come, +Julius?" + +"Yes, and I never saw my mother more exulting. When Rosamond ran +down to tell her, she put her arms round her neck and cried. She +who never had a tear through all last year. I met your father and +mother half-way, and they told me I might come on." + +"I think nothing short of such news would have made mamma leave this +boy," said Jenny; "but she must have her jubilee with Mrs. +Poynsett." + +"And I'm quite well," said Herbert, who had been grasping Julius's +hand, with a wonderful look in his eyes; "yes, really--the doctor +said so." + +"Yes, he did," said Jenny, "only he said we were to let him alone, +and that he was not to get up till he felt quite rested." + +"And I shall get up to dinner," said Herbert, so sleepily, that +Julius doubted it. "I hope to come back before Sunday." + +"What does your doctor say to that?" + +"He says," replied Jenny, "that this gentleman must be rational; +that he has nothing the matter with him now, but that he is low, and +ripe for anything. Don't laugh, you naughty boy, he said you were +ripe for anything, and that he must--yes, he _must_--be turned out +to grass somehow or other for the winter, and do nothing at all." + +"I begin to see what you are driving at, Mrs. Joan, you look so +triumphant." + +"_Yes_," said Jenny, blushing a little, and looking quite young +again; "I believe poor mamma would be greatly reconciled to it, if +Herbert were to see me out to Natal." + +"Is that to be the way?" + +"It would be very absurd to make Archie come home again for me," +said Jenny. "And everything else is most happily smoothed for me, +you know; Edith has come quite to take my place at home; mamma +learnt to depend on her much more than on me while I was with +Herbert." + +"And it has made her much more of a woman," added Herbert. + +"Then you know that full statement poor Mr. Moy put forth when he +left the place, on his wife's death, quite removed all lingering +hesitation on papa's part," added Jenny. + +"It ought, I am sure!" said Julius. + +"So, now, if Herbert will go out with me, it seems to me to be all +right," said Jenny, colouring deeply, as she made this lame and +impotent conclusion. + +"My father wishes it," said Herbert. "I believe he meant to see you +to-day to ask leave of absence for me. That is what he wishes; but +I have made up my mind that I ought to resign the curacy--where I +have never been any use to you--though, if I had been well, I meant +to have worked a year with you as a priest." + +"I don't like to lose you, but I think you are right. Your +beginning with me was a mistake. There is not enough work for three +of us; but you know Easterby would be delighted to have you at St. +Nicholas. He says his most promising people talk of what you said +to them when they were ill, and he asked me if you could possibly +come to him." + +"I think it would be better to begin in a new place, further from +home," said Herbert, quietly. + +And both knew what he meant, and how hard it would be to be the +clergyman he had learnt to wish to be, if his mother were at hand to +be distressed by all he did or did not do. + +"But, any way," added Herbert, "I hope to have some time longer at +Compton before I go. Next Sunday, if I only _can_." + +His mind was evidently full of the Feast of the Sunday, and Julius +answered, "Whichever Sunday you are strong enough, of course, dear +fellow. You had better come with him, Jenny, and sleep at the +Rectory." + +"Oh! thank you. I should like nothing so much; and I think they +will spare me that one day." + +"You will come in for a grand gathering, that is, if poor Cecil +accepts. Miles thinks she ought to be godmother." + +"Oh!" + +"And no one has said a word of any cloud. It is better he should +know nothing." + +"And oh! Julius, is it true that her father has bought Sirenwood for +her?" + +"Quite true. You know it was proposed at first, but the trustees +doubted of the title; but when all that was cleared up, it turned +out to be a better investment than Swanslea, and so they settled it, +without much reference to her." + +"She will let it, of course?" + +"I suppose so." + +"You don't think she will come to the christening?" + +"I cannot tell; Rose has had one or two very sad letters from her. +She wanted us very much to come to Dunstone, and was much +disappointed that we were prevented. I fancy her heart has turned +to us, and that it is very sore, poor thing." + +Julius was right. Cecil did return an answer, whose warmth quite +amazed all but Miles and Anne, who thought nothing too much for +their son; and she gladly came to attend the christening of the +young Raymond. Gladly--yes, she was glad to leave Dunstone. She +had gone home weary and sick of her lodging and convalescence, and +hoping to find relief in the home that had once been all-sufficient +for her, but Dunstone was not changed, and she was. She had not +been able to help outgrowing its narrow opinions and formal +precisions; and when she came home, crushed with her scarcely +realized grief, nothing there had power to comfort her. + +There was soothing at first in her step-mother's kindness, and she +really loved her father; but their petting admiration soon grew +oppressive, after the more bracing air of Compton; and their +idolatry of her little brother fretted and tried her all the more, +because they thought he must be a comfort to her, and any slight +from her might be misconstrued. Mr. Venn's obsequiousness, instead +of rightful homage, seemed deprivation of support, and she saw no +one, spoke to no one, without the sense of Raymond's vast +superiority and her own insensibility to it, loving him a thousand +times more than she had loved him in life, and mourning him with an +anguish beyond what the most perfect union would have left. She had +nothing to do. Self-improvement was a mere oppression, and she +longed after nothing so much as the sight of Rosamond, Anne, Julius, +or even Frank, and her amiable wishes prevailed to have them invited +to Dunstone; but at the times specified there were hindrances. Anne +had engagements at home, and Rosamond appeared to the rest of the +family to be a perpetual refuge for stray De Lanceys, while Frank +had to make up for his long enforced absence by a long unbroken +spell of work. + +Cecil therefore had seen none of the family till she arrived at +Compton. She was perfectly well, she said, and had become a great +walker, and so, indeed, she showed herself, for she went out +directly after breakfast every morning, and never appeared again +till luncheon time; and would take long rides in the afternoon. "It +was her only chance of sleep," she said, when remonstrated with. +She did not look ill, but there was a restless, worn air that was +very distressing on her young features, and was the more piteous to +her relations, that she was just as constrained as ever in her +intercourse with them. She was eagerly attentive to Mrs. Poynsett, +and evidently so anxious to wait on her that Anne left to her many +little services, but if they were alone together, they were tongue- +tied, and never went deeper than surface subjects. Mrs. Poynsett +never discussed her, never criticized her, never attempted to fathom +her, being probably convinced that there was nothing but hard +coldness to be met with by probing. Yet there was something +striking in Cecil's having made people call her Mrs. Raymond +Poynsett, surrendering the Charnock, which she had once brandished +in all their faces, and going by the name by which her husband had +been best known. + +To Anne she was passively friendly, and neither gave nor sought +confidences, and Anne was so much occupied with her baby, and all +the little household services that had grown on her, as well as with +her busy husband, that there was little leisure for them; and though +the meeting with Rosamond was at first the most effusive and +affectionate of all, afterwards she seemed to avoid tetes-a-tetes +with her, and was shyer with her than with Anne. + +It was Miles that she got on with best. He had never so fully +realized the unhappiness of his brother's married life as those who +had watched it; and he simply viewed her as Raymond's loved and +loving widow and sincere mourner, and treated her with all brotherly +tenderness and reverence for her grief; while she responded with a +cordiality and gratitude which made her, when talking to him, a +pleasanter person than she had ever been seen at Compton before. + +But it was not to Miles, but to Rosamond, that she brought an +earnest question, walking in one autumn morning to the Rectory, amid +the falling leaves of the Virginian-creeper, and amazing Rosamond, +who was writing against time for the Indian mail, by asking-- + +"Rosamond, will you find out if Mrs. Poynsett would mind my coming +to live at Sirenwood?" + +"You, Cecil!" + +"Yes, I'm old enough. There's no place for me at home, and though I +must be miserable anywhere, it will be better where I have something +to do, of some real use to somebody. I've been walking all round +every day, and seeing what a state it is in--in the hands of +creditors all these years." + +"But you would be quite alone!" + +"I am quite alone as it is." + +"And would your father consent?" + +"I think he would. I am a burthen to them now. They cannot feel my +grief, nor comfort it, and they don't like the sight of it, though I +am sure I trouble them with it as little as possible." + +"Dear Cecil!" and the ready tears welled up in Rosamond's gray eyes. + +"I don't want to talk of it," said Cecil. "If I felt worthy to +grieve it would be less dreadful; but it all seems like hypocrisy. +Rosamond, if you were to lose Julius to-morrow, you would not be as +unhappy as I am." + +"Don't, don't!" cried Rosamond, making a gesture of horror. "But +does not coming here make it worse?" + +"No, real stabs are better than dull aching; and then you--you, +Rosamond, did know how it really was, and that I would--I would--" + +Cecil wept now as Rosamond had longed to see her weep when she had +left Compton, and Rosamond spoke from her tender heart of comfort; +but the outburst did not last long, and Cecil said, recovering +herself-- + +"After all, my most peaceful times of late have been in walking +about in those woods at Sirenwood; I should like to live there. You +know _he_ always wished it to be the purchase, because it joins +Compton, and I should like to get it all into perfect order and +beauty, and leave it all to little Raymond." + +"I should have thought the place would have been full of ghosts." + +"I tried. I made the woman let me in, and I sat where poor Camilla +used to talk to me, and I thought I was the better for facing it +out. The question is whether Mrs. Poynsett will dislike it. She +has a right to be consulted." + +Perhaps Cecil could not be gracious. Certainly, Raymond would have +been thankful for even this admission. + +"You wish me to find out?" + +"If you would be so good. I would give it up at once if she has any +feeling against it, and go somewhere else--and of course she has! +She never can forget what I did!" + +Rosamond caressed Cecil with that sweetness which saw everything in +the most consoling manner; but when the poor young widow was out of +sight, there was a revulsion of feeling. + +"No, Mrs Poynsett must always feel that that wretched marriage broke +her son's heart, and murdered him!--murdered him!" said Rosamond to +herself, clenching that soft fist of hers. "It ought not to be +broached to her!" + +But Julius--when she stated it to him rather less broadly, but still +saying that she did not know whether she could bear the sight of +Cecil, except when she was before her eyes, and how could his mother +endure her at all--did not see it in the same light. He thought +Sirenwood gave duties to Cecil, and that she ought not to be +hindered from fulfilling them. And he said his mother was a large- +minded woman, and not likely to have that personal bitterness +towards Cecil that both the ladies seemed to expect, as her rival in +her son's affections, and the means of his unhappiness and death. + +He was right; Mrs. Poynsett was touched by finding that Cecil clung +to them rather than to her sublime family, and especially by the +design as to little Raymond, though she said that must never be +mentioned; nothing must bind so young a creature as Cecil, who +really did not know what love was at all. + +"She is afraid the sight of her is distressing to you," said +Rosamond. + +"Poor child, why should she?" said Mrs. Poynsett. "She was the +victim of an unsuccessful experiment of my dear boy's, and the +unsuspecting instrument of poor Camilla's vengeance. That is all I +see in her." + +"Mrs. Poynsett, how can you!" cried Rosamond, impetuously. "With +all I know of her sorrow, I rage at her whenever I am out of sight +of her." + +"I can't do that," said Mrs. Poynsett, half smiling, "any more than +I could at a doll. The poor thing was in a false position, and +nobody was more sorry for her than Raymond himself; but you see he +had fancied that marriage must bring the one thing it would not in +that short time." + +"It would, if she had not been a little foolish donkey." + +"Or if Camilla Tyrrell had let her alone! It is of no use to rake +up these things, my dear Rosamond. Let her come to Sirenwood, and +do such good as she can there, if it can comfort her. It was for my +sake that the unconscious girl was brought here to have her life +spoilt, and I would not stand in the way of what seems to be any +relief." + +"But is it no pain?" persisted Rosamond. + +"No, my dear. I almost wish it was. I shall never get on with her; +but I am glad she should come and be near you all; and Miles likes +her." + +Mr. Charnock demurred at first, and wanted to saddle Cecil with her +old governess as a companion, but when he found that Mrs. Poynsett +and Miles made no objection, and remembered that she would be under +their wing, and would be an inestimable adviser and example to Anne, +he consented; and Cecil's arrangements were made with startling +rapidity, so that she was in possession before Christmas, which she +insisted on spending there. Dunstone had stereotyped hospitalities, +which she could not bear, and would not prevent, and now that her +first year of widowhood was over, the sorrow was not respected, +while it seemed to her more oppressive than ever. + +So there she was in vehement activity; restless rather than +religious in her beneficence still, though the lesson she had had +showed itself in her constantly seeking the advice of Miles, who +thought her the most sensible woman in the world, except his Nan. +Whether this constant occupation, furnishing, repairing, planning, +beautifying her model cottages, her school chapel, and all the rest, +were lessening the heartache, no one knew, but the sharp black eyes +looked as dry and hard, the lines round the mouth as weary as ever; +and Rosamond sometimes thought if Sirenwood were not full of ghosts +to her, she was much like a ghost herself who came + +"Hovering around her ancient home, + To find no refuge there." + +There was another who could not help seeing her somewhat in that +light, and this was Eleonora Vivian, who had come to Compton to be +with Frank, when he was at last able to enjoy a well-earned holiday, +and with ears restored to their natural powers, though he always +declared that his eight months of deafness had done him more good +than anything that had ever befallen him in his life. It had thrown +him in on his real self, and broken all the unfortunate associations +of his first year in London. His first few months, while he was +still in need of care, had been spent with Miles and Anne, and that +tender ministry to him which his sister-in-law had begun in his +illness had been with him when he was tired, dispirited, or beset by +the trials of a tardy convalescence. As his interpreter, too, and +caterer for the pleasures his infirmity allowed, Anne had been +educating herself to a degree that 'self' improvement never would +have induced. + +And when left alone in London, he was able to take care of himself +in all ways, and had followed the real leadings of his disposition, +which his misdirected courtship had interrupted for the time, +returning to the intellectual pursuits which were likely to be +beneficial, not only as pleasures, but in an economical point of +view; and he was half shy, half proud of the profits, such as they +were, of a few poems and essays which he certainly had not had it in +him to write before the ordeal he had undergone. + +Eleonora's elder sister, Mrs. Fanshaw, had come home from India with +her husband, newly made a Major-General. Frank had gone to Rockpier +early in January, to be introduced to them, and after spending a day +or two there, to escort Lena to Compton. Mrs. Poynsett needed but +one glance to assure her that the two were happier than their wooing +had ever made them before, save in that one brief moment at Cecil's +party. Eleonora looked more beautiful, and the look of wistful pain +had left her brow, but it had made permanent lines there, as well +had seemed likely, and though her laugh would never have the abandon +of Rosamond's, still it was not so very rare, and though she was +still like a beautiful night, it was a bright moonlight one. + +A few private interviews made the cause of the change apparent. The +sister, Mary Fanshaw, had something of Camilla's dexterity, but +having been early married to a good man, she had found its use +instead of its abuse; and though Lena's trust had come very slowly, +she had given it at last, and saw that her elders could deal with +her father as she could never do. Sir Harry respected the General +enough to let himself be restrained by him, and the husband and wife +were ready to take the charge--removing, however, from Rockpier, for +the religious atmosphere of which they were unprepared, and which +General Fanshaw thought very dull. Affairs were in course of being +wound up on the sale of Sirenwood, and the General had talked to +Frank, as one of the family, in a way that had proved to him his own +manhood more than anything that had happened to him. Out of the +wreck, nothing remained to the old man, and the portion which had +been secured by the mother's marriage settlements to younger +children, though hitherto out of reach, was felt by the daughters to +be due to the creditors, so that only two thousand pounds apiece had +been secured to each of them; and this the General consulted Frank +about appropriating for Sir Harry's use during his lifetime, himself +retaining the management, so as to secure the attendance of the +favourite valet, the keeping of a horse, and a fair amount of menus +plaisirs. + +It was also made plain to Frank that Lena's filial duties and +scruples need no longer stand in the way of the marriage. Mrs. +Fanshaw had two girls almost come out, and perhaps she did not wish +them to be overshadowed by the aunt, who, however retiring, could +not help being much more beautiful. So all that remained was that +Mrs. Poynsett should be willing to supplement Frank's official +income with his future portion. She was all the more rejoiced, as +this visit showed her for the first time what Lena really was when +brought into the sunshine without dread of what she might hear or +see, or of harm being done by her belongings; and her gratitude for +the welcome with which she was received was most touching. + +The rest of her family were in course of removing to their new home, +where Mrs. Fanshaw would be mistress of the house, and so Eleonora's +stay at Compton was prolonged till the general migration to London, +which was put off till Easter. Just before this, Herbert Bowater +came back from Natal, and walked from Strawyers with all his happy +dogs, as strong and hearty and as merry as ever; his boyish outlines +gone, but wholesome sunburn having taken the place of his rosiness, +and his bonny smile with its old joyousness. He had married Jenny +and Archie himself, and stayed a month on their ostrich farm, which +he declared was a lesson on woman's rights, since Mrs. Ostrich was +heedless and indifferent as to her eggs, but was regularly hunted +back to the duties by her husband, who always had two wives, and +regularly forced them to take turns in sitting; a system which +Herbert observed would be needful if the rights of women were to +work. He had brought offerings of eggs and feathers to Lady +Rosamond, and pockets full of curiosities for all his village +friends; also, he had been at the Cape, had seen Glen Fraser, +rejoiced the inhabitants with his accounts of Anne, and brought home +a delightful budget for her. + +But the special cause of his radiance was a letter he brought from +his father to Mr. Bindon. The family living, which had decided his +own profession, had fallen vacant, and his father, wishing perhaps +not to be thought cruel and unnatural by his wife, had made no +appointment until Herbert's return, well knowing that he would +decide against himself: and feeling that, as things stood, it would +be an awkward exercise of patronage to put him in at once. Herbert +had declared that nothing would have induced him to accept what he +persuaded his father to let him offer to James Bindon, whom he had +found to have an old mother in great need of the comfortable home, +which, without interest, or any talent save for hard work, he could +scarcely hope to secure to her. + +"And you, Herbert," said Julius, "can I ask you to come back to me, +now that we shall have a fair amount to do between us?" + +Herbert smiled and shook his head, as he took out an advertisement +for a curate in one of the blackest parishes of the Black Country. +"I've written to answer that," he said. + +Julius did not try to hinder him. What had been exaggerated had +parsed away, and he was now a brave man going forth in his strength +and youth to the service he had learnt to understand; able still +keenly to enjoy, but only using pleasure as an incidental episode +for the delight of others, and as subordinate to the true work of +his life. + +He asked for his fellow-worker, Mrs. Duncombe. There were tidings, +but disappointing ones. She had written a long letter to Julius, +full of her reasons for being received into the Roman Communion, +where she rapturously declared she had for the first time found +peace. Anne and Rosamond took the change most bitterly to heart, +but Julius, though believing he could have saved her from the +schism, by showing her the true beauty and efficiency of her own +Church, could not wonder at this effect of foreign influences on one +so recently and imperfectly taught, and whose ardent nature required +strong forms of whatever she took up. And the letters she continued +to write to Julius were rapturous in the cause of the Pope and as to +all that she had once most contemned. She had taken her children +with her, but her husband remained tolerant, indifferent, and so +probably he would do while his health lasted. + +Early in the summer Frank and Eleonora were married, and a pretty +little house in the outskirts of London found for them, suiting with +the grace of the one and the poetry of the other. It was a small, +quiet household, but could pleasantly receive those literary friends +of Frank's whom he delighted to present to his beautiful and +appreciative wife, whose sweetness and brightness grew every day +under the influence of affection and confidence. The other augury +of poor Lady Tyrrell, that their holidays would be spent at Compton +Hall, was fulfilled, but very pleasantly for both parties, for it +was as much home to Lena as to Frank. + +Miles's geniality made all at ease that came near him, and Anne, +though never a conversational person, was a quietly kind hostess, +much beloved by all who had experienced her gentleness, and she had +Frank and Lena to give distinction in their different ways to her +London parties, as at Compton, Rosamond never failed to give +everything a charm where she assisted in planning or receiving. + +Rosamond would never cease to love society. Even had she been a +grandmother she would have fired at the notion of a party, enjoy, +and render it enjoyable; and the mere announcement of a new face +would be as stimulating to her as it was the reverse to Anne. But +she had grown into such union with her husband, and had so forgotten +the Rathforlane defence, as to learn that it was pleasanter to do as +he liked than to try to make him like what she did, and a look of +disapproval from him would open her eyes to the flaws in any scheme, +however enchanting at first. + +She was too necessary an element in all hospitalities of Cecil or of +Anne not to get quite as much diversion as so thorough a wife and +mother could find time for, since Julia did not remain by any means +an only child, and besides her permanent charge of Terence, relays +of De Lanceys were constantly casting up at the Rectory for +mothering in some form or other. + +Cecil depended on her more than on any one else for sympathy, not +expressly in feeling, but in all her pursuits. In three years' time +Sirenwood was in perfect order, the once desolate garden blazed with +ribbons, triangles and pattipans of verbena, scarlet geranium and +calceolaria, with intervals of echiverias, pronounced by Tom to be +like cabbages trying to turn into copper kettles; her foliage plants +got all the prizes at horticultural shows, her poultry were +incomparable at their exhibitions, her cottages were models, her +school machinery perfect, and if a pattern in farming apparatus were +wanted, people went to Mrs. Raymond Poynsett's steward. She had +people of note to stay with her every winter, went to London for the +season, and was made much of, and all the time she looked as little, +and pinched, and weary, and heart-hungered as ever, and never seemed +to thaw or warm, clinging to no one but to Miles for counsel, and to +Rosamond for the fellow-feeling it was not always easy to give--when +it was apparently only about an orchid or a churn--and yet Rosamond +tried, for she knew it was starvation for sympathy. + +The Charnock world murmured a little when, after a succession of De +Lancey visitors for four months, the Rectory was invaded by +Rosamond's eldest brother, Lord Ballybrehon, always the most hair- +brained of the family, and now invalided home in consequence of a +concussion of the brain while pigsticking in India. He was but a +year older than Rosamond, and her favourite of all, whose scrapes +she had shared, befriended, defended, and scolded in turn, very +handsome, very lazily daring, droll and mischievous, a sort of +concentration of all the other De Lanceys. His sister loved him +passionately, he fascinated the Rector, and little Julia was the +adorer of Uncle Bally. + +But Rosamond was rather aghast to find Bally making such love as +only an Irishman could do to the prim little widow at Sirenwood, +dismayed and a little bit ashamed of her unspoken conviction that +Bally, after all his wild freaks and frolics, had come to have an +eye to the needs of the Rathforlane property; and what were her +feelings when, instead of finding the wild Irishman contemned, she +perceived that he was believed in and met fully half way? The +stiffness melted, the eyes softened and sparkled, the lips parted in +soft agitated smiles, the cheeks learnt to blush, and Cecil was +absolutely and thoroughly in love! + +Yes, she had found her heart and was won--won in spite of the +Dunstone dislike to the beggarly title--in spite of Miles's well- +considered cautions--in spite of all her original self. And if +Ballybrehon began from mere desire to try for the well-endowed +widow, he had the warm loving nature that was sure to kindle and +reciprocate the affection he evoked, enough to make him a kind +husband. + +And yet, could any one have wished Cecil Poynsett a more trying life +than one of her disposition must needs have with impetuous, +unpunctual, uncertain, scatter-brained, open-handed Ballybrehon, +always in a scramble, always inviting guests upon guests without +classification, and never remembering whom he had invited! + +Rosamond herself declared she should be either in a rage or worn to +fritters by a month of it. How Cecil liked it never appeared. Some +thought that they squabbled and worried each other in private, but +it is certain that, as Terry said, Bally had turned the block into +living flesh and blood, and Lady Ballybrehon was wondrously +livelier, brighter, and sweeter ever since she had been entirely +conquered by the tyrant love, and had ceased to be the slave of her +own way. + + + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE THREE BRIDES*** + + +******* This file should be named 12485.txt or 12485.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +https://www.gutenberg.org/1/2/4/8/12485 + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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